Banteay Chhmar protects thousands of square meters of historical carvings, like this scene showing traitors executed during a rebellion.

Banteay Chhmar, Cambodia — The remote Khmer temple of Banteay Chhmar is one of the most intriguing ancient shrines in Cambodia because much of the site remains hidden, 800 years after it was built. This includes thousands of square feet of detailed bas-relief carvings that remains buried, unseen since the stone walls collapses centuries ago.

The Cambodian government is working to have Banteay Chhmar listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, like the Angkor Heritage Park and the Khmer temple of Preah Vihear. Three partners supporting the efforts of the government and local authorities are the Global Heritage Fund (GHF), Community Based Tourism (CBT) and Heritage Watch International.

Andrew Marino, an educator with extensive Asian experience, is now working for Heritage Watch International teaching English to CBT workers at the site. He also maintains the Visit Banteay Chhmar website and posted these two videos produced by Agir Pour le Cambodge and Global Heritage Fund respectively. The films give viewers worldwide a chance to experience this unique and remote temple, as well as understanding more about the restoration and community development efforts underway.

Banteay Chhmar Community Based Tourism

The legendary history of Banteay Chhmar and a look at how the local community-based tourism (CBT) group is beginning to offer temple tours, homestays and educational activities including traditional music, silk weaving, bird watching etc. Originally supported by Agir Pour le Cambodge (APLC) the CBT is now supported by Global Heritage Fund (GHF) which is conserving the temple.

Global Heritage Fund at Banteay Chhmar

An overview of the Global Heritage Fund’s (GHF) conservation project of the Banteay Chhmar Temple in Banteay Chhmar, Cambodia. The 12th century Angkorian temple bears startling bas-reliefs of Angkorian-era life and Bayon-style face towers similar to those found at Bayon Temple, near Angkor Wat.

RELATED Banteay Chhmar LINKS

Banteay Chhmar 1937 – George Groslier’s 1937 account of this ancient Khmer City

Banteay Chhmar – Working to Save Another Angkor Wat

Global Heritage Fund

Heritage Watch International

The Khmer temple of Preah Vihear is located in Cambodia, as resolved by the International Court of Justice in their ruling on June 15, 1962. Photo by Kent Davis.

Strasbourg - The European Parliament has issued a strongly worded resolution seeking to end fighting between the armed forces of Thailand and Cambodia near the Khmer temple of Preah Vihear on the Cambodian-Thai border. (download a PDF of the resolution here)

Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the ruling by the International Court of Justice on June 15, 1962 that irrevocably ruled that the temple stood on Cambodian soil. Despite this, violence erupted in the area again in early February, resulting in fatalities to soldiers and the displacement of innocent civilians on both sides.

According to media reports, shelling from Thailand during the recent clash has caused serious damage to the ancient Khmer temple itself. UNESCO listed Preah Vihear as a World Heritage site on July 7, 2008. The European Parliament notes that the international community has a special responsibility to preserve this monument.

This troupe of dancers from the Nginn Karet Foundation gathered at Preah Vihear to perform a dance of peace in August 2010.

Respecting a Sacred Site

Sadly, to Khmer and Hindu people throughout the world, the temple of Preah Vihear is a spiritual site that deserves respect above the affairs of governments and armies.

To honor the temple’s sacred nature, a special group of children gathered there on August 17, 2010 to perform a religious ceremony of rare intensity called a “buong suong“. At that time, sixty-two young girls danced a sacred ritual praying for peace.

All the children are students at the Conservatoire NKFC Samdech Preah Ream Buppha Devi, the first school of Cambodian dance to operate under the Royal Patronage of HRH Princess Buppha Devi.

The peace ritual was organized by Ravynn Karet Coxen, founder of the Nginn-Karet Foundation for Cambodia, as part of her ongoing effort to bring purity and respect to Khmer temples throughout the region. Though unable to return to Preah Vihear due to the fighting, the NKFC troupe conducted another peace ritual 12 km from the Cambodian-Thai border on February 10, 2011, at the temple of Banteay Chhmar.

These children join people throughout the world who wish to see the sanctity of this and every sacred Khmer temple respected.

Other Resources

Click here to download a PDF of the European Parliament resolution on the border clashes between Thailand and Cambodia (117k)

Sacred Dance Arts Sooth Cambodian Souls

Cambodia Complains of Google Map Mistake at Preah Vihear

Preah Vihear on Wikipedia

Preah-Vihear.com – Useful maps and historical information

Khmer Temple Photo Index

Elegy: Reflections on Angkor by John McDermott

McDermott first visited Cambodia in the mid-1990s, when the country was still recovering from decades of civil war and genocide. When he returned again in 2000, the photographer committed himself to recording the ancient ruins of the mysterious Khmer civilization that were still untouched and unknown to most of the world.

Faces on The Bayon by John McDermott

The Khmer Empire flourished from the 9th to the 14th centuries, but its magnificent capital of Angkor — with temples covering almost 250 square miles — was virtually abandoned to the jungle upon its collapse.

In the late 19th century, French explorer Henri Mouhot brought the civilization to the attention of the West for the first time. Since then, the Angkor archaeological complex has welcomed an increasing number of international tourists and researchers. Some two million visitors are expected this year.

McDermott’s vision was to create a comprehensive portrait of the temples in a timeless style mirroring the mystery of a place that has almost no written history. As the book and exhibit reveal, McDermott’s images were made before this major influx of tourism changed the character of these remote jungle ruins. Sadly, many of the views McDermott captured in his photographs are no longer visible due to changes in infrastructure and restoration efforts.

Hailed as “the Ansel Adams of Angkor” by The New York Times, McDermott’s body of work reveals “a moody, surrealistic world redolent with the mysterious spirit one encounters when visiting.”

The exhibit at the Sundaram Tagore gallery includes sepia-toned silver gelatin prints and archival pigment ink prints. To create his vision, McDermott uses specialized black and white film and strong darkroom interpretation.

His book, Elegy: Reflections on Angkor, was released in 2010. His photographs are on display as part of the permanent collection in the National Museum in Phnom Penh, and are held in private collections around the world.

Oprah Winfrey choses “Elegy: Reflections on Angkor” as a Book to Watch

Oprah has chosen “Elegy: Reflections on Angkor” as one of “18 Books to Watch” in April 2011.

American-born photographer John McDermott has been dubbed the “Ansel Adams of Angkor”—and you can see why: His moody photos of Cambodian temples are full of light and shadow as befits both ancient peoples and current circumstance.

— Sara Nelson

For more information please visit:

Images of Asia – John McDermott Photography

Angkor Thom gate by John McDermott.

By Darryl Collins - Independent Scholar
Reprinted with the permission of UDAYA – Journal of Khmer Studies

Banteay Chhmar, CAMBODIA — In early March 1924, an automobile entourage had already passed through Battambang, Mongkol Borei and Sisophon before arriving at Banteay Chhmar. Photographs – possibly taken by George Groslier [footnotes at bottom - i] (1887-1945) himself, of governors’ residences, schools, a post office [ii] and court witness their passage en route to Banteay Chhmar.

School, teacher & students at Sisophon in 1924. © National Museum of Cambodia

However, it is most likely the photograph of the arrival of the motorcade on the 9 March 1924 was restaged for posterity (top photo) as a wooden glass-plate camera and tripod would almost certainly have travelled as part of the on-board luggage. Presumably the camera was positioned, and either a mechanical timer used, or someone on hand recorded this event. Parts of a glass-plate camera (possibly equipment used by Groslier), remain in the collection of the National Museum of Cambodia (below).

Incomplete glass-plate camera (equipment possibly used by George Groslier) Collection: National Museum of Cambodia

A hand-written caption under the image states ‘Arrivée à Banteai Chhmar des premières automobiles parvenues au temple’: stamped and dated ‘Mars 1924’, is further registered as ‘H181; Dim (Sunday) 9-3-1924’.

The cars display numbered licence plates: P.P.466 (rear vehicle) and P.P.72 (front vehicle). [iii] A car expert has suggested that

“the PP466 car looks to be very similar to an early 1900-29 Renault (Frenchmade); the identifying feature being the unusual engine bonnet, which had the radiator behind the engine on the firewall, rather than up front behind the grill. However, I have found other French manufacturers La Buire and Clement-Bayard also used this design around this time.”

Further, “on a second look at these cars I noticed that the car nearest to the camera has solid steel wheels which dates this car closer to 1924, the other with wire spokes, probably a little earlier.” [iv]

Illustrated advertisement: Sociéte des Transports et Messageries d’Indochine: Phnom Penh-Saigon: Auto-cars voyageurs. 1928.

Advertisements for auto-cars (1928 & 1930) include maps depicting routes ex Phnom Penh via Sisophon across the Siamese border to the rail-head at Aranyaprathet. The trip in 1924 would have been a hot and arduous one, as the temple lies some 60km from Sisophon, and even today can only be reached by an uneven dirt road.

Illustrated advertisement: Sociéte des Transports et Messageries d’Indochine: Phnom Penh-Saigon: Auto-cars voyageurs, 1930.

Personages in the Banteay Chhmar arrival photograph remain a mystery; of the eight figures in the two cars, five are almost certainly Cambodians (interpreters, guides and drivers); only three appear to be Caucasian – one in the rear car and two seated in the front car, turning to face the camera. Assuming the cars departed from Phnom Penh, together with the photographic evidence and museum interests at heart, one of the foreigners in the picture must be George Groslier.

A fourth foreign figure leaning on a walking stick, stands poised as if to welcome the group (was he resident and already working at the temple)? The sturdy wooden thatched pavilion in front of the vehicles surrounded by a fence with a decorative gate certainly lends an air of permanence to the site. Set in the dry, freshly leveled earth are three sandstone heads (deva) with newly planted native vegetation to provide a suggestion of a garden path approach to the sala (open air structure). The stone heads would have originated from the figures of gods and demons grasping the serpent Vasuki that originally flanked one of the causeways to the temple compound.

The only other witnesses to this event are three shadowy figures of curious local Khmer (to the left of the vehicles) and one solitary figure under a small thatch hut to the right, viewing the arrival of the motorcade. The comparatively short shadows under the cars suggest an early afternoon arrival.

Governor’s residence, Sisophon, 1924. © National Museum of Cambodia

George Groslier prophetically wrote in 1924, “The collection of photographs owned by the Musée Albert Sarraut is of inestimable value. Fortunate acquisitions allowed us to gather documentation over the last 30 years or so. Most of the images are purely documentary. The conditions under which some of them were taken and the difficulties associated with their conservation in Indochina, has resulted in some low contrast prints, however, they are of sufficient quality for study.”[v]

School, teacher & students, Mongkol Borei. © National Museum of Cambodia

Although photographs of the Banteay Chhmar complex were taken as early as 1914, [vi] ten years later in 1924, [vii] and again in 1932, [viii] Groslier was not to write of the temple until some four years after in his 1936 article “Troisième recherche sur les Cambodgiens” [ix], followed the next year by “Banteai Chhmar, ville ancienne du Cambodge.” [x]

Courthouse, Sisophon, 1924. © National Museum of Cambodia

George Groslier’s son, Bernard Philippe Groslier, writing of his father, headed the tribute: ‘George Groslier, French painter, writer and archaeologist: 4 February 1887-18 June 1945 (Phnom Penh, Cambodge).’ [xi]

In addition, could be added the terms ‘museologist’ and ‘photographer,’ for as the founding director of what is now the National Museum of Cambodia, the cataloguing and documenting of his milieu and the growing collection of masterpieces of Khmer art for public display, is arguably his greatest legacy.

References cited

Anon., undated catalogue: Musée A. Sarraut: Service Photographique: Inventaire des Clichés, National Museum of Cambodia.

Groslier, George, Hanoi, 1924. Catalogue Général du Musée du Cambodge (Musée Albert Sarraut).

Groslier, George, ‘Troisième recherche sur les Cambodgiens’, BEFEO XXXV : 159-206.

Groslier, George, Paris, 1937. ‘Bantéai Chhmar, ville ancienne du Cambodge’, L’Illustration, 3 April, no. 4909.

Various contributors, Paris, 1992. Disciplines Croisées : Hommage à Bernard Philippe Groslier, Editions de l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Direction générale de la Coopération culturelle, scientifique et technique.

Footnotes

[ii] The post office at Svay Sisophon was originally among a number of telegraphic and postal services handed over by Siam to the French colonial administration at the time of retrocession of the provinces of Battambang, Sisophon and Siem Reap in 1907.

[iii] P.P. presumably standing for Phnom Penh; these vehicles were most likely rented for the occasion; automobile taxi services commence operations slightly later in Phnom Penh on 1 May 1925.

[iv] Quotes courtesy Gordon McPherson, vintage car enthusiast, Adelaide, South Australia.

[v] Groslier 1924.

[vi] ibid., nos. 670-716.

[vii] Anon., undated catalogue, National Museum of Cambodia, L43-55; P57-63; R99-102.

[viii] ibid., L86-133.

[ix] Groslier 1936.

[x] Groslier 1937: 352-357

[xi] Various contributors 1992: 59.

Banteay Chhmar government building, 1924. © National Museum of Cambodia

About UDAYA – Journal of Khmer Studies

Udaya is the leading scholarly journal of Khmer culture and art. Since 2005, Friends of Khmer Culture has sponsored production of the journal, edited by .

The Sanskrit word udaya means “rising sun”. The UDAYA Journal also represents a dawn and rebirth for the reemergence of Khmer scholarship after decades of civil unrest in Cambodia. The journal includes articles from leading experts on both the cultural past of Cambodia as well as modern ideas about the evolution of Khmer society.

Udaya is an annual publication with articles in Khmer, English and French. For PDF information and a Table of Contents from each issue,  click the following links:  Issue I, 2000; Issue II, 2001; Issue III, 2002; Issue IV, 2003; Issue V, 2004; Issue VI, 2005; Issue VII, 2006; Issue VIII, 2007; Issue IX, 2008

For info on subscriptions or single issue purchases please email udaya@khmerculture.net.

One of eight Lokesvara images originally carved on the temple walls of Banteay Chhmar. Four of these were looted in 1992 (see missing wall on right). The Global Heritage Fund and other agencies (see links below) are now actively preserving and restoring the historic temple.

Banteay Chhmar Information Resources

Global Heritage Fund

Heritage Watch International

Cambodia Community Based Eco-Tourism Network

Banteay Chhmar Heritage Conference Website

Archaeological Institute of America – Banteay Chhmar Site Preservation Grant

Article – Banteay Chhmar: healing the scars of looting

Article – Banteay Chhmar – Ancient Khmer City in Cambodia (1933 article)

62 barefoot dancers gather at the temple of Preah Vihear on the tense Cambodian-Thai border to perform a sacred ritual for peace led by Ravynn Karet-Coxen (right).

A religious ceremony of rare intensity took place August 17 in the temple of Preah Vihear, where sixty-two young girls danced a sacred ritual to pray for peace. Originating the event was Ravynn Karet Coxen, founder of the Nginn-Karet Foundation for Cambodia.

By Frédéric Amat

© 2010 Cambodge Soir – This translation of the original article appears with the permission of the copyright holder. No further reproduction is permitted.

PREAH VIHEAR, CAMBODIA — Sixty-two girls, entirely dressed in white reminiscent of Rome’s Vestal Virgins, performed a Buong Suong (sacred ritual) before the astonished eyes of soldiers stationed in the heart of Preah Vihear temple, which is located four hours by road from Siem Reap.

All the dancers come from impoverished families living in the villages of Banteay Srey district, which is considered to be the cradle of the Khmer culture. All attend classes at the Conservatoire Buppha Devi, which was founded by the Nginn Karet Foundation and named for its Royal Patron. With specialized dance and music teachers, the Conservatoire offers these disadvantaged children from farming families the opportunity to learn the refined disciplines of classical dance, folk dance, music and shadow theater thereby discovering their country’s ancient culture and learning traditional Cambodian values.

The troupe of Nginn Karet Foundation dancers gather at Preah Vihear

According to Ravynn, “our institution doesn’t aim to train these young artists to later work in the tourist venues of nearby Siem Reap town. The arts we teach develop the spirit, mind and body by creating close communion with nature. These young dancers train to perform sacred rituals that honor and invoke our gods with the pure respect of our ancestral traditions.

“These rituals, and their associated gestures, have been developed over a thousand years to petition the heavens to bless our country and to attract prosperity and abundance to our land. Today, Angkor’s temples are perceived more for tourism or for their archaeological aspects, but rarely for their spiritual quality, which is a pity. Our goal is to re-sanctify our ancestor’s temples with these purifying rites”.

Sacred dancers ascending Preah Vihear temple with offerings of peace.

For these young artists, discipline is strict. They are required to regularly attend the training six half-days every week; the other half-days being devoted to academic studies.

In the Hindu (not Buddhist) ritual that took place at Preah Vihear — as for other ceremonies previously organized by Ravynn and members of her foundation — the dancers must be “pure”, which is to say virgins. They are not adorned with makeup or jewelry, so as to enhance the beauty of the gestures and to preserve the piety of the rites.

Gathering Lustral Water at Preah Vihear's sacred pond Srea Meas.

The adornments and offerings are therefore natural, carved by the dancers and teachers from banana trunks or designed with plants, flowers and fruits, each having a specific symbolic meaning.

“The same is true of our Institution of Royalty, which is paramount for the Khmer because it represents the divine presence on earth and the protection of the Kingdom. In accord with the ideals of the Devaraja religion of Jayavarman II, prayers, incantations and pilgrimages are all necessary to strengthen the soul of our country. I fundamentally believe that when the sacred sites have been respected as such, and re-sanctified, Cambodia will regain peace.

“It is with this goal that we organized this sacred ritual at Preah Vihear with 62 dancers. This number is not without significance, by the way. It commemorates the irrevocable judgment of the International Court of Justice of The Hague, delivered in 1962, that granted Cambodia the right to regain the sovereignty of Preah Vihear,” explains Ravynn, whose father, Nginn Karet, participated in the World Court proceedings as an expert engineer geographer.

The sacred dancers began their blessing ritual at the foot of the mountain.

So, at Preah Vihear, sixty-two dancers, candles and sticks of incense in hand, ascended hundreds of temple steps, from the mountain’s base to its final courtyard. The young ladies gently and beautifully invoked the names of all the Khmer gods, royal spirits, kings, spiritual masters, ancestors and the leaders of modern Cambodia, as they stopped at each Gopura (an entry structure on each level) to perform special ceremonies using lustral water gathered from the temple’s sacred pond of Srea Meas.

As the sacred ritual concluded storm clouds gathered and raindrops fell -- to the dancers it was a sign that their gods had heard their pleas for peace.

Focused on their ritual dance they reached the highest point at the edge of a cliff, offering their final prayers for tensions to subside so that this sacred site is again peaceful.

When all nine dance rituals were complete the witnesses were awed to see the sky darken. Within minutes lighting flashed, thunder rumbled and heavy rain descended near the mountain. On the top, only a mist of spray touched the gathered troupe of dancers, who saw it as a sign that the gods had heard their plea and accepted the Buong Suong.

This was the first time in many centuries that a sacred Hindu rite was celebrated in Preah Vihear temple; a rite for peace, at the summit of Cambodia, in this sanctuary mid-way between Heaven and Earth.

***

Cambodge Soir is the most important French language newspaper published in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. It is distributed throughout the country and is available online for purchase by the single issue or by subscription (online edition).

Angkor Wat contains 12th century portraits of 1,796 individual women. They were clearly part of a "social network". American researcher Kent Davis asks "Was this temple an ancient Facebook"?

Andrew Buncombe reports from Asia for the UK Independent

Angkor, Cambodia — Amid the splendour of the 12th-century temple of Angkor Wat, they stand and stare like silent sentinels, sensuous rather than erotic, carved with elegance and care. But exactly who are these 1,796 mysterious women and why, more than a century after Cambodia’s famed Hindu temple was rediscovered by Western archaeologists, did it take the efforts of an amateur researcher from Florida to push experts into trying to resolve the puzzle?

Researcher Kent Davis at Angkor Wat.

Though Kent Davis had lived in South-east Asia during the 1990s, he did not have an opportunity to see Angkor Wat until 2005. Like most visitors to the huge complex in the centre of the Cambodia, for many years cut off from the outside world because of the presence of the Khmer Rouge, he was mesmerised by the experience.

But he was also left with a flurry of questions. “I went to Angkor as a tourist and I was startled when I got there and saw these women,” said Mr Davis, 54, a publisher and writer who now lives near Tampa, Florida. “I was not prepared for it. The human element of them struck me and I wanted to know who they were. I asked one of the guides and he said they were there to serve the king after he went to heaven.”

Mr Davis’s interest was tweaked, so he wanted to know more. He vowed he would return to the US and investigate. Yet when he got home he found there was essentially nothing written about these women, who appear throughout the temple complex in full body carvings.

The women of Angkor Wat appear to include different Asian ethnicities.

Indeed, the only study of the female carvings he could find had been made in the early 20th century by Sappho Marchal, the daughter of Frenchman Henri Marchal, then the curator of the temple site. Frustrated but intrigued, he decided he would find out for himself. Five years and several trips to Angkor later, Mr Davis has slowly begun to get some answers.

MSU researchers plotted 130 identification points on each face.

In 2008, he asked for the help of computer experts from the University of Michigan. That team was able to conduct facial mapping experiments on digital photographs of the women, or devatas. The team, whose findings were presented last month at the International Conference on Pattern Recognition, an academic convocation in Istanbul, concluded that there were at least eight different facial types, perhaps reflecting a variety of ethnicities in the Khmer kingdom.

The results are to be examined further by archaeologists and more computer mapping is planned. But for all the effort that went into the mapping, the results of which were published in DatAsia magazine, many questions about the women remain unanswered.

“It’s a 12th century Facebook,
but no one has ever heard of this social network.”

“There are almost 1,800 faces there,” said Mr Davis, who now uses 65 separate characteristics to define the individual women in a devata database. “It’s a 12th century Facebook, but no one has ever heard of this social network. This was the biggest temple the Khmer people ever built. It is still the largest religious structure on Earth! It must have been important to them because they threw everything into it. They would have only put their most important images into it; these women must have been incredibly important to the kingdom.”

Mr Davis wrote to universities, pestered experts, and sought the opinions of people from around the globe who had worked at Angkor. Trude Jacobson, an assistant professor of history at the University of Queensland, Australia, and author of Lost Goddesses: Denial of Female Power in Cambodian History, said: “Kent is an enthusiastic researcher of a question that everyone assumed was settled long ago, or doesn’t matter.

Each of the 1,796 women at Angkor Wat is unique.

“The history of women in Cambodia, until very recently, has been one in which they were relegated to the shadows. His interest is infectious and has made others more interested in questions of gender in an otherwise heavily masculinised historical inquiry.”

What has struck Mr Davis as he has continued his enquiries, is that for all the women at Angkor there are relatively few male carvings.”Could these different women represent the different professions of the Khmer kingdom?” he said. “Could they be scholars, agriculturalists? I think they must represent the most important women in the kingdom.”

Dr Peter Sharrock, an expert on South-east Asia at London’s School of African and Oriental Studies, has studied the temples around Angkor for years. “We understand [the female carvings] little but they play a major role in the architectural sculpture of these temples, which must imply a major role in the beliefs of the ancient Khmers and in the rituals in their temples,” he said.

“Khmer descent was primarily matrilineal, and Khmer women were literate and powerful. Many were queens, and most kings base their genealogies and claims to the throne on their female ancestors. The ancient Khmers venerated the goddess Prajnaparamita in the most elaborate cult to her known anywhere in Asia. So there are fundamental questions here about an exceptional female religious and regal role in ancient Cambodia that remain unanswered.”

Despite 150 years of experts purporting that the women of Angkor Wat are imaginary, Davis contends that they are realistic, accurate portraits of actual women who were members of the royal Khmer court.

Professor Jacobson believes the images were part of a broader iconography relating to the supernatural world. “The devatas, placed either side of doorways, were guards who monitored who was permitted access from the mundane world to the supernatural,” she said.

“[Those] represented as flying or dancing, were responsible for leading the souls of the dead to the supernatural world from the battlefield. The models for the images at Angkor were doubtless members of the royal family.”

Despite the abundance of women at Angkor Wat, not a single man is honored with the same type of portrait carving.

Mr Davis said he was dedicated to trying to throw greater light on the mystery of the carvings by working with the team of researchers he has cultivated. At this point, he said, starting to analyse the images was like “being the first person to get a map to the British Museum and the keys to the front door”.

He added: “Once we define facial types more thoroughly, an incredibly exciting prospect appears. If these images are portraits of actual people, it’s logical to assume that they had children within this region, and that creates the possibility of using facial pattern recognition on people living in this area to see if facial shapes and types seen at Angkor still live here. We could actually find the descendants of some of the sacred women in the temple.”

Angkor Wat, the icon of Cambodia's Khmer Empire reflects in a sacred pond.

Angkor Wat – Symbol of a nation

• The sprawling temple complex of Angkor Wat, located amid dense jungle and close to the city of Siem Reap, was built in the early 12th century and is one of a series of stunning palaces and temples that were built over a 400-year period by the Khmer Kingdom.
• Today, the temples attract up to a million tourists a year, but for many years the remarkable buildings were unknown to the West, which only “rediscovered” them in the 19th century. During the 1970s and 1980s they were off-limits as a result of the presence of the Khmer Rouge, the Maoist-inspired rebels who ruled Cambodia from 1975-79 and who then engaged in a bitter civil war for the next two decades.
• Angkor Wat itself, the most impressive and best-preserved of the complexes, was built for King Suryavarman II in the early part of the 12th century and is dedicated to the Hindu god Vishnu. It has since become a symbol of Cambodia, even appearing on its national flag.

Angkor Wat at dawn.

Angkor Wat central towers in Vizerra 3D model

By Kent Davis – Devata.org

Santa Clara, CA – Virtual reality innovators at 3DreamTeam dazzled DEMO conference attendees with 3D technology that brings the world’s most amazing heritage sites directly to your computer. The Cambodian temple of Angkor Wat is one of 20 initial projects for the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Sites.

The incredibly detailed Vizerra locations allow virtual visitors to walk through Angkor Wat, Machu Picchu, Petra, Red Square, Swayambhunath Stupa, Stonehenge, the Taj Mahal and more.

Vizerra's 3D model of Angkor Wat allows you to explore the entire site by air or on the ground.

In our 2009 article, “Virtual or Reality? 12 amazing 3D comparison photos of Angkor Wat”, side by side comparisons show the Vizerra reality almost identical to being at Angkor Wat. Since then, 3DreamTeam has continued refining their stunning Angkor Wat model using detailed photographs of devata (sacred female) portraits, surface textures and blueprints provided by Devata.org.

Vizerra's Angkor Wat model includes devata (sacred female) images. The technology will soon allow links to location specific data and high resolution photos.

3DreamTeam is now working directly with NVIDIA, the leading developers of 3D hardware technology. Games and movies comprise most 3D content now available but 3DreamTeam is expanding consumer and educational applications with its Vizerra technology.

NOTE: Vizerra software and location models are available as a free download to users worldwide:

System Requirements – Recommended

Intel Core 2 Duo / AMD 64 X2 5200+
GeForce 8800 GTX / ATI Radeon HD 4770
4Gb RAM
Broadband Internet connection (at least 2560 Kbit/s)

Minimum

Pentium 2.4 GHz / AMD Athlon XP 2500+
NVidia GeForce 6800 / ATi Radeon X850
2Gb RAM
2Gb free hard disk space
Internet connection (at least 30 Kbit/s)

Angkor Wat 3D Photos from Vizerra

Angkor Wat's West Gopura (Gate) viewed from the north in Vizerra's 3D model.

Angkor Wat in Vizerra 3D model, viewed from Southwest.

Angkor Wat's causeway facing east, with a library structure on the left.

Angkor Wat's cruciform gallery is accurately ringed with devata in Vizerra's 3D model

Vizerra is refining devata (sacred female) portraits in new versions of the software. In the future, the 3D model will show the carvings in accurate locations linked to a database.

The Northwest corner of Angkor Wat in Vizerra's 3D model.

Angkor Wat's bas relief galleries now show textures but will soon accurately render the artwork.

Khmer bronze yogini with clues to Southeast Asian Tantric rituals.

The Yogini, beautiful, wildly fierce females frequently shown dancing on corpses, derive their iconography from obscure Vedic, village, and tantric sources, and should not be confused with charming celestial females known as apsara, as will be discussed later.

Yoginis dance on corpses in a Tantric ritual at the Khmer temple in Pimai, Thailand.

Trained as ‘yogic-sexual assistants,’ yogini were indispensable in the Hevajra cult, resulting in a need for a significant number of women able to perform the necessary Tantric temple-rituals.* The Chinese Superintendent of Maritime Trade in thirteenth-century Guangzhou, Zhao Rukuo, mentions the presence of foreign women in Khmer temples.

“In Chenla [Cambodia], the people are devout Buddhists. In the temples there are 300 foreign women; they dance and offer food to the Buddha. They are called a-nan…”

Their description as a-nan (Skt. Bliss) suggests an erotic role in temple rituals.*

The Khmer Yogini dancer has distinctly foreign features.

Detail of Tantric yogini dancer with third eye marking.

Such a role attributed to yogini may not have resonated with Khmer women, resulting in the need for foreign women to fulfill the required Tantric temple-rituals.

Zhao’s statement may explain this unusual little bronze dancing yogini who is not Khmer but Negrito, confirming Zhao’s statement concerning foreign women in Buddhist temples. Negritos are known to have inhabited parts of Peninsular Thailand and the Malay Peninsula.

The Negrito yogini wears a sampot chang kben that dips low in front, is adorned with a pectoral with pendants front and back, and displays an empty socket in back for a butterfly bow, all characteristics of the second half of the eleventh century.

A third eye marking her forehead and her dance pose, in which the raised right foot touches the left thigh, are typical Tantric yogini characteristics.

To date, this is a rare image of an obvious foreigner in Khmer art.

* Citing the work of Dr Peter D. Sharrock, SOAS, including “The Yoginis of the Bayon” and “Garuda, Vajrapani and religious change in Jayavarman VII’s Angkor”. Please see the final publication for full citations.

Rear view of Khmer yogini bronze showing sampot chang kben.

Emmy Bunker

About the Author

Emma C. Bunker, a research consultant to the Denver Art Museum’s Asian Art Department, specializes in the arts of ancient China, the Eurasian Steppes, and Southeast Asia. Links to two of her publications relating to Khmer art appear below:

Adoration and Glory

Khmer Gold

The restored temple of Chau Say Tevoda. Note the new stone sections in lighter color.

Between 1,120-1,150AD, Angkor Wat’s sponsor, King Suryavarman II, also began building the elegant Hindu temple of Chau Say Tevoda. Yasovarman II is credited with additional work during his brief reign (1,160-1,166AD). Finally, Jayavarman VII (ruling 1,181-1,215 AD) added new decorative elements to harmonize with the religious transformation he initiated converting the state from Hinduism to Buddhism.

The central shrine is encircled by sacred female images called devata.

Two of the Khmer civilization’s greatest kings, Suryavarman II and Jayavarman VII, also installed the greatest number of sacred female images, or devata, in their temples. The style and unique qualities of the devata at Chao Say Tevoda make this small temple well worth a detour on any visit to Angkor.

The Khmer kings Suryavarman II and Jayavarman VII enshrined images of more than 4,000 sacred women in their temples. No one knows exactly why.

Chau Say Tevoda includes a central sanctuary, two libraries and four gopura (gateway) structures, one for each cardinal point. Directly to its north sits Thommanon temple, which was also built by King Suryavarman II based on a similar design.

Thommanon also features prominent devata in fine condition (see Devata.org’s Thommanon photo gallery here) but there are significant stylistic differences in the women populating the two temples. For years, Thommanon was in far better condition thanks to extensive restoration done by the EFEO in the 1960’s under the direction of Bernard Philippe Groslier.

Many of the women at Chao Say Tevoda express strength in their beauty.

Unfortunately, Chao Say Tevoda had been devastated by centuries of natural erosion, and all that remained were 4,000 pieces of stone masonry, many of which had tumbled down an embankment into the Siem Reap River.

On March 29, 2000, H.R.H. Princess Buppha Devi with APSARA Authority and other Cambodian dignitaries welcomed H.E. Yang Tin Ai, Ambassador for the People’s Republic of China as his government initiated a massive restoration project of the temple that included both Chinese and Cambodian workers. Tim Tye’s Asia Explorers website offers a few excellent photos taken while the restoration.

The Chinese restoration project was controversial because they chose to totally reconstruct the temple buildings by including newly fabricated stones. While American and Japanese teams rejected this approach it conformed to UNESCO and ICOMOS guidelines allowing for their use of 2-9% of modern replica stones in heritage reconstruction.

The Chinese restoration team included replicas of missing stone sections (seen above in lighter colors).)

The results are dramatic. The new sections are easy to identify and, while the replicas do not equal the artistic quality of the original Khmer sections, they do help visitors experience the temple in a condition closer to what was originally built.

The Chinese team completed their work in 2009, when the improved temple again began receiving visitors.

May the devata of Chao Say Tevoda bestow blessings on the Chinese for their important contribution of restoring this Khmer cultural treasure.

NOTE: A complete photo gallery of all the unique Chau Say Tevoda devata is in preparation. The link will be posted here in the future. In the meantime a trinity of devata appears below:

This devata's crown, with central element, is unusual. None of the symbolic attributes that devata display have yet been interpreted.

This alert looking devata is crowned by her long, thick, braided hair dressed in coils.

This graceful crowned devata is similar to her sisters at Angkor Wat. Note that she holds a "rooted bud" (Devata.org terminology) exactly like the sacred women surrounding the central sanctuary on the top level of Angkor Wat.

Special thanks to Nicole Groslier for providing original photos and for her kind permission to translate this draft of her father’s article, which later appeared in L’Illustration magazine, April 3, 1937. The translator assumes all responsibility for errors. Serious researchers should consult M. Groslier’s final article in the original French.

Banteay Meanchey, Cambodia - If one ventures to the north-western borders of Cambodia, one arrives in a region surrounded at right angles by the extreme western end of the Dangrek mountain chain. Beyond them lies Siam. Occupying 2 or 3,000 square kilometers, this area is nearly deserted. Consisting of soil made of clay and sand, crossed by some dry rivers six months of the year, it offers nothing to the traveler but uncultivated plains and sparsely wooded forests whose trees remain stunted due to fires that rage in the dry season.

Villages become increasingly rare, finally disappearing completely. In the summer, there is no game and torrid heat; in winter, the area is subjected to violent storms deflected by the mountains. This is the most desolate place in Cambodia. Still, however, ruins are found there; an imposing array of monuments from an ancient empire. Among these ruins is not only one of the largest Khmer temples that we know of (including those of the Angkor group), but also one of largest temples in the world. This temple is known as Banteay Chhmar.

What series of events inspired the builders eight centuries ago, at the height of Angkor’s power, to choose to settle in such a desolate region? And why did they later abandon the site that presents itself to us in the ruinous state that we now find it today? Here is one of the most intriguing puzzles in the history of Cambodia. We cannot address this issue here, but to understand the facts, it is helpful to know that the Khmers organized the places they inhabited bit by bit, and that their irrigation works, which we will examine in depth, made them livable and perhaps prosperous.

Banteay Chhmar temple plan.

Today, the temple of Banteay Chhmar is almost entirely collapsed. The two authors who previously published descriptions of it — Etienne Aymonier around 1883, then Lunet de Lajonquière around 1903 — both noted that of all the Khmer monuments that they had explored Banteay Chhmar was the most ruined, the largest, the most chaotic…and the most indecipherable.

In their summaries Aymonier and de Lajonquière also gave contradictory sketches and descriptions of many pages. This attracted us to reexamine this remote group of temples. We had to make four visits over the course of several years because the temple is only accessible for two months per year. After three campaigns, we still had not even been able to reach the foundations of the walls. Despite our efforts and best intentions we risked only adding to the questions, and augmenting the work of our predecessors by very little. It was then that Mr. George Cœdès, Director of the French School of the Far East (EFEO), helped us with appropriations to support our project. We were able to immediately dispatch a team of forty coolies who gave us fifteen days of labor. But their work was only enough to enable us to probe about a third of the essential areas inaccessible in our former research.

Banteay Chhmar's main temple (small grey square at left) is encircled by 8 secondary temples and a vast artificial reservoir with the Mebon temple built on an island in the center.

The second site plan that we present here introduces the identification of the temples and hydraulic works that remain from the ancient city. The “Baray” is a reservoir formed by a rectangular seawall, 3 meters high on average, that encloses an area of 1,276,450 square meters (1,526,621 sq. yards). Inside edges are entirely lined with laterite blocks, which gave easy access to the water. Originally a river, now dried out, fed this vast reservoir that also collected rain water.

Ruins of the boat landing terrace on the Baray. Excavations by the EFEO revealed carved lotus flowers and sacred geese with wings spread.

Close to the center, the Khmers created an artificial island where they constructed a “Mebon” temple (i.e. a temples situated in the center of a Baray). On the Baray’s west seawall, the Khmers built an embarkation terrace for boat traffic to the central temple (photo above). Its foundation stones, originally submerged in water, are sculpted with open-winged aquatic birds among lotuses. The dimensions of this architectural element, the style of its décor, its bold position, dominated by the imposing mirror of water and the sacred Mebon temple island, prove to us from our first steps the collective viewpoint and theatrical taste of the builders of Banteay Chhmar.

The central temple is entirely encircled by a rectangular moat 65 meters wide (213 feet) with a depth of 3.6 meters (11.8 feet). One crosses to the main temple by four axial causeways, each originally edged by balustrades consisting of two rows of stone giants and supporting a Naga parapet, an ornamental motif seen at the gates of Angkor Thom, as well as at Angkor’s Baray and its Mebon temple.

View of the south side of the moat surrounding Banteay Chhmar, with the causeway linking it to the mainland.

Before entering the boundaries of this huge temple, let us note that on its north-south and east-west axes are found seven satellite temples, with an eighth located near the southeast angle of the moat (see diagram above). These buildings, of secondary artistic interest because of the similarities among them, each include one or two surrounding walls, a tower with four faces forming a central shrine and a system of moats and basins, lined with stone banks like the Baray. On the 8 or 9 square kilometers covered by the Banteay Chhmar group, more than a sixth of the area was therefore excavated — sometimes up to depth of 6 meters (20 feet) — with the intention of creating reservoirs of water and, as a result, very clear liquid surfaces to complement the architecture.

South exterior gallery of Banteay Chhmar's main temple. These galleries originally surrounded the temple covering nearly 700 meters of bas relief carvings of Khmer life.

Here, in a few words, are the main guiding principles of the plan: all galleries and colonnaded walkways join together or cross in right angles. The majority of these junctions feature a tower shrine, tapering towards the center with four faces in some areas of the temple (the same type of the towers seen in The Bayon of Angkor Thom). As they approached the central shrine, the towers increases. From 6-7 meters (20-23 feet) tall at the periphery, they attained a height of about 20 meters (66 feet) in the center. In total, there were 56 towers.

One of the courtyards of Banteay Chhmar leading to the central labyrinth.

The two main axes of this group are clear at first glance. The point where they intersect is occupied by the central shrine, the Holy of Holies. Thus the architectural center and ritual center of the temple coincide. By passing through the temple from East to West, one encounters six distinct sections, each closely dependent on the others:

1 – A rectangular gallery enclosing the entire temple measuring 250 meters by 190 meters (820 x 623 feet). This consists of an arch roof built against a wall supported by pillars on the outside edge. The outside face of the covered wall features bas-relief carvings that, in their entirety, cover an area of 1,090 square meters (11,733 sq. feet). The interpretation of the historical and legendary stages pictured on the bas-reliefs is still impossible. Each side of the gallery is penetrated at the central axis by a monumental door with triple entry passages and three towers. One reaches these entry gates by crossing a Terrace of Honor, lined with Naga parapets and staircases flanked by lions (only the eastern terrace is shown on our plan);

2 - A rectangular gallery surrounding a courtyard, which is occupied by a crucial gallery. This beautifully proportioned building was, originally, independent of the temple itself. To the north and south it is associated with two water basins with steps and two additional buildings set upon 4 meter (13 feet) tall foundations. These are flanked by 1.7 meter (5.6 feet) tall standing monsters that act as caryatids;

3 - The main section of the temple. This “checkerboard” of galleries divides itself into three complexes that connect, one to another, from east to west, as three complete temples joined end to end. Each includes, in effect, a central tower sanctuary preceded by an entry pavilion, with towers and ceremonial gates set to the north and south. These sections are simultaneously united and independent;

As one advances west, the composition tightens; the towers and entry pavilions multiply as one reaches the principal sanctuary. Then one emerges in an open air courtyard that is mostly occupied by a group of three isolated towers. This transition achieves a remarkable contrast. These provisions obviously correspond to religious constraints imposed on the architects by the multiple divinities who were worshipped in this immense temple. The problem to be solved was therefore made much more difficult.

Also, from an architectural viewpoint, it is of great interest to follow diversity of the plan, despite the repetition of similar motifs that can be deduced within. This long rectangular area of 40 meters (131 feet) wide by 170 meters (558 feet) from east to west is divided by rows of towers — sometimes three, sometimes five, sometimes on elevated foundations and sometimes with four divine faces — joined end to end without a gap, leaving no doubt in one’s mind that no section of the system of axes that govern the design was neglected. NOTE: It is this aspect that, not escaping the eye of Cambodians, inspired the modern name of the temple: Banteay Chhmar which means “narrow citadel”;

4 and 5 - To the north and south, the temple’s main section is flanked by two similar groups that are symmetrical and independent of the main structure. Both of these two shrines are topped with face towers and encircled with a rectangular gallery;

6 - Finally, completing in the west, we find the same composition style as both precedents. But, here, the central shrine is built on a foundation 3.7 meters (12 feet) high, decorated with moldings and serrated designs, flanked by staircases on all four sides. This design is different from the rest of the temple which is strictly level, the highest foundation previously encountered not exceeding 80 centimeters (31.5 inches) above the base.

Interior structure of Banteay Chhmar's crucial gallery: winged women with arms raised holding lotus blossoms.

Banteay Chhmar’s plan differs considerably from most of the great Khmer temples now known. Usually, these plans are concentric and consequently develop with similar dimensions based on the four cardinal points. Generally, secondary buildings, or those added at later times, were more haphazard and without symmetry. Here, as we’ve just seen, the group is radically opposite these other designs.

The plan is eccentric, developing from east to west, in a series of successive structures that never break their rigorous symmetry. The surrounding gallery enclosure, like that of traditional temples (but here it is independent), is penetrated, but the architect neglects the north, south and west entries of the central group, even masking them with independent sanctuaries.

The bird-god Garuda combined with the multi-headed serpent Naga decorates the balastrades of the terraces.

If the builders first undertook a rigorous staking of their construction sites, the disparity among almost all the Khmer monuments is that the lines of the architect are often remarkable, but the construction itself is often mediocre; this also exists at Banteay Chhmar, one of the largest of all their temples.

One of the innumerable devata nymphs who appear on the walls of Banteay Chhmar.

Given the technique of shaping the stones and stacking them one on top of the other, it was necessary to create axes 7 meters apart for three lines of towers, so there were surprises. After all was said and done, this vast monument, perfectly composed in every section by the architects, was built “approximately” and as well as the circumstances allowed.

Despite these mistakes that the workforce was powerless to change, they compensated with true will, true intelligence and a boldness that made it certain that they could accomplish building the main temple of Banteay Chhmar. Its horizontal development on a single axis precluded it from creating a massive impression as a group, but as the Khmers experienced it, proceeding through each impressive section, the small defects that we have just noted disappeared.

One of the towers with four divine faces at Banteay Chhmar.

The 5-6,000 measurements we took of these ruins have us allowed us to calculate the cubic volume and carved surfaces. We met too many unknown factors in our research to calculate the total time spent in the construction and decoration of Banteay Chhmar. However, we were able to determine the minimum time required for such a project by determining the maximum number of workers the site could accommodate. The final answer was about sixty years, provided that there was no interruption of work.

Goddess from the Buddhist pantheon at Banteay Chhmar.

On the other hand, inscriptions discovered from of the reign of Jayavarman VII (1180-1201 AD) indicate that the large temple was already finished at that time. One can therefore postulate that the ancient city of Banteay Chhmar was a prosperous religious center during the twelfth century, and that construction of the central complex of this temple was begun by about 1140 AD at the latest. As for the religion practiced there, the most anyone can say is that there was Vishnuism at the beginning. The temple later appears to have been affected by Buddhism, at least in its most recent sections. In any case, its iconography belongs to these two religions.

Banteay Chhmar lintel.

George Groslier and his daughter Nicole at the gate of their Phnom Penh home - 1923.

George Groslier (1887-1945) lived, breathed and loved the art and culture of his country of birth: Cambodia.

His work as an historian, curator, educator and author was the motivating force behind much of the revival of interest in traditional Cambodian arts and crafts. He produced a large body of research and, in 1926, began adding fictional works to his oeuvre, depicting Europeans in the context of the exotic Far East.

For a complete list of George Groslier’s work please visit CambodianDancers.com

Special thanks to Nicole Groslier for her kind permission to use her original photos and for allowing Kent Davis to translate this draft of her father’s article, which later appeared in L’Illustration magazine, April 3, 1937.