Jayavarman II-More tales (and Tails) to the Mystery !

Dr Uday Dokras
SDOK KOK THOM : A Reconstruction of Meaning and Spirit from the Heap of Stones

Sdok Kok Thom Sanctuary, Sa Kaeo province, Thailand

Sdok Kok Thom Sanctuary is one of the important evidences of Jayavarman II’s existence and is
located at Mu 3, Ban Nong Samet, Tambon Khok Sung, King Amphoe Khok Sung, Sa Kaeo
province, near the Thai-Cambodian border. It is one of the large Khmer stone monuments
outside Cambodia. This monument is made of sandstone and laterite. Étienne François
Aymonier (26 February 1844 – 21 January 1929) who was a French linguist and explorer
was the first archaeologist to systematically survey the ruins of the Khmer empire in
today's Cambodia, Thailand, Laos and southern Vietnam. His principal work was "Le
Cambodge", published in three volumes from 1900 to 1904. In 1901, reported about Sdok
Kok Thom sanctuary describing it as “one of the most prominent stone buildings ever built by
human.”

The main sanctuary was undamaged, the pediment depicting a deity lying above the face of
Rahu, and the lintel depicting Indra on 3-headed elephant above the face of Rahu were still in
their original positions on the eastern side. Moreover, a stone inscription was found in its original
position on the stone base in the northeast corner of the gallery. Later in 1920, Police Captain
Luang Channikhom found the rectangular Sdok Kok Thom inscription no. 2, located at the front
of the sanctuary on northern direction and of size 50 centimetres in width, 18 inches thick made
of stone inscribed in Sanskrit and Khmer languages.

1
Sdok Kok Thom before excavation and moving of fallen stones

In 1935, The Fine Arts Department declared Prasat Sdok Kok Thom as a National Monument.
The first Conservation survey was carried out by the 5th Regional Office in 1993. Land mines
clearing and moving of fallen stones were carried out during 1996 - 2000, along with the
restoration of Outer Eastern Gopura. In 2001, the conservation project implementation began,
including reassembling of all fallen stones, analysis of architectural characteristics,
archaeological excavation for determination of size and area of the pond, and planning for
restoration of the whole sanctuary. In the same year, excavation and restoration of the front
causeway was completed. The work as planned in the project began in 2003, with the restoration
of small buildings namely, the 2 Bannalai (libraries). In 2004, the Inner Eastern Gopura was
restored. The restoration of the main sanctuary between 2005 until 2008.

Inscriptions : Sdok Kok Thom is very famous amongst scholars because of its relevant to 2
inscriptions which are highly significant in terms of Khmer historical study.

1. The Sdok Kok Thom Inscription no.1, as recorded by the National Library, was brought
by staff of the Office of Archaeology, Fine Arts Department and given to experts in
ancient languages for reading and translation on 30th May, 1968. The inscription
mentions the construction of a religious building circa 10th century as a sanctuary to
enshrine Shiva Lingam. The date specified in the inscription was 937 AD., the reign of
King Jayavarman IV.

2. Sdok Kok Thom Inscription no.2 is the inscription to honour King Udhayadhityavarman
II on the occasion of the building (restoration) of the monument until completion in 1052
AD. The inscription also records history of religious civilization that clearly indicates that
the kings of Cambodia were supporters and protectors of the religion, led by Brahmins
who also acted as consultants and intermediaries between the Gods and the Kings. The
inscription also records history of a Brahmin family who played important roles in the
court of Cambodia that goes back to approximately 200 years, the time of the first
ancestor in the reign of King Jayavarman II who combined the Land Chenla and the
Water Chenla; and founded Angkor. Thus the inscription is an important reference in
dating of Khmer history and Khmer art history from the foundation of Angkor until the
reign of Udhayadhityavarman-II.

2
Not much is known about Jayavarman II inspite of the Archeological and geographical evidence.
Most of it sparse and second hand. Many consider Jayavarman II as the founder of the Khmer
Empire. He didn't leave behind any inscriptions, and compared to the massive building projects
of his successors, his temple of Ak Yum seems rather insignificant. But what he did do was lay
the foundations for what was to come. He declared independence from the Shailendra Dynasty,
and established to cult of the God King, or Devaraja, which would serve as a great source of
authority for him and later rulers, and help keep their Empire together.The site of Angkor was
founded as the capital of a relatively unified Cambodia around 900 A.D. It continued as the
capital of the Khmer nation until 1431, when it was abandoned as the ruler took the government
south to Phnom Penh. By the 8th c., however, there were thousands of people already living at
Angkor in at least one city, known to us by inscriptions as Indrapura. This city was located at the
west end of Angkor. Among its more famous monuments is Ak Yom, the first pyramid-temple
constructed in Cambodia (early 8th c.).

Between the 1st and 6th c. A.D., the focus of Khmer political and economic activity was in the
southern half of the country. During that time irrigation techniques were perfected, there is
evidence of some stone foundations for otherwise wooden buildings, and the kings began to
adapt Indian gods such as Shiva and Vishnu, as well as Buddhism. The earliest statues date to the
beginning of the 6th c. or so. Their style is distinctly Khmer, and not just a copy of Indian
prototypes.After the 6th c., the focus of power shifts to the central region of Cambodia, and brick
temples start to appear on the scene. The temple complex at Sambor Prei Kuk has enclosing
walls, some quincunx temple plans (a central temple and 4 intercardinal temples), stone lintels
and door jambs, and related canals and ponds. All of these features will continue throughout the
Angkor period.

Even the pictorial depictions are imaginations of the artists and come in a variety of diverse
forms. Yet he attracts a lot of attention due to the fact that one wants to believe that it is from
him that the Khmer Empire arose. Let us say that he was the founding father of that empire. This
3
successful war for independence which created the identity of the Khmers was celebrated by
successive rulers in the constructions of Hindu and Buddhist collasus.

One of the first Western visitors to the temple was Antonio de Madalena, a Portuguese friar who
visited in 1586. Angkor Wat was then effectively rediscovered by the French explorer Henri
Mouhot in the 1840s. António da Madalena (sometimes spelled, in English, Antonio da
Magdalena, died c. 1589) was a Portuguese Capuchin friar who was the first Western visitor
to Angkor in 1586.Born in Coimbra and lived in the Alcobaça Monastery from 1575 to 1579, he
travelled to Goa in 1580, to establish a library for his order. In 1583 he travelled overland to
what is today Cambodia, where in 1586 he was the first Western visitor to Angkor.
He gave an account of his journey to Angkor to historian Diogo do Couto, the main chronicler
and "guarda-mor" (curator) of the Archives of Portuguese exploration-colonization in Asia.
Curiously, Diogo do Couto did not include Madalena's testimony in the sixth volume of the sum
initiated by writer João de Barros, the Décadas da Ásia. He attempted to aid in a reconstruction
effort of Angkor, but the project was unsuccessful. In 1589, the Franciscan friar perished
during shipwreck of the Sao Tomé caravel off Natal (South Africa), probably while he was
heading back home after many years spent in India, Malacca and Ayuthaya in Siam. After do
Couto's death, his personal papers were kept by his brother-in-law and priest Deodato da
Trindade, and his wife's brother, Luisa de Melo.
In the fifth volume of the Décadas da Ásia (Asian Decades), written during the years 1586-1587
and published only in 1612, Diogo do Couto alludes to Father da Madalena as one of his
informers on mainland Southeast Asian affairs. Though the description of Angkor was not
included in the Décadas, it circulated quite widely since echoes of its content appeared in sundry
Iberan published works of the first decades of the 17th century, such as Father Gabriel Quiroga
de San Antonio's Breve y verdadera relacion de los sucessos del reyno de Camboxa in 1604; in
Father Joao dos Santos' Ethiopia Oriental et varia historia de cousas notaveis de Oriente in 1609
and Bartolomé Leonardo de Argensola's Conquista de las Islas Malucas in 1609.
It was only in 1947 that historian Charles R. Boxer found do Couto's transcription of Madalena's
original relation to his journey in Cambodia and made it known to a broader public, before it was
translated in French by Bernard-Philippe Groslier in 1957:

4
This revealed a precise description of Angkor Wat and especially Angkor Thom as seen in 1550,
which was discovered anew during a royal hunt by King Ang Chan, one hundred years after
the fall of Angkor. While the Franciscan friar praised the beauty of the religious complex "like
no other monument in the whole world", the friar also compares the stupas to
Portuguese coruchea or capirote, usually worn by the Penitents seeking redemption in the
Christian faith. Madalena correctly attributes an Indian origin to the Khmer architecture while
Jesuit Pedro de Ribadeneira and his Spanish sources still believed it could have been the work
of Alexander the Great and even in 1604, Dominican friar Gabriel Quiroga de San Antonio
believed it could be a temple of the lost tribes of Israel.

António da Madalena (or Magdalena, ??-1589, aboard the Sao Tomé) gave an account of his
journey to Angkor to Diogo do Couto, the main chronicler and "guarda-mor" (curator) of the
Archives of Portuguese exploration-colonization in Asia. Curiously, Diogo do Couto did not
include Madalena's testimony in the sixth volume of the sum initiated by writer João de Barros,
the Décadas da Ásia. After do Couto's death, his personal papers were kept by his brother-in-
law, priest Deodato da Trindade, his wife Luisa de Melo's brother. It was only in 1947 that
historian Charles R. Boxer found do Couto's transcription of Madalena's relation to his journey in
Cambodia.The Franciscan friar perished when his ship sunk during a storm near the coast of
Natal (South Africa), probably while he was heading back home after many years spent in India,
Malacca and Ayuthaya (Kingdom of Siam).

Da grande e admiravel cidade que se discobrio nos matos do Reino camboja e de sua
fabrica e sitio" | "Of the Great and Marvellous City Discovered in the Forests of the
Kingdom of Camboja, its construction and its location" | "De la grande et merveilleuse ville
qui fut decouverte dans les forets du Royaume de Camboja, de sa construction et de sa
situation"

The first description of Angkor by a European traveler (Year 1551)- Fraile Antonio da Madalena’s
relation in Diogo do Couto’s Duodecima Decada da Asia

5
Since the late 1990s a surge of new books have entered the arena of the curiosity towards
Angkor.
Potuguese historian Vanessa Loureiro writes about the Jesuits in Cambodia: A Look into
Cambodian Religiousness to explain how did Franciscan, Dominican and Jesuit missionaries
interact with the rulers of Cambodia?

According to her the real motives behind the

Portuguese and Spanish presence in the Kingdom from the second half of the 16th century to the
first quarter of the 18th century was:
 Commercial ambitions behind religious zeal: "Diogo do Couto conveys an idea of the
importance of the Cambodian ports within the commercial circuits of the Indochinese
Peninsula when he reports that in 1551, on the occasion of the Malacca siege by a
coalition of the Muslim princes, an emissary to Patan [was sent] with the aim of warning
the vessels that arrived from Siam, from Cambodia and from other places in Southwest

6
 Ásia, in the direction of the fortress, not to go into the hands of the enemy (Diogo do
Couto, Década VI, Lv. 9, Cap. 8, Lisboa, Régia Oficina Tipográfica, 1782).

 The fleeting fate of Portuguese religious missions to Cambodia: a) "Friar Gaspar da

Cruz was the first Portuguese clergyman to set foot in the Kingdom of Cambodia [in
1555] and to settle here – according to Luís Fróis, “(…) as the king himself requested
news from the creator of heaven and land, and of this evangelisation in which the
Christians live” -, [soon admitting that] the promises of the king were no more than bait
used to attract the Portuguese and their vessels. He quickly convinced himself that the
conversion of the Cambodian souls into Christians would not be possible."

b) "Portuguese clergyman would only set foot again in this region nearly two decades later. In
fact, in 1570 when Apram Langara rose to the throne, (...) aware that holding onto the kingdom
would only be possible with the aid of the Portuguese, the ruler requested that clergymen and
the military be sent and promised the missionaries the conditions to spread the word of God.
Even though the number of Portuguese religious men in the Far East was limited, the prelate of
the Dominican Order insisted in opening a mission in Cambodia. Thus, in 1582-1583,
the priests Friar Lopo Cardoso and Friar João Madeira arrived in Lovek."

c) "The death of Apram Langara and the rising to the throne of Barom Reachea II resulted in
the inversion of the religious policy. The new King, with deeply rooted Buddhist beliefs, did not
hesitate in “revoking their permission of preaching to the natives of the Kingdom”. Facing a
variety of obstacles, Friar Lopo Cardoso tried to abandon the mission but was not authorised to
do so by the prelate of the Order (...) Now alone in Cambodia, Friar Silvestre de
Azevedo continued with his mission and slowly began to win the amity and protection of the
monarch. He became advisor and dignitary of the kingdom, with the title of “Pa” (Father),
which gave him the privilege of sitting in the presence of the king and of using a hat, symbols of
royal dignity. Barom Reachea II allows him to once again preach the Gospel and build
churches, and he even placed a learned man of the court at his service to assist him in the
drawing up of the doctrine Mistérios da Fé Cristã in Khmer."
d) "In 1585, more missionaries arrived in Cambodia: Friar Antonio Dorta and Friar António
Caldeira, and then another two Franciscan friars. These five men, with the consent of the king
and the opposition of the bonzes, baptised approximately 300 children.25 However, all this
empathy shown by Barom Reachea II in relation to Christianity was beyond any doubt
because of the need for Portuguese military aid and his good will did not last for long
(...) During the same period, two personalities who would take on an important role within the
scope of the Siamese invasions, joined the missionaries: Diogo Veloso and Blas Ruiz de Herman
Gonzales. The first, in particular, became the King’s favourite and even married into the royal
family and was designated by the King as “Adopted Son”. In 1592/1593, fearing the possibility
of an invasion by Siam, Barom Reachea II asked for help from Malacca through Friar Silvestre
de Azevedo and Diogo Veloso. Never having received a reply, he turns to Manila, and in July
1593 he sent Diogo Veloso with a letter in which he asked for military aid and promised in
return, commercial advantages and an area for Evangelisation. This missive left before the
entrance of the Siamese troops in the territory and for various reasons, help took long in
arriving."

7
 What really happened to Friar Antonio da Madalena, who shared the first description
of Angkor by an European to chronicler Diogo de Couto? "Siam Preah Nareth invaded
Cambodia in April 1594 and occupied Lovek, then holding captive in Siam Friar
Silvestre de Azevedo, Friar Jorge da Mota and Friar Luís da Fonseca, as well as three
Franciscan friars: Friar Gregório da Cruz, Friar António da Madalena and Friar
Damião da Torre. After the release of the captives, only Friar Silvestre de Azevedo
returned to Cambodia." [Indeed, Friar Paolo da Trinidade, in his Conquista espiritual de
Oriente (completed in 1636; Book 3), notes that "em 1593 foram levados presos a Siao fr.
Rodrigo da Cruz, fr. Gregório de San Francisco, fr. António da Madalena e fr. Damiao da
Torre, vendo sus vidas em mao de tan cruel tirano, como era el Rei Preto de Siao."] Da
Madalena then sailed from Siam to Goa, where he met Diogo do Couto, and later on
perished at sea on his return journey.

 The Jesuits: "Cambodia only attracted the attention of the missionaries of the Company
of Jesus after merchants from Macao settled in the kingdom seeking alternative port
areas due to the constant Dutch ambushes on the traditional routes which linked Macao
to India and to Japan. Therefore, after sending missionaries to Cochinchina, the College
of Macao in 1616, sent Father Pero Marques, accompanied by a Japanese brother, to
explore the possibilities of opening a mission in Cambodia (...) In fact, the Portuguese
authorities only became directly engaged in the mission after the expulsion of the Jesuits
from Japan. However, conscious of the sturdy roots of Theravada Buddhism in
Cambodia, and that the natives were more interested in gaining access to commerce with
the Portuguese
than in getting to know the word of Christ, these priests limited their work to the
Christians who were settled in the kingdom and others who disembarked occasionally,
specially the Japanese."

 Bottom line: "174 years after the first Portuguese priests stepped into the kingdom of
Cambodia, the religious beliefs of its natives remained unchanged. In almost 150 years
of missions, Dominicans, Franciscans and Jesuits managed only to widen the restricted
circle of the Christian community beyond the Europeans, some Japanese merchants,
Conchinchina people and Malay. The few Cambodians which converted to Christianity
never reached twenty and even those, shortly afterwards, embraced their original
religion."

ADB input:
1. In his Conquista... (op.cit., Libro I, Cap. 70), Friar Paolo da Trinidade makes an
important observation: "...como lemos da cidade de Angor no Reino de Cambaia onde
havia um templo de nove claustros no qual se acharam mais de doce ídolos, todos de oro
maciço, e alguns deles como meninos de dez anos.¨ [...as we read of the city of Angkor in
the Kingdom of Cambodia, where there was a temple of nine cloisters in which more than
twelve idols were found, all of solid gold, and some of them less than ten years
old.] Since this account was written around 1630, it shows that that Angkor Wat was far
from neglected as a worship center, or "left to the jungle".

8
2. The Spanish Dominican missionary Gabriel Quiroga de San Antonio wrote an extended
account of his voyage up the Mekong River at the beginning of the 17th century to spread
the Lord’s word and provide Philippines' King Don Philippe with an assessment of the
region’s colonial potential.

3. To quote the essay “Gold, Swords and The Cross: Christianity In Cambodia 1500-
1700” (CNE, 2021), "some sort of uprising against the European presence began, which
ended with the killing of hundreds of Chinese merchants and the usurper king Preah
Ram I at the hands of the Spanish. The young son of the now dead former king, who had
been living in exiled in Laos, was returned and put on the throne by the Europeans, who
were granted a protectorate in the areas of Takeo and Prey Veng. Trouble continued to
brew, and in 1598 the Spanish fleet was ambushed by a well-organized group of Malay,
Cham and Chinese on the Mekong, and all but annihilated. The Philippines Governor
Pérez Dasmariñas refused to send reinforcements, but authorized a group of volunteers
to travel to Cambodia in a donated ship. A Dominican friar, Alonso Jiménez, was also
sent to Longvek with a contingent of merchants interested in establishing the church and
business."

9
 Angkor remains, not only a secret place but a place full of secrets.

"The tale of it is incredible; the wonder which is Angkor is unmatched in Asia." So begins Helen
Churchill Candee's classic tale of Asian adventure. Today, readers can again experience the
mystery of Cambodia's vast jungle temples through her eyes. Although Helen Candee is best
known for surviving the sinking of the RMS Titanic, she walked with kings, presidents, the
wealthy and the powerful. entertaining, educating and influencing them. This independent
woman championed feminine equality and fought tirelessly for woman's rights. And, as a single
woman, she traveled the Far East with a keen eye for detail, an inquisitive mind, and a sensitivity
for local culture. Helen Candee's travelogue remains one of the most evocative English language
accounts of the ancient Khmer capital.

As Helen Candee’s photo shows, Angkor Wat had fewer visitors in the 1920’s!

Angkor the Magnificent – Cambodia Daily Review-A Glimpse of a Bygone Era

Helen Churchill Candee’s Account of Southeast Asia Was Ahead of its Time

10
By Michelle Vachon – The Cambodia Daily, Angkor the Magnificent – Cambodia
Daily Review © 2010 – Visiting Angkor, she described it as “one of the most grandiose cities of
antiquity” in her book first published in 1924. “’In these precincts, the race called the Khmers
lived a life of luxury, pomp and display, which has not been exceeded at any time in any part of
the world. And all this was at a time when Europe was sunk in the dull apathy of the Dark Ages,
when France was a savage country, England uncivilized and Germany a hinterland of barbarous
hordes.”

11
“Angkor the Magnificent” – Helen Churchill Candee. DatAsia, Inc., 2008, Hardbound, 359
pages.
A new edition of “Angkor the Magnificent” has been released by the US publishing
house DatAsia, which has published other out-of-print books dealing with Cambodia.

Journalist and historian “Randy Bryan Bigham and other Titanic historians including Phillip
Gowen provided text and photos for Helen’s first published biography,” Mr. Davis said.
Written as a journal rather than a travel guide, one of the most surprising aspects of her book on
Angkor is how fresh it reads. Using a very personal and even poetic style of writing, Ms
Churchill Candee creates an intimacy with the reader as she describes fellow travelers and
incidents that might have happened just yesterday: hotel guests complaining about their rooms,
tourists fascinated by Cambodian classical dancers or negotiating with market vendors.

Also found in her visit to Angkor is the female star of long-ago stage shows imposing her cap-
rices on her patient husband, and a single woman who, while behaving as an austere celibate
flirts with that same husband at the first opportunity. There also is the fat Catholic priest, taking
the best seat in a small boat away from a Cambodian woman carrying a baby, two irascible
journalists and a US artist eager to sketch everything she sees in Cambodia.
12
Candee arrived at Angkor by boat and because the Tonle Sap lake’s water level was too low for
the vessel to dock, passengers had to transfer from the bigger boat to small fishing embarkations
at midnight. “We had not been told [Angkor Wat] would greet us like the sun at early morning,”
she writes. “But we were thrown before its beauty unprepared, unshrived, unshorn.” She would
dedicate nearly two chapters to describing the temple.

The enigmatic faces of the Bayon temple mesmerized her: “Nowhere in the world does mutual
race understanding seems so impossible as before the great temple of Bayon […] An art
expresses a people’s soul.

Helen Churchill Candee at age 50///Face tower at Preah Khan.// 1920’s view of Phnom Penh’s Royal Palace

She also describes other monuments, including Ta Prohm and Prah Khan; her visit to Siem Reap
town, then just a village; and a Cambodian classical dance performance at Angkor Wat. She also
speaks of the animals portrayed in sculptures and wall carvings at Angkor. “It is like nothing
else,” she writes of the naga. “The form is the result of many centuries of legend and belief; the
past evidence of past religion and stories.”Ms Churchill Candee had come to Cambodia hoping
to better understand what had happened after the Khmer empire lost its power around the 15th
century. In the absence of books and archives that were probably written on perishable material
and destroyed by the elements and wars, leaving only religious and administrative records carved
on stones, the transition between Angkor and the weak Cambodian nation of the late 19th
century is hard to explain, she writes.

The Khmer dominated the region for centuries and then, she says at the end of her book, “The
envy of the enemy killed them. […] A race arose from obscurity; it built the most marvelous
edifices of Asia; it was subjugated and it disappeared.”Today, Angkor remains, she writes, “not
only a secret place but a place full of secrets.”

13
 Secrets Indeed !

In 802 A.D., King Jayavarman II (r. 802 - 834) is crowned king of an independent Cambodian
nation. The ceremony takes place in the Kulen mountains to the north of Angkor. Perhaps as a
function of this ceremony, the second pyramid-temple (Rong Chen) in Khmer history is
constructed on top of Mt. Kulen. At the same time, the king institutes a devaraja cult - a form of
worship that has been universally misinterpreted as the "god-king" cult. Rather than a cult meant
to further glorify the king, the devaraja itself was a sacred image, perhaps a Shiva lingam, that
was intended to establish its own supremacy over all of the regional gods in Cambodia. In that
way, as the devaraja was taken to each successive capital with each successive king, no local
gods could lay claim to hegemony in the region of the capital. Similarly, the king's own ancestral
gods were subordinate to the devaraja. As the king stood in relation to his people, as his central
temple stood in relation to all others, so stood the devaraja in relation to all regional and
ancestral gods.

When a Khmer king came to power, he first had a royal obligation to construct hydraulic works
such as irrigation canals and reservoirs to benefit his subjects. He then was bound by custom to
set up small towers on a single platform to honor the preceding king(s) and/or his ancestors -
normally one and the same. There were usually 3 towers along the front of the platform for the
male ancestors of the king, and 3 towers in back for the female consorts of those ancestors. This
custom lasted until 950 or so, at which time the ancestral towers began to be incorporated into
the central royal temple.

The third obligation of the king was to establish a central pyramid-temple that would mark the
heart of his capital. When the king died, it seems as though some of his ashes were buried under
the main image in his pyramid-temple. His successor would then move the center of the capital
to a slightly different location within the site of Angkor, and the process of constructing canals,
reservoirs, ancestor temples, and a pyramid-temple would begin again.

Not all kings reigned long enough to construct a central temple in their capital, and in some
cases, we are not sure where the central temple might have been. Nevertheless, the king's own
deity was named for the king himself, and carried a suffix to indicate divinity. For example, an
image named Indreshvara at the Bakong combined the name of the king, Indra varman, with a
suffix indicated the divine Shiva: ishvara. The image would have been carved in the likeness of
the king, and was sculpted with clothing and jewelry that royalty would also wear. According to
inscriptions, a portion of the king's essence resided in the image, and a portion of the deity
resided in the king. Cambodia is the only known nation on the planet which professed this
unique royal-divine sharing between a statue and a king.

The king who built Angkor Wat, had studied and lived in the kingdom of Java (Indonesia) during
the Sailendra dynasty. This is shown in the inscriptions found (K 235 Sdok Kok Thom, Yang
Tikuh and Vat Smrong, Ligor). The building is similar to the Prambanan (Hindu) and Borobudur
(Buddhist) temples in Java (Indonesia).Eventually though, and perhaps even the rulers of Pagan,
that some have been asking about! Cambodia which in my terms is the Fatherland of
Jayavarman II is not the motherland. Would that be in java- now Indonesia?

14
 Siem Reap

A visit to Siem Reap, a developing town that functions as a gateway into Angkor Thom – where
the majestic Angkor Wat stands – tells me a lot about the country's faith in the many Gods it
worships. The ruins of Angkor Wat, Ta Prohm and Bayon stand wrapped in mysteries that many
have tried to unravel with limited success. We do know that the Angkor Wat was a Hindu temple
but was it also a mausoleum for King Suryavarman, who erected the temple? We know that King
Jayavarman VII ordered the construction of Ta Prohm but is the temple dedicated to Hindu God
Brahma? Why would a Buddhist king build a temple for a Hindu God? We know about the stone
faces of Bayon but are they bodhisattvas or portraits of King Jayavarman himself? Siem Reap is
an intriguing place riddled with puzzles. It’s also a country that has endured invasions, bombings
and genocide. The urns that hold the remains of the millions who died under communist leader
Pol Pot are still exhibited around pagodas.

In 2002, Siem Reap City held various events commemorating its 1200th anniversary. Siem Reap
as we know today is a cluster of small villages along the Siem Reap River. These villages were
originally developed around Buddhist pagodas (wats) which are almost evenly spaced along the
river from Wat Preah En Kau Sei in the north to Wat Phnom Krom in the south, where the Siem
Reap River meets the great Tonlé Sap Lake.

The name "Siem Reap" can be translated to mean 'defeat of Siam' (siem in Khmer), and is
commonly taken as a reference to an incident in the centuries-old conflict between the Siamese
and Khmer kingdoms, although this is probably apocryphal. According to oral tradition, King
Ang Chan (1516–1566) had named the town "Siem Reap" after he repulsed an army sent to

15
invade Cambodia by the Thai king Maha Chakkraphat in 1549.[4] Scholars such as Michael
Vickery consider this derivation to be simply a modern folk etymology, and maintain that while
the names Siem Reap and Chenla. the old Chinese name for Cambodia, may perhaps be related,
the actual origin of the name is unknown.
The traditional tale claims that King Ang Chan of Cambodia tried to assert greater independence
from Siam, which was then struggling internally. The Siamese king Chairacha had been
poisoned by his concubine, Lady Sri Sudachan, who had committed adultery with a
commoner, Worawongsathirat, while the king was away leading a campaign against the
Kingdom of Lan Na. Sudachan then placed her lover on the throne. The Thai nobility lured them
outside the city on a royal procession by barge to inspect a newly discovered white elephant.
After killing the usurper, along with Sudachan and their new-born daughter, they invited Prince
Thianracha to leave the monkhood and assume the throne as King Maha Chakkraphat (1548–
1569). With the Thais distracted by internal problems, King Ang Chan attacked. He seized the
Siamese city of Prachinburi in 1549, sacking the city and making slaves of its inhabitants. Only
then did he learn that the succession had been settled and that Maha Chakkraphat was the new
ruler. Ang Chan immediately retreated to Cambodia, taking captives with him. King Maha
Chakkraphat was furious over the unprovoked attack, but Burma had also chosen to invade
through Three Pagodas Pass. The Burmese army posed a much more serious threat, as it
captured Kanchanaburi and Suphanburi. It then appeared before Ayutthaya itself.

The Thai army managed to defeat the Burmese, who quickly retreated through the pass. Maha
Chakkraphat's thoughts then turned to Cambodia. Not only had Ang Chan attacked and looted
Prachinburi, turning its people into slaves, but he also refused to give Maha Chakkraphat a white
elephant he had requested, rejecting even this token of submission to Siam. [6] Maha Chakkraphat
ordered Prince Ong, the governor of Sawankhalok, to lead an expedition to punish Ang Chan and
recover the Thai captives. The rival armies met, and Ang Chan killed Prince Ong with a lucky

16
musket shot from an elephant's back. The leaderless Thai army fled, and Ang Chan allegedly
captured more than 10,000 Siamese soldiers. To celebrate his great victory, King Ang Chan
supposedly named the battleground "Siem Reap", meaning 'the total defeat of Siam'.
In reality, surviving historic sources make this derivation appear unlikely, since they date the
decline of Angkor to more than a century before this, when a military expedition from Ayutthaya
captured and sacked Angkor Wat, which began a long period of vassal rule over Cambodia. The
1431 capture coincided with the decline of Angkor, though the reasons behind its abandonment
are not clear. They may have included environmental changes and failings of the Khmer
infrastructure.
From the 16th to the 19th centuries, infighting among the Khmer nobility led to periodic
intervention and domination by both of Cambodia's more powerful neighbors, Vietnam and
Siam. Siem Reap, along with Battambang (Phra Tabong) and Sisophon, major cities in northwest
Cambodia, was under Siamese administration and the provinces were collectively known as
Inner Cambodia from 1795 until 1907, when they were ceded to French Indochina. During the
18th century, under the rule of the Ayutthaya Kingdom, it was known as Nakhon Siam
Angkor Wat (Wat temple) is the central feature of the Angkor UNESCO World Heritage
Site containing the magnificent remains of the Khmer civilization. Angkor Wat's rising series of
five towers culminates in an impressive central tower that symbolizes mythical Mount Meru.
Thousands of feet of wall space are covered with intricate carving depicting scenes from Hindu
mythology. The most important are the Carved Bas reliefs of the Hindu narratives. They tell a
story about gods fighting demons in order to reclaim order which can only be achieved by
recovering the elixir of life known as amrita. The gods and demons must work together to release
it and then battle to attain it.
Angkor Thom
Angkor Thom is an inner royal city built by Jayavarman VII, the Empire's famed 'Warrior King',
at the end of the 12th century and is renowned for its temples, in particular the Bayon. Other
notable sites are Baphuon, Phimeanakas, the Terrace of the Elephants, and the Terrace of the
Leper King. The city can be accessed through five city gates, one at each cardinal point and the
Victory Gate on the eastern wall.
Other temples
A number of significant temples are dotted around Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom within the
Angkor Archaeological Park, including Ta Prohm, Preah Khan, Banteay Kdei, Phnom
Bakheng, Ta Keo, Ta Som, East Mebon, Drukhsh, Pre Rup. and Neak Pean. These temples may
be visited along the grand circuit or the small circuit routes. [15] Other sites are the Roluos group
of temples located to the east of Siem Reap.

Significance of Jayavarman II’ Hariharalaya was an ancient city and capital of the Khmer
empire located near Siem Reap, Cambodia in an area now called Roluos . Today, all that remains
of the city are the ruins of several royal temples: Preah Ko, the Bakong, Lolei. Toward the end of
the 8th century A.D., the Cambodian king Jayavarman II conquered vast territories near the great
lake Tonle Sap. For at least part of this time, he established his capital at Hariharalaya.
However, when he declared himself the universal monarch of the country in 802 A.D., he did so

17
not at Hariharalaya, but at Mahendraparvata on the Phnom Kulen Plateau. Later, he returned the
capital to Hariharalaya, where he died in 835.

This 7th century sculpture of Harihara is from Phnom Da in Cambodia.

The name "Hariharalaya" is derived from the name of Harihara, a Hindu deity prominent in pre-
Angkorian Cambodia. The name "Harihara" in turn is a composite of "Hari" (one of Vishnu's
names listed in Vishnu sahasranama) and "Hara" (meaning the Hindu god Shiva). Cambodian
representations of Harihara were of a male deity whose one side bore the attributes
of Vishnu and whose other side bore the attributes of Shiva. For example, the deity’s head-
covering consisted of a mitre-type hat (the attribute of Vishnu) on one side and as twisted locks
of hair (the attribute of Shiva) on the other. Alaya is a sanskrit word meaning "basis," or "home,"
so Hariharalaya is home of Harihara or home of the deity representing both Hari (Vishnu) and
Hara (Shiva).

Jayavarman II was succeeded by Jayavarman III and then by Indravarman I, who were
responsible for the completion of the royal temple mountain known as the Bakong and the
construction of Indratataka baray. Indravarman I consecrated the temple’s dominant religious
symbol, a lingam called Sri Indresvara (the name is a combination of the king’s name with that
of Shiva), in 881. Indravarman I also constructed the much smaller temple today called Preah
Ko ("Sacred Bull"), dedicated in 880. In 889, Indravarman I was succeeded by his
son Yasovarman I, who constructed the temple of Lolei (the name may be a modern corruption
of "Hariharalaya") on an artificial island in the middle of Indratataka. Yasovarman also founded
a new city at the site of Angkor Thom north of modern Siem Reap and called it Yasodharapura.
Yasovarman made the new city his capital and constructed a new royal temple mountain, known
as the Bakheng. Yasodharapura was to survive until the 1170s when it was sacked by invaders
from Champa.

The Shivalaya of Preah Ko and Temple Mountain of bakong

18
"The Sacred Bull" or Preah Ko and Bakong were the first temples to be built in the ancient and
now defunct city of Hariharalaya (in the area that today is called Roluos), some 15 kilometers
south-east of the main group of temples at Angkor, Cambodia. The temple was built under
the Khmer King Indravarman I in 879 to honor members of the king's family, whom it places in
relation with the Hindu deity Shiva.
Preah Ko (Sacred Bull) derives its name from the three statues of sandstone located in the front
of and facing the temple's central towers. These statues represent Nandi, the white bull who
serves as the mount of Shiva

Preah Ko is known for the beauty and intricacy of its carvings. The design on this lintel includes
warriors mounted on three-headed nāgas, horsemen, and a deity mounted on a kala.

After the Khmer king Jayavarman II founded the Khmer empire in 802 A.D., he finally
established his capital at Hariharalaya, where he died. Indravarman I was the nephew
of Jayavarman II. When he ascended to the throne, he ordered the construction first of Preah Ko,
which was dedicated in 879, and later of the temple-mountain known as the Bakong. It is likely
that this building program was made possible by the king's peaceful reign and his ability to draw
income from the expanding empire. A restoration of the towers took place in early 1990s,
financed by German government.
Preah Ko consists of six brick towers arranged in two rows of three towers each perched on a
sandstone platform. The towers face east, and the front central tower is the tallest. The
sanctuaries are dedicated to three divinized forefathers of Indravarman and their respective
wives. The front central tower is dedicated to Jayavarman II, the founder of the Khmer empire.
The tower to the left is dedicated to Prithivindreshvara, King Indravarman's father; the tower to
the right to Rudreshvara, his grandfather. The three rear towers are dedicated to the wives of
these three men.The central towers all bear images of the Hindu god Shiva.

19
Whether Bakong is the first Khmer temple mountain of sandstone constructed by rulers of
the Khmer Empire near modern Siem Reap in Cambodia or Preah Ko is still unclear. In the final
decades of the 9th century AD, it served as the official state temple of King Indravarman I in the
ancient city of Hariharalaya, located in an area that today is called Roluos. The Bakong is the
royal temple mountain founded by King Indravarman I at Hariharalaya.

The structure of Bakong took shape of stepped pyramid, popularly identified as temple mountain
of early Khmer temple architecture. The striking similarity of the Bakong and Borobudur temple
in Java, going into architectural details such as the gateways and stairs to the upper terraces,
suggests strongly that Borobudur was served as the prototype of Bakong. There must have been
exchanges of travelers, if not mission, between Khmer kingdom and the Sailendras in Java.
Transmitting to Cambodia not only ideas, but also technical and architectural details of
Borobudur, including arched gateways in corbelling method.

In 802 AD, the first king of Angkor Jayavarman II declared the sovereignty of Cambodia. After
ups and downs, he established his capital at Hariharalaya. A few decades later, his successors
constructed Bakong in stage as the first temple mountain of sandstone at Angkor.[3] The
inscription on its stele (classified K.826) says that in 881 King Indravarman I dedicated the
temple to the god Shiva and consecrated its central religious image, a lingam whose name Sri
Indresvara was a combination of the king's own and the suffix "-esvara" which stood for Shiva
("Iśvara").[4]: 62–63 [5] According to George Coedès, the devarāja cult consisted in the idea of divine
kingship as a legitimacy of royal power, but later authors stated that it doesn't necessarily
involve the cult of physical persona of the ruler himself. Bakong enjoyed its status as the state
temple of Angkor for only a few years, but later additions from the 12th or 13th centuries testify
that it was not abandoned. Toward the end of the 9th century, Indravarman's son and
successor Yasovarman I moved the capital from Hariharalaya to the area north of Siem
Reap now known as Angkor, where he founded the new city of Yaśodharapura around a
new temple mountain called Bakheng.

20
The site of Bakong measures 900 metres by 700 metres, and consists of three
concentric enclosures separated by two moats, the main axis going from east to west. The outer
enclosure has neither a wall nor gopuram and its boundary is the outer moat, today only partially
visible. The current access road from NH6 leads at the edge of the second enclosure. The inner
moat delimits a 400 by 300 metres area, with remains of a laterite wall and four cruciform
gopuram, and it is crossed by a wide earthen causeway, flanked by seven-headed nāgas, such as
a draft of nāga bridge . Between the two moats there are the remains of 22 satellite temples of
brick. The innermost enclosure, bounded by a laterite wall, measures 160 metres by 120 metres
and contains the central temple pyramid and eight brick temple towers, two on each side. A
number of other smaller buildings are also located within the enclosure. Just outside the eastern
gopura there is a modern buddhist temple.
The pyramid itself has five levels and its base is 65 by 67 metres. It was reconstructed by
Maurice Glaize at the end of the 1930s according to methods of anastylosis. On the top there is a
single tower that is much later in provenance, and the architectural style of which is not that of
the 9th century foundations of Hariharalaya, but that of the 12th-century temple city Angkor
Wat.
Though the pyramid at one time must have been covered with bas relief carvings in stucco, today
only fragments remain. A dramatic scene-fragment involving what appear to be asuras in battle
gives a sense of the likely high quality of the carvings. Large stone statues of elephants are
positioned as guardians at the corners of the three lower levels of the pyramid. Statues of lions
guard the stairways.

21
The Temple Mountain of Baphuon:
In many ancient religions, mountain tops—from the Greeks’ Mt. Olympus to the highest
Himalayas of Hindu mythologywere believed to be the privileged home of the gods. Southeast
Asia, largely dependent on India for its principal religions of Hinduism and Buddhism, is no
exception. On the island of Java in Indonesia, for example, the ancient holy site of Dieng was
established in the crater of an extinct volcano. Its name in old Javanese, Di Hyang (in Sanskrit,
Devalaya), means, in effect, “home of the Gods.” According to Thierry Zephir, Khmer architec-
ture, of which the temple-mountain is at once the best-known and most important expression,
remains one of Asia’s major contributions to the world’scultural patrimony. Despite the
considerable number of studies, both general and specific, devoted to it, it is far from having
been completely explained. It still constitutes a field of exploration and research as rich as the
religious traditions that gave rise to it.1

In Cambodia, in the classic Khmer architecture of the Angkorean period, we find a temple type
in which the sanctuary is built atop a stepped pyramid. Nineteenth century archaeologists called
these “temple- mountains.” Each important sovereign was apparently obliged to build one in
order to establish his power. Baphuon is one such temple at Angkor, Cambodia. It is located
in Angkor Thom, northwest of the Bayon.

Built in the mid-11th century, it is a three-tiered temple mountain built as the state temple
of Udayadityavarman II dedicated to the Hindu God Shiva. It is the archetype of the Baphuon
style with intricate carvings covering every available surface. The temple adjoins the southern
enclosure of the royal palace and measures 120 metres east-west by 100 metres north-south at its
base and stands 34 meters tall without its tower, which would have made it roughly 50 meters
tall. Its appearance apparently impressed Temür Khan's late 13th century envoy Zhou
Daguan during his visit from 1296 to 1297, who said it was 'the Tower of Bronze...a truly
astonishing spectacle, with more than ten chambers at its
base.----------------------------------------------------------------
1. Zephir, .Thierry"The Angkorean Temple-Mountain" Expedition Magazine 37.3 (1995): n.
pag. Expedition Magazine. Penn Museum, 1995 Web. 18 Sep 2021
<http://www.penn.museum/sites/expedition/?p=4853>

Zephir, Thierry in "The Angkorean Temple-Mountain." Expedition Magazine 37, no. 3 (November,
1995): -. Accessed June 28, 2024. https://www.penn.museum/sites/expedition/the-angkorean-temple-
mountain/ has the following to say about The Angkorean Temple-Mountain-Diversity,
Evolution, Permanence and I quote:
22
In many ancient religions, mountain tops—from the Greeks’ Mt. Olympus to the highest
Himalayas of Hindu mythologywere believed to be the privileged home of the gods. Southeast
Asia, largely dependent on India for its principal religions of Hinduism and Buddhism, is no
exception. On the island of Java in Indonesia, for example, the ancient holy site of Dieng was
established in the crater of an extinct volcano. Its name in old Javanese, Di Hyang (in Sanskrit,
Devalaya), means, in effect, “home of the Gods.”
In Cambodia, in the classic Khmer architecture of the Angkorean period, we find a temple type
in which the sanctuary is built atop a stepped pyramid. Nineteenth century archaeologists called
these “temple- mountains.” Each important sovereign was apparently obliged to build one in
order to establish his power (see Stern 1954).
Let us explore this architectural expression of royal eminence through three of its aspects:
diversity, evolution, and permanence.

Diversity: the Symbolism of the Temple-Mountain

In the Indian religious context, a sanctuary functions primarily as the terrestrial dwelling place of
the gods, the place from which they will be able to provide aid and prosperity to humankind.
Many countries of Southeast Asia were under Indian influence; each resolved in its own way the
problem of creating a divine residence in the world of human beings. Generally, architects and
builders based the construction of their sanctuaries on strict religious texts (unfortunately, we
have none from ancient Cambodia). To the rules prescribed by these texts were added numerous
others relating to astronomy, geomancy, or numerology, the meanings of which are often lost
today. Our lack of knowledge of almost everything that guided the creation of the sanctuaries
makes it difficult to understand them and to explain their symbolism.
In Cambodia, however, the study of local ancient epigraphy has furnished a variety of insights
into the symbolism of religious architecture. In the light of some of these inscriptions, we can
make a connection between Mount Meru, the center and axis of the universe in Indian
cosmography, and certain temple-mountains of Angkor, the ancient Khmer capital. These
structures provide an image, a kind of representation of Mount Meru on a human scale. The best
known example is the sanctuary built around A.D. 906 on the top of Phnom Bakheng, the precise
center of Yasodharapura, Angkor’s first capital (Fig. 2). In addition to being constructed on one
of the rare hills (phnom in Khmer) of the region, the monument was conceived as a square
pyramid with five levels. Locating the pyramid on a natural hill at the geometric center of the
royal city underlines the symbolic identification of the monument, center and axis of the city,
with Mount Meru, center and axis of the universe.

In fact, the temple of Phnom Bakheng restates, with much greater complexity, the symbolic
principles expressed earlier at the temple of the Bakong, founded in A.D. 881 (Fig. 1). At the
Bakong, the summit of the five-level pyramid is occupied by a single sanctuary tower, whereas 5
towers arranged in a quincunx (a square of 4 towers with a fifth in the center) occupy the summit
of Phnom Eakheng. Again, 12 temple annexes occupy the fourth level of the Eakong, but at
Phnom Bakheng these 12 annexes appear on each of the five levels. Finally, only 8 large brick
sanctuary towers are distributed at the foot of the Eakong, whereas 44 comparable towers ring
the base of the Phnom Bakheng pyramid.

23
The temple-mountains of the Eakong and the Eakheng seem to suggest similar symbolic
considerations in their main features, although those of the latter are more lavish. But the
interpretation of the other temple-mountains at the Angkor site is different, at least in part. No
temple-mountain of Angkor is truly comparable to another. Contrast the simplicity of the early
temple of Eaksei Chamkrong (Fig. 3) with the immense complexity of the Bayon (Fig. 4). Eaksei
Chamkrong was founded under the reign of Harsavarman I as the representation of Mount Kai
lasa, private domain of the god Siva; the Eayon was the state temple of Jayavarman VII in which
secular symbolic Hindu principles and new Mahayana conceptions from the reign of the
founding king were unified.

If there was any continuity in the function of the temple-mountain, it was above all as the seat of
the protective divinity of the realm. In addition to personal prestige and the exaltation of his
chosen divinity (usually the god Siva), each builder had in mind special concerns such as his
ancestral cult or that of the royal person. His successors did not necessarily care about these
concerns, at least not in the same way.
What we know about temple-mountains at the present time, therefore, seems to confound any
attempt at analysis based on firm, well-established principles of continuity. It is better to regard
each of these creations of Khmer architectural genius as the specific expression of changing
religious principles at a particular period, in response to rules that were probably evolving from
one reign to another.

Evolution: Long Rooms into Galleries

While the symbolism of temple-mountains does not follow a clear evolutionary line nor fit into
an unchanging tradition, their architectural conception is a different story. It is not possible here
to cover all aspects of the rigorous evolution of their layout nor the diverse structures they
comprise. Instead, I shall take one particularly explicit example: the transformation of long
rooms into galleries, as evidenced in the concrete record of the construction itself.
The oldest temple-mountain available for study is the Bakong (founded A.D. 881). Within its
first enclosure is a series of five rectangular buildings of which four are symmetrically
distributed north and south of the monument’s principal east-west axis. These buildings are
normally called long rooms. Although not found at Phnom periphery of the first levels of the
pyramids of the Eastern Mebon (A.D. 952) and Pre Rup (A.D. 961; Fig. 5). At the unfinished
temple of Ta Keo (end of the 10th, beginning of the 11th century; Fig. 6), the series of long
rooms of the two preceding temples is transformed into a ring gallery along the perimeter of the
second level (Fig. 7). This gallery at Ta Keo was covered with a framework and tiles and is,
curiously, totally inaccessible.

To be rigorously accurate, it should be pointed out that the transformation of long rooms into
galleries could be simply an innovation, an addition, to temple mountain architecture. However,
it might signal a profound symbolic or cultural change. Technically, nevertheless, the appearance
of galleries, whether involving a new creation or the organic transformation of pre-existing long
rooms, clearly represents an evolution, a further step in Khmer construction.
The next phase is at Phirneanakas where a ring gallery was set up on the third and last level of
the pyramid in the first half of the 11th century. This gallery is the first to be entirely vaulted in
sandstone (Fig. 8). At the Eaphuon, in the third quarter of the 11th century, three ring galleries

24
occupied the first, third and fifth levels of the pyramid; moreover, the highest gallery rests on
two series of columns and has, probably for stability, a windowed center wall (Fig. 9).
The following phase is at Angkor Wat (first half of the 12th century), the major accomplishment
of Angkorean Khmer architecture (Fig. 10). Here, the three levels of the pyramid are girded by
vaulted sandstone galleries. These rest, at the first two levels, on a wall and columns, and at the
third level, on columns alone. Side aisles, which themselves rest on columns, buttress these
galleries. This system is adopted at the Bayon several decades later for the monument’s two
enclosed galleries.

These diverse observations indicate, therefore, that the architects worked in a consistent way in
terms of technical boldness and the visual lightening of the structures. A comparable
evolutionary line can be drawn, although on the basis of different criteria, for the sanctuary
towers themselves and for other buildings such as the “libraries” (for this type of structure, see
Coedès 1911).

Far from being rigid, Khmer architects have always questioned their art; their research was only
interrupted by unfavorable historic circumstances after the reign of Jayavarman II in the 13th
century. Would they have been able to go farther still and glorify new monuments with new
architectural solutions? Nothing could be less certain, for Angkorean Khmer architecture evolved
with a major handicap: the vaulting method routinely used was, in effect, corbelling, which
necessarily limits the interior span. Having conducted a rich dialectic between covered and
uncovered spaces, which path would Khmer architecture have chosen, given the methods of dry
wall construction they used? The question remains unanswered here but it invites reflection and
is worth asking.
Permanence: The “Architecture-Image”
The most constant aspect of Khmer architecture, whether individual structure, sanctuary
complex, or city, is that of “architecture-image,” that is, the representation in architectural form
of images provided by the texts. Khmer epigraphy often refers to a monument’s precise place in
Indian cosmography (see Eoisselier 1970). As mentioned above, in the Indo-Khmer religious
perspective the sanctuary could be likened to a mountain. In the case of Phnom Eakheng, the
quincuncial arrangement of the five sanctuary towers at the summit corresponds in a very
concrete way to the peak of Mount Meru buttressed by four other strong mountains. All forms of
religious architecture in Angkorian Cambodia must therefore be as close as possible to the image
suggested by the texts.

The image of a divine home, in this case that of Siva, is shown in what seems to have been its
most important form in two famous bas-reliefs on the Eanteay Srei temple (consecrated in A.D.
967-968) near Angkor. The reliefs occupy the tympana of the pediments on the southern library
in the monument’s first enclosure. They show us Siva surrounded by many divine or semi-divine
personages in his private celestial home of Kailasa; he is seated at the summit of a stepped
pyramid (Fig. 11). It is thus perfectly appropriate to designate the stepped pyramid monuments at
Angkor as temple-mountains, even if it hints of redundancy in that every sanctuary in the Indian
tradition is akin to a mountain. In building their pyramids, the Khmer simply solidify this image.

The bas-reliefs of the library present another picture of the inhabitants of Siva’s home: hybrid
figures with human bodies and animal heads. These figures are also found on the stairs leading to

25
the monument’s three sanctuary towers and, again, permit us to regard these temples just as
though they were divine mountains.
According to Professor Jean Filliozat, the conformity of the architecture to the texts is such that
some of the texts may have been inspired by the architecture (1961). Professor Filliozat
concludes that the descrip tion of the Hari (Vishnu) Temple in the Indian
text KurmaPurana may have been purely and simply inspired by the temple-mountain of
Angkor Wat. Its builder, the great king Stuyavarman II (A.D. 1113 to at least 1145), was a
fervent devotee of Vishnu. Whether the text influenced those who created the temple, or whether
the temple—well-known, important and prestigious—influenced the description in
the Kurrnapurana matters relatively little, given the text’s uncertain date.

The moats and the system of concentric walls at Angkor Waft certainly will arrest one’s attention
more. These features characterize all the temple-mountains. They evoke divine residences
perched on top of concentric chains of insurmountable mountains surrounded by oceans, in the
image of Mount Meru. At Angkor Waft, the small courtyard situated at the same height as the
cruciform gallery on the second level, as well as those that surround the central sanctuary at the
summit of the pyramid, could even be likened to the primordial ocean, seat of repose of Vishnu
during his sleep between two cosmic eras. In fact, during the rainy season, these courtyards fill
with water. It is easy to imagine that on certain occasions, with the drainage systems blocked,
they were turned into basins.

Our last example of an “architecture-image” is that of Angkor Thom and the Bayon, an
immensely complicated monument with multiple meanings. The equivalence of the Bayon to
Mount Mandara has long been invoked to explain the birth of the city. Using Mount Mandara as
a churning rod, giants supporting the body of an immense serpent stir and agitate the Sea of Milk
just as the gods and demons have done from time immemorial. In Hindu mythology, the purpose
of stirring up the Sea of Milk was to obtain the elixir of immortality. This elixir appeared only
after the appearance of a certain number of other precious things, among them the goddess Sri
(Beauty, Prosperity), the elephant Airavata (the god Indra’s mount), or the aPsaras (celestial
nymphs). The churning myth also helps us to understand Angkor Thom, the city of Jayavarmnan
VII, as a source of benefits, treasures, or riches, and by extension, the source of prosperity of the
Khmer Empire itself. (See the Vishnu purâna [Book I, chapter 9] and the Bhâgavata
Purina [Book 8, chapters 6-11] for versions of this myth.)
In the case of Angkor Thom, however, several images are superimposed on one another.
Professor J. Eoisselier sees in the Eayon an image of the Room of Good Order
(Sudhammasabha) of Buddhist mythology.

Viewed this way, the monument’s striking towers covered with faces would be in
communication with the Brahman Sananlcumara (“perpetually young”), those who transmit the
teaching of Buddha to the Buddhist and Hindu divinities periodically reunited in the Room (Fig.
13). Angkor Thom thus becomes a replica on earth of the city of Indra—the king of the gods—at
the center of which this Room was built. Situated on the summit of Mount Meru, the city of
Indra is guarded by the four great kings of the East; it is their faces that one should recognize in
the monumental gates of Angkor Thom (Fig. 12). Moreover, 54 giant figures supporting a mas-
sive serpent are stationed on each side of the dikes crossing the moats; they recall the image of
the Churning of the Sea of Milk. We might go further and liken the giants to divine or semi-

26
divine armies assuring the protection of the city (see Le Bonheur 1989). And finally, the scene
recalls the symbolic equivalence of the serpent (nag) and the rainbow—a celestial bridge per-
mitting passage from the human world outside the city to the divine world created at the heart of
Angkor Thom by the Bayon itself (Fig. 14).

Diverse, evolving, permanent: Khmer architecture, of which the temple-mountain is at once the
best-known and most important expression, remains one of Asia’s major contributions to the
world’scultural patrimony. Despite the considerable number of studies, both general and specific,
devoted to it, it is far from having been completely explained. It still constitutes a field of
exploration and research as rich as the religious traditions that gave rise to it.

27