Researcher Kent Davis theorizes that the many carved images of women found throughout the temple complex hold the key to the origins and purpose of the ancient monuments.
Written by Jessie Beard – February 12, 2009
© 2009 The Phnom Penh Post – This article appears with the kind permission of the copyright holder. No further reproduction is permitted.
Kent Davis has spent years researching and photographing what he calls the devatas, or carved female images, that appear throughout the Angkor Wat temple complex. His theory is that the ancient religious site was actually conceived and wrought to glorify women and the "feminine principles they represent".
SIEM REAP, CAMBODIA – A TEAM of researchers, led by US educational program and marketing executive Kent Davis, is analysing 7,000 digital photos taken in November 2008 for a database that will attempt to unveil a mystery that’s been bugging Davis since he first visited Angkor Wat in November 2005.
He wants to determine why there are so many images of women in the temples, and he’s postulating a theory that Angkor wasn’t built to honour kings or gods, but to glorify women.
When Davis first came to Angkor, he immediately became fascinated by the carvings of women and instinctively felt they had been historically trivialised as decorations.
“I wasn’t prepared for the temple’s human side as realistic carvings of women greeted me. Quite clearly, the images of these women were a major part of the monument’s design and purpose,” he said.
“These women who are so extraordinary and so filled with significance that it’s incomprehensible they have remained unstudied and unappreciated in modern times. The fact that they have been hidden in plain sight during 150 years of intense Khmer scholarship is truly amazing.
“But a quantitative analysis could unlock the secrets these complex women have guarded for so long.”
Using a computer database, the project involves recording the diverse features of the women, enabling detailed analysis of them for the first time since they were carved.
Davis also departs from convention by referring to the women shown in temple carvings as devatas, not Apsaras.
“No one knows what the ancient Khmers called the women at Angkor Wat. I generally choose to use devata for historical and semantic reasons. About a hundred years ago, some scholars began using the Hindu term apsara, and that became more common over time.”
Davis’s use of the term devata and his quest to comprehensively analyse the collection of female carvings was also inspired by the work of a young French woman, Sappho Marchal, who began classifying the women by their attributes in her own personal drawings.
Marchal lived at Angkor Wat and was the daughter of the second curator of the Angkor Wat conservation program. She published a book, Costumes et parures Khmers d’apres les devata d’Angkor-Wat, in 1927, and when Davis discovered her writings, he became even more determined to finish what Marchal had started all those years ago.
Davis has already evaluated 259 carvings of women and expects to include over 1,800 carvings in his study. He said that once he amassed about 25,000 digital photos of the carvings he was studying, the sheer complexity required that a computer database be used.
But on April 17 last year, Davis’s project received a major setback – fire gutted his house and studio, destroying a collection of more than 2,000 books on the history of Southeast Asia. This included the manuscript he was preparing to republish, Angkor the Magnificent, originally written in 1924 by American socialite and Titanic survivor Helen Churchill Candee. [NOTE - Davis completed Angkor the Magnificent and it is now available on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk ]
The book is credited with introducing the concept of Cambodian tourism to Americans and Britons, and Davis’s revised version was scheduled to go to the publisher the day after the fire.
But the biggest setback was the destruction of Davis’s original notes and manuscripts on female statues at Angkor Wat, including 6 digital back ups of his 25,000 photos of the female carvings.
Not to be deterred, Davis returned to Angkor Wat last November to redo some photography.
“I had logistical help from three Cambodians and three European scientists in Cambodia. But due to the independent nature of the study, their contributions are unofficial.
“Now, the only limitations to progress are time and money. I have most of the photo data again and have built the database program. The process of preparing the images and inputting the data will be quite time-consuming.
“The first paper published will be a technical study I just completed with Michigan State University researchers using computer technology to analyse the faces of the 259 devata on the West Gopura.
“Beyond the database, I have an enormous amount of research data about the images in relation to Cambodian, Southeast Asian and South Asian culture. The introduction to this body of work will be published in the anthology to be called Daughters of Angkor Wat, through my publishing company DatAsia.
“Ultimately, my goal is to work with Cambodian researchers and the Apsara Authority.
“But the onus is on me to prepare substantial evidence before approaching them with my paradigm, which is that the primary reason Angkor Wat was built was to protect, honour and glorify these women, as well as the feminine principles that they represent.
“My view is that Angkor Wat is there because of the women.”
Related posts:
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- Top of Angkor Wat – Most Sacred Shrine Reopens to Visitors By Kent Davis Siem Reap, Cambodia – Towering above the...
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Many thanks, Sir, for these marvellous pictures and your nice researchs. These Apsaras, the mythical women of Angkor are the Dakinis, the kindly female divinities of Buddhism, almost exactly as we can see them with colours in the vision of the Dharmata Bardo process. It’s the most extraordinary experience in the life of a human being, one can never forget this! I could maybe help you in your investigations and would like to do it.
You have a great credit to pursue in this way after the fire of your house, which can be interpreted probly as a test by the Dakinis of your sincerity and real love for them. With my kindest regards.
Yours sincerely. P.O. Mojon, Switzerland.
Dear M. Mojon, Thank you for your encouragement and interesting comments. Yes, we accept the house fire as a test, and don’t regret it. Believe it or not, many good ideas came from that fire, but my commitment to honoring the women of Angkor never wavered. The devata of Angkor are Hindu, but it is interesting that you see them from a Buddhist perspective. I am now preparing a review of Miranda Shaw’s book \Buddhist Goddesses of India,\ a work that is quite enlightening in terms of the Khmer women at Angkor Wat. With best regards, Kent Davis
Dear Mr. Davis, many thanks for your kind answer and your relevant informations. About the Buddhist perspective for the Devata of Angkor, I would like to bring my own accurate testimony and short account of what I experimented. On May 21st of 1998, in a very difficult period of my life, I was meditating since 5 days without food and drink when the smiling face of Buddha appeared to me with many smaller celestial entities dancing around the Buddha’s head, which was shining in a yellow as made of pure gold whereas the divinities were glittering after waves of surrounding colours (mainly green) of an incredible brightness. The deities were undulating, vibrating and smiling in a strange sound of a very low intensity, a sort of humming. I was perfectly still and quiet, my eyes were closed and this unreal vision in my brain was made of an extraordinary, a fabulous keenness and beauty.
It was very near and similar to the appearance of your coloured pictures showing the famous Devata (Apsara) from Angkor and it’s because I immediately recognized them and their significance. The entities were full of compassion and I felt suddenly an incredible wellbeing in the center of my belly ! I had never felt someting like this and was comforted for the rest of my life ! In the end, I saw quickly the elephant head of Ganesha. The whole vision lasted a very long time, all the day, from the sunrise to the night. But for me, it seemed to be much shorter, just a moment ! I will never forget these miraculous appearances and feelings ! Since, I know undoubtly that exist other universes, dimensions and realities !
On the moment, I was conscious that something extraordinary happened to me, but I understood nothing to this phenomenon and was not able to explain it. Many years later, I found the famous Tibetan book “Bardo Thödol” with the description of someting very close to what I experimented, named as “Bardo of the Dharmata” and relating phenomenons and visions in the intermediate stage after the death and before a new birth, with the description of the Devata named “Dâkinîs”. Moreover, I realised that the 21st of May 1998 was the Ascension Day coinciding at this moment with the 3 days celebrating the Buddha (Vesak), and that the head of Ganesha of my vision was very comparable with the famous one of the Phnom Kulen near Angkor (National Geographic, vol. 16.6, n° 93, June 2007).
So, if I consider my way since 1998, all these elements seem to be highly symbolic and significant. The dramatic fire of your house and your documents was maybe intended to direct your researchs towards the discovery of a highest level of knowledges and reality. With my kindest regards. Yours sincerely. Pierre-Olivier Mojon