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Angkor Wat
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Angkor Wat (1113-1150 AD) pays homage to the sustainer of the Khmer cosmos, Vishu. Symbolizing Mount Meru, the center of the universe, it was built by Suryavarman II during the first half of the 12th century.
Angkor Wat, forming a rectangle of about 1,500 by 1,300 metres, covers an area - including its 190 metre wide moats - of nearly 200 hectares. The external enclosure wall defines an expanse of 1,025 metres by 800, or 82 hectares. It is the largest monument of the Angkor group.
Constructed to the south of the capital (Angkor Thom), Angkor Wat is sited in the south-east corner of the ancient city of Angkor - Yasodharapura - built by Yasovarman I, centred on Phnom Bakheng and which stretched between the Siem Reap river to the east and the dike of the Baray to the west.
Research has found that Angkor Wat is in fact a funerary temple, and the only one built during the life of the founding king - Suryavarman II - for his consecration, and probably also as a depository for his ashes.
Info from cambodianonline
45 files, last one added on Mar 07, 2006
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Banteay Samre
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About 20km northeast of Angkor Wat, just off the road to Banteay Srei, the Banteay Samre temple (1150-1175 AD) was built by Suryavarman II in the middle of the 12th century and has well preserved bas-reliefs of the Vishnu legends.
The Samres are an indigenous people of uncertain origin who populated the region at the foot of the Kulen hills. The inhabitants of Pradak are regarded as their descendants.
The monument's story tells of the accession to the throne of a poor farmer of Samre origin named Pou, who specialized in the cultivation of sweet cucumbers. He made homage of his first harvest to the king, who found them so succulent that he quickly secured exclusive rights, ordering Pou to kill anybody who should enter his chamcar (field).
During the rainy season when the cucumbers were scarce, the sovereign, impatient for their taste, went himself to visit his gardener. But arriving after nightfall and mistaken for a thief, he was mortally wounded by the farmer and was thus buried in the middle of the field.
The king had no direct descendants, thus they resorted to divine intervention by calling for the Victory Elephant to designate the new king. Stopping just in front of the sweet cucumber farmer, it saluted him, lowered its trunk between its feet, kneeled and, encircling him with its coiling trunk, placed him gently on its back.
After becoming king, the farmer exhumed the corpse of his predecessor to celebrate the funerary ceremony at the Mebon, followed by the rites of cremation at Pre Rup. The court dignitaries, humilified at being governed by a Samre, soon expressed their discontent by neglecting to show any respect. The king, unable to discipline them with either kindness or cruelty, left the Royal Palace and went to live at some distance from the city at Banteay Samre. There, he summoned his ministers who remained loyal to the attributes of the royalty and the regalia of the old king rather than to the Master himself. When he could take no more of the disloyal ministers, he called for the commode of his predecessor, and decapitated all those who chose to humiliate him. His reign followed from thenceforth.
Info from cambodianonline
14 files, last one added on Mar 07, 2006
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Ta Prohm
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Ta Prohm was built in the Bayon style largely in the late 12th and early 13th centuries (1186 AD). Located approximately one kilometre east of Angkor Thom and on the southern edge of the East Baray, it was built by King Jayavarman VII as a Mahayana Buddhist monastery and university.
One of the first temples begun in Jayavarman VII's massive building program, the temple's modern name means old Brahma, but the original name was Rajavihara (Royal Temple).
It was centred on veneration of the king's family. The main image (of Prajnaparamita, the personification of wisdom, installed in 1186) was modelled on his mother, while the two satellite temples in the third enclosure were dedicated to his guru (north) and his elder brother (south ). Expansions and additions continued as late as the rule of Srindravarman at the end of the 13th century. The temple's stele recorded that the site was home to more than 12,500 people, with a further 80,000 in surrounding villages helping to supply the institution. The temple amassed considerable riches, including gold, pearls and silks.
After the fall of the Khmer empire, the temple fell into neglect for centuries. When the effort to conserve and restore the temples of Angkor began in the early 20th century, Ta Prohm was chosen by the École française d'Extrême-Orient to be left largely as it was found as a "concession to the general taste for the picturesque" (Glaize).
Info from Wikipedia
24 files, last one added on Mar 07, 2006
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Angkor Thom
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Angkor Thom means the Great City. Jayavaman VII built the complex in 1190 AD, on the ruins of an ancient city once controlled by Udayadityavarman II (1056-1066). The exterior wall forms a large square, running 3-km long on each side with the Southern Gate guarded by Nagas 'churning the Milky Ocean'.
Angkor Thom encompasses a variety of important temples - Bayon, Baphuon, Phimeanakas, Terrace of the Leper King, and Terrace of the Elephant. With the Bayon at the center, the city stands on a slope and rainwater drains to a pond linked to the moats.
Unlike Angkor Wat, which was dedicated to the Hindu god Vishnu, Angkor Thom is a Buddhist monument. The giant faces that surmount the gateways are not those of any gods in the Hindu pantheon but of a 'Bodhisattva' known in Cambodia as Lokesvara, and to Buddhists elsewhere as Avalokitesvara, the Lord who looks in every direction. The serene and meditative features, which show both masculine power and a curious, rounded femininity, are thought to be modeled on those of the god-King Jayavarman VII (ruled AD 1181-1219), the builder of Angkor Thom.
When the star-map of 10,500 is transported to the ground, the perimeter wall of Angkor Thom delimits a sacred enclosure drawn around the breast or heart of the Naga constellation of Draco. At the exact geometrical centre of this enclosure, where the diagonals cross over the 'heart' itself, looms the breathtaking edifice known as the Bayon - which is regarded as Jayavarman VIII's finest architectural achievement. - Graham Hancock - Heaven's Mirror p.193
Info from cambodianonline
45 files, last one added on Mar 07, 2006
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Tonle Sap
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The Tonlé Sap (meaning Large Fresh Water River but more commonly translated as Great Lake) is a combined lake and river system of huge importance to Cambodia.
It is the largest freshwater lake in South East Asia and is an ecological hotspot that was designated as an UNESCO biosphere in 1997.
For most of the year the lake is fairly small, around one meter deep and with an area of 2,700 square km. During the monsoon season however, the Tonle Sap river which connects the lake with the Mekong river reverses its flow. Water is pushed up from the Mekong into the lake, increasing its area to 16,000 square km and its depth to up to nine meters, flooding nearby fields and forests. This provides a perfect breeding ground for fish and makes the Tonle Sap ecosystem one of the most productive inland fisheries in the world, supporting over 3 million people and providing over 75% of Cambodia's annual inland fish catch and 60% of the Cambodians' protein intake. At the end of the rainy season, the flow reverses and the fish are carried downriver.
The receding waters also leave nutrient rich deposits of sediment in the surrounding area creating prime agricultural land for the rest of the year.
Due to this, a large community of fishermen and farmers have sprouted up along the coast with many living in 'water-homes'.
Info from Wikipedia
27 files, last one added on Mar 07, 2006
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Kampong Cham
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Kampong Cham is the capital of the Cambodian province of Kampong Cham. It is the third largest city in Cambodia with a population of 63,771 people (2006) and is located on the Mekong River. Kampong Cham is 124 kilometers northeast from Phnom Penh and can be reached by either boats or a recently constructed asphalt road.
Kampong Cham is home to the largest minority group in Cambodia, the Muslim Chams.
The Chams are descended from refugees of the kingdom of Champa, which once ruled much of Vietnam between Cao Ha in the north and Bien Hoa in the south. In 1471 Champa was conquered by the Vietnamese, and many Chams fled to Cambodia. They settled along the Tonle Sap and Mekong rivers and in Batdambang, Pouthisat, Takev, Kampot, Kampong Cham, Kampong Thum, and Kampong Chhnang provinces. At some time before the seventeenth century, the Cambodian Cham and some of those in adjacent Vietnam converted to Islam, probably as a result of contacts with their Malay kin who had embraced that religion centuries earlier.
Info from countrystudies
21 files, last one added on Mar 07, 2006
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