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Published: November 26th 2006
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South Gate Ankor Thom
Angkor Thom was the last capital of the Khmer empire and is surrounding my a huge wall with five gates, the north, South, East and West as well as the Victory Gate when victorious armies would return through. Each of the gates has a row of 54 demons on the left and like this pictures shows 54 gods on the left :) Hello! We just thought we would tell you all about our visit to Angkor in Cambodia which has definitely been one of the highlights of our trip. I don't know why it has taken so long to put all these pictures up but we have already left Cambodia and are in Vietnam now but just imagine if you can stepping back in time (ok just back two weeks) to when we were at Angkor.. now here comes the history bit..
Being so incredibly hyped up we were not sure what to expect at Angkor really but having made the lengthy pilgrimage from southern Laos to Siem Reap (the town closest to the ruins of Angkor) we brought a three day pass and went along to have a little look. The tickets to the site are $40 for three days (or $20 for a one day pass) and you really need to cycle or get a lift out to the site as it is a bit of a hike from town. On our first trip out the site we were driven along in a tuk-tuk and were both delighted when we came around a bend in the road and saw Angkor
Spare bits of temple
Teams of archeologist from around the world are still working to rebuild many of the buildings but we think they have forgotton where some of the bits go.. Wat for the first time and quickly began to understand what all the fuss is about.
The ruins of Angkor are the remains of the buildings of the Khmer civilization which was established in 802 AD. All the buildings were constructed between the 9th and 13th C with the earliest temples being from brick and later from sandstone which was all shipped 40km downriver, a pretty amazing feat when you consider just how much building took place in this period. As you wander around the site you can really get a feeling of how it might have looked when it was first built, especially considering that many people still live in close proximity to the temples and in wooden houses that can not be dissimilar to traditional Khmer homes - give or take a scooter or two. The wooden structures of Angkor of course have long since disappeared which leaves only the temples - as only the gods were able to dwell in stone buildings.
The site of Angkor is often credited as having been 'discovered' by Henri Mouhout in 1860 but of course the story is a lot more complicated than that. According to our handy guide
At the famous Angkor Wat
Famous? Wat for? Well it is the largest temple in the world for a start, built by King Suryavarman II in the 12th century and dedicated to Vishnu its origional name meant “The city which is a temple,” which just about sums it up really. book (by Dawn Rooney) there were visitors to the temples way before Mouhout and reports of the ruins of Angkor reached the West many years prior to his visit however these for some reason were largely ignored. The fact that there were Chinese, Japanese, Arabians, Spanish and Portuguese in Phnom Phen (the capital of modern Cambodia) in the 16th c, not to mention the Dutch and the English in the 17th meant that there were a few famous visits to the site. In case you were wondering these included Antiono de Magelene in 1585 who wrote how the King of Cambodia had only recently himself rediscovered the site in the 16th C and that in fact this was when Angkor Wat, the most famous of the temples was first rebuilt. In 1601 Marcelo de Ribadervia reported on the ruins but also that there were stories about how had been built by Cesar or Alexander the Great (madness of course as the ruins are evidence of the skill and wealth of the Khmer empire). It was the Japanese visitor Shimano in the 1630s who drew the first known map of the temples but it was when Mouhout arrived that Angkor Wat
Bayon at Angkor Thom
One of the MANY faces at the Bayon temple in Angkor Thom - in fact there are 54 towers like this one which all represent the ominpresece of the king. was well and truly on THE map.
Actually it later turned ou that although the city of Angkor was officially abandoned as a royal city in the 15th C it is claimed that the largest of the buildings (Angkor Wat) has been used continuously since that time as it contains Buddhist statues from every century between the fifteenth and nineteenth. So it was never actually 'lost' or 'ruined'. Having said that although the Wat is the most famous of the buildings there are actually more than 1000 temples spread over an area of 120 miles. At the moment it is possible to visit about 30 of them (some are really remote and many have not been cleared of land mines) and we managed a fair few in our time there. Many of the temples are in pretty good shape considering they have been exposed to the weather for about 1000 years and are fighting a constant battle with the jungle. The huge trees in the forest and swampiness around Angkor grow quickly and many of the buildings have trees growing on/in/though them. Whilst this looks very cool and of course is ideal of a snap shot or Hollywood block
buster it does mean that many of the of the buildings are now being held together by the trees so that to remove them would be disastrous. This in turn means that there is a great deal or work to be done simply to retain the current condition of the temples let alone to restore them to their former glory. Atempts at this are being made however since the Indian goverment sent a team of archelogists to Angkor in 1986. This early restoration work has been widly citicised for apparently doing more harm than good, however others also point out that that when the Cambodian appeal for help was made in the midst of their civil war India was the only country who stepped in to help restore and preserve the temples. Today restoration projects are going on at many of the temples with the help of numerous international archeological societies.
Famously a French archeological team had been in the middle of restoring The Baphuon temple in the 1960s when they were ousted by the Khmer Rouge. The plans recording where each bit of stone went were lost and the numbering system that had been used to label them
became meaningless. Thus the site has been called the worlds largest jigsaw as the boffins puzzle over which bit to put where. Today Angkor is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and has more than one million vistors per year - and sometimes it felt like they were all there on the day we went, watching the sun rise of Angkor Wat was pretty crowded as was our trip to watch the sun set from the top of Phnom Bakheng, worth it though. Heading out to Banteay Srei first thing in the morning is well worth it as the coach tours don't turn up until about 9 so we had the whole thing to ourselves in the morning.
Amazingly the civil war was apparently not as destructive to the buildings as had originally been reported (little consolation perhaps when so much of Cambodia was torn apart) but another human influence has been looting for the international art market something which is most noticeable at the Victory Gate of Angkor Thom where many of the gods and demons have had their heads removed and been smuggled across the border to Thailand to be sold on the international market.
The buildings
of Angkor are incredible and the many different temples at the site provide a really interesting cross section of archeological styles and insight into Khmer Hindu and Buddhist traditions. As well as visiting the most famous temples is was fantastic to head out to the lesser known and much less visited temples such as Phnom Bok and just relax, these are places without the tour bus loads people and when you are done looking at the buildings and the carvings then it is good to just chill out with a book in your own personal temple. There are also lots of little places to eat around the temples and people are constantly trying to sell you ice cold water which is perfect as it is hot hot in Cambodia at the moment. Hope you not all too cold at home? 😊 love liz and tom
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Lucy
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Wicked Pics guys, your turning into quite the photographers!