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Ancient Cambodia
T he c ity o f A nk go r Wat is o ne o f the wo rlds great c ultural arc heo lo gic al sites and was o nc e the pinnac le o f the great Khmer Empire

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Perhaps no other ruins symbolize the breath taking beauty of the Ancient World more the the Temples of Angkor Wat, in modern day Cambodia. These ruins form the center of what was once a very powerful Khmer empire that covered much of South East Asia. In the 19th century, when French explores first saw they many sided temples with the faces of gods staring back to them from the roots of fig trees, they left a lasting impression of what was then an unknown culture. These evocative images stared back at them across several centuries, being described as cities created by gods. Current excavation are only now revealing
Bust of Hevajra, Angkor period, late 12thearly 13th century

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to us the immensity and architectural sophistication in one of the first Hindu Empires ever established. The Khmer people are in many ways the ancestors of today's Cambodian people, and it is with great pride that after years of neglect that there is a renewed interest in preserving one of the grates architectural legacies left to us from the ancient world before they once again succumb to the ravages of nature and time.

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Khmer Civilization & Empire

The country which is today called Cambodia is only a small fraction of the v ast Khmer Empire that controlled much of Indo-China from the ninth to the 1 3th century AD. At its height, the Khmer Empire consisted of today 's Cambodia, Laos, most of southern V ietnam and Thailand, as well as some of the Malay peninsula. From the time of Jay av arman II (c. AD 800 - AD 850) to the mid-1 5th century , the Khmer Empire was known as the Kingdom of Kambuja, after the legendary first-century founder of the first Cambodian kingdom of Funan, the Indian Brahmin Kambu. It is in this earliest Cambodian kingdom that Cambodian people see their real roots. The English word `Cambodia' is deriv ed from this name From around AD 550 to AD 800, the Kingdom of Chenla ruled some of the lands that would become the Khmer Empire. In this tex t the lands in question will be referred to as Funan and Chenla up to the reign of Jay av arman II. From then on, they will generally be referred to as the Khmer Empire or Kambuja. Cambodia will also be used, referring both to the Khmer empire, and to the smaller kingdom which the French dominated in the 1 9th and 20th centuries. The beginning of the Khmer or Angkor civ ilization takes place during the A View of Angkor Wat, perhaps the m ost fam ous of South East Asian Ruins

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period from 802 to 1 431 A.D. It stretched at its apogee, up to the ThailandBurma border in the West and Wat Phou of Laos in the North. It appeared that owing to the ancient Khmer rulers, that they strengthened unity between peoples with a good political doctrine and the dev elopment of an intelligent irrigation sy stem, which allowed the control water of the Mekong Riv er for agriculture and so began an age of prosperity . This Empire slowly deteriorated during fiv e centuries. But still, the Khmer Civ ilization left some fabulous and ex ceptional monuments (like Angkor Wat and Bay on Khmers temples), as well as a numerous sculptures and carv ings in stone. The ancient Khmers were great masters of stone carv ing and we can see the ev idences of this in v arious Angkor temples that ex tended on the large plain of Siem Reap up to outside of Cambodian border to the Preah V ihear at Dangrek mountain, Phnomrung and Phimai in Thailand and Wat Phu in Laos. These temples were made up patiently during centuries by Khmer artisans, and the effort to realize such efforts required a tremendous workforce. This was in sharp contradiction with the normal and

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easy life of the Khmer people and v illagers of their time. For historians and

Map Showing the Khm er Em pire at its height in the 13th Century

archaeologists, it is not easy to do a detailed study of Khmer civ ilization. Most of the writing, found after the ex cav ation of Angkor, was carv ed in the stones, which hav e deteriorated ov er centuries. They are important ev idence to understanding the basic constituency of Khmer society and its chronology . They relate principally to religious rituals, king's praises and literature of such Indian epics as the " Ramay ana " and " Mahabharata ". There is not much written on the subject of the ordinary life of the local people who made up the bulk of Khmer society . It is owing to a Chinese Ambassador Zhou Daguan, who liv ed in the middle of 1 3th century during the Y uan dy nasty , that we hav e our best accounts of the Khmer Empire. He trav eled to Angkor, liv ed with people and ex plored the empire during one y ear. He wrote v iv idly about the people liv ing in the empire, and his formal accounts do shed some knowledge of this period. Angkor Wat represented the center of Khmer civ ilization. It is situated on the plain of Siem Reap prov ince north of the Great Lake of Tonle Sap. All along Khmer history , the throne were often desired by neighboring states, which often resulted in some v iolent bloodshed. Different successiv e kings built a different capital, as in the Angkor Wat and Ruolos sector, with some names like Hariharata, Y asodharapura, Jay endanagari, Angkor Thom and a lot of other unknown names among the list of kings. In the Khmer society , hierarchy was peaked by the God-King, surrounded by Brahmans tutors and the members of his roy al family . The priests who liv ed in the temples were also powerful and controlled their own lands and paddy fields. Often times roy al patrons would help the building projects, and many of the names of donors were written in the stones in each temple. Here is where we learn that they were noblemen or high dignitaries responsible for the administrativ e and judiciary tasks. These writings shed some light on the history of Khmer civ ilization, but for historians it is still difficult to know a
L A T ES T C O MMEN T S

Under founding of denmark the picture of a statue is not gorm the old, but holger danske/ ogier the dane. Holger Danske is normally regarded as a Danish national symbol. He is first mentioned in literature as one of the French king Charlemagnes warriors in La Chanson de Roland from around 1060. In this Chanson he is

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history of Khmer civ ilization, but for historians it is still difficult to know a complete list of the Angkor Empire society hierarchy . The Khmer Civ ilization economy was based principally on agriculture, the majority of people was farmers or peasants and some of the less wealthy of them was fastened to large landowners or of the temples. The lowest hierarchy of the Khmer Civ ilization was reserv ed for the slav es who belonged at temples. Interestingly their names are the majority of the names inscribed on the stones. Being that their names were kept in a holy place, this has led some historians to think they could not hav e been the low class slav es as the word " slav e " implies. It is possible that temples serv ants and priests were " Gods slav es " and not meant to be owned by any human being. Slav es were mostly captured in the neighboring countries, but Khmer people themselv es could fall in the lowest status and being a " slav e " if they failed to pay their rents or loans to the upper ruling class.

called Oger le Danois, his name being the only link to Denmark. In the later epos La Chevalerie dOgier de Danemarche (12001215) he is portrayed as the main character and is described as a son of the Danish king Gudfred (d. 810), an enemy of Charlemagne. His first appearance in Nordic literature is in the saga Karlemagnssaga from the latter part of the 1200s, which in the main consists of passages translated from French texts. His name here is given as Oddgeir danski. This saga was translated into Danish during the 1400s and thereafter

Ankgor Wat Temples

The temples of Angkor, built by the Khmer civ ilization between 802 and 1 220 AD, represent one of humankind's most astonishing and enduring architectural achiev ements. From Angkor the Khmer kings ruled ov er a v ast domain that reached from V ietnam to China to the Bay of Bengal. The structures one sees at Angkor today , more than 1 00 stone temples in all, are the surv iv ing remains of a grand religious, social and administrativ e metropolis whose other buildings palaces, public buildings, and houses were built of wood and are long since decay ed and gone. One of the m any faced tem ples in Angkor Wat, depicting the Hindu God Vishnu

Holger Danske became part of Danish folklore with several

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decay ed and gone.

Vishnu

accounts in the Danish Chronicle first published around 1509. The Danish national writer Hans Christian Andersen in 1845 wrote the fairytale Holger Danske, where he is described as sitting fast asleep in the casemates of the Castle of Kronborg, with his beard having grown into the table in front of him and his sword in his lap, prepared to wake up to action in case of Denmark being threatened from outside forces. Today his statue can be seen in the casemates of Kronborg as described by Hans Christian

Conv entional theories presume the lands where Angkor stands were chosen as a settlement site because of their strategic military position and agricultural potential. Alternativ e scholars, howev er, believ e the geographical location of the Angkor complex and the arrangement of its temples was based on a planet-spanning sacred geography from archaic times. Using computer simulations it has been shown that the ground plan of the Angkor complex the terrestrial placement of its principal temples mirrors the stars in the constellation of Draco at the time of spring equinox in 1 0,500 BC. While the date of this astronomical alignment is far earlier than any known construction at Angkor, it appears that its purpose was to architecturally mirror the heav ens in order to assist in the harmonization of the earth and the stars. Both the lay out of the Angkor temples and iconographic nature of much its sculpture, particularly the asuras ('demons') and dev as ('deities') are also intended to indicate the celestial phenomenon of the precession of the equinox es and the slow transition from one astrological age to another. Angkor Wat, built during the early y ears of the 1 2th century by Sury av aram II, honors the Hindu god V ishnu and is a sy mbolic representation of Hindu cosmology . Consisting of an enormous temple sy mbolizing the my thic Mt. Meru, its fiv e internested rectangular walls and moats represent chains of mountains and the cosmic ocean. The short dimensions of the v ast compound are The tem ples were obscured by dense jungles until rediscovered by Europeans in the 19th Century

Andersen. During the German occupation of Denmark in 1940-45

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precisely aligned along a north-south ax is, while the east-west ax is has been deliberately div erted 0.7 5 degrees south of east and north of west, seemingly in order to giv e observ ers a three day anticipation of the spring equinox . Unlike other temples at Angkor, Ta Prohm has been left as it was found, preserv ed as an ex ample of what a tropical forest will do to an architectural monument when the protectiv e hands of humans are withdrawn. Ta Prohm's walls, roofs, chambers and courty ards hav e been sufficiently repaired to stop further deterioration, and the inner sanctuary has been cleared of bushes and thick undergrowth, but the temple has been left in the stranglehold of trees. Hav ing planted themselv es centuries ago, the tree's serpentine roots pry apart the ancient stones and their immense trunks straddle the once bustling Buddhist temple. Built in the later part of the 1 2th century by Jay av arman V II, Ta Prohm is the terrestrial counterpart of the star Eta Draconis the Draco constellation. During half-millennia of Khmer occupation, the city of Angkor became a pilgrimage destination of importance throughout Southeastern Asia. Sacked by the Thais in 1 431 and abandoned in 1 432, Angkor was forgotten for a few centuries. Wandering Buddhist monks, passing through the dense jungles, occasionally came upon the awesome ruins. Recognizing the sacred nature of the temples but ignorant of their origins, they inv ented fables about the my sterious sanctuaries, say ing they had been built by the gods in a far ancient time. Centuries passed, these fables became legends, and pilgrims from the distant reaches of Asia sought out the my stic city of the gods. A few adv enturous European trav elers knew of the ruins and stories circulated in antiquarian circles of a strange city lost in the jungles. Most people believ ed the stories to be nothing more than legend howev er, until the French ex plorer Henri Mouhot brought Angkor to the world's attention in 1 860. The French people were enchanted with the ancient city and beginning in 1 908 funded and superbly managed an ex tensiv e restoration project. The restoration has continued to the present day , ex cepting periods in the 7 0's and 80's when military fighting prev ented archaeologists from liv ing near the ruins.

one of the principal partisan organizations was named after Holger Danske.
in Ancient Denmark

A nice article full of facts about the Netherlands, but not very usefull as a realistic representation of the history of this area. Moreover, a disproportionate share of this article is about the history of the ancient Frisians (who are different from the modern Frisians) and the more internationaly political, military and religious developments and not particulary about the Netherlands (Holland is just a part of the Netherlands, just like Friesland). There is so much more to tell

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Orthodox archaeologists sometimes interpret the temples of the Angkor complex as tombs of megalomaniacal kings y et in reality those kings designed and constructed the temples as a form of serv ice to both god and their own subjects. The temples were places not for the worship of the kings but rather for the worship of god. Precisely aligned with the stars, constructed as v ast Angkor Thom is a sm aller sister com plex to Angkor Wat and as only been partly excavated

much more to tell about the ancient history of the Netherlands! I hope you will find this feedback usefull, and if you need/like to have any help, you can contact me. p.s.: Pier Gerlofs Donia is not a national hero of the Dutch, but a regional hero to some Frisians. Hes also not someone who could count as an ancient hero, as he was born in 1480
in Ancient Netherlands

three dimensional y antras and adorned with stunningly beautiful religious art, the Angkor temples were instruments for assisting humans in their realization of the div ine. Jay av aram V II, spoke of his intentions in erecting temples as being: "full of deep sympathy for the good of the w orld, so as to bestow on men the ambrosia of remedies to w in them immortality.By virtue of these good w orks w ould that I might rescue all those w ho are struggling in the ocean of existence."

hello, id just like to add the fact that these polynesians belong to

Cambodian Religion
Since the ancient time, the Khmers had accepted the two great religions from India, i.e. Hinduism and Buddhism, by which the former one was more popular. Hinduism had play ed an important role in Khmer civ ilization as the Angkor monarchs adopted its concept of dev a-raja, or "god-king", by which the king was rev ered as an incarnation of the god Shiv a, a supreme Hindu deity who was regarded as a protector.

the austronesian race. They share similar cultures and languages (Madagascar, Cham from Vietnam, Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, etc)

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Most temples in the Angkor Empire were dedicated to either god Shiv a or god V ishnu. Believ ed to be the holy house of the supreme gods, the temples were carefully built with fine arts, and the materials used are those of ev erlasting stones. Many impressiv e sculptures of great craftsmanship were enshrined. The second religion being rev ered by the Khmers was Buddhism of Mahay ana sect which came into the region quite at same time as Hinduism, howev er, Buddhism was less prominent. Both Hinduism and Mahay ana Buddhism play ed an important role as the political, religious and philosophical pillars of Khmer Civ ilization by which the king was rev ered as the god-king or dev a-raja. This ideology enabled the king to rule ov er the country as an absolute monarch with sov ereign spirituality ov er his people, and thus enhanced the unity of the kingdom. Successiv e kings were able to mobilize large manpower to serv e the army , to maintain ex tensiv e irrigation sy stem and to build numerous massiv e temples. Not until the 1 3th century , Therav ada Buddhism was introduced to the Khmer from Sri Lanka and became more prominent in the roy al court as well as in the local people. The teaching of Therav ada Buddhism directly crashed with the original belief of the Khmer people as it taught the people to seek self enlightenment and abandoned the worldly things. With this teaching, the attitudes of the people towards its Hindu gods as well as the god-king changed, and thus led to the gradual weakening of the empire which ev entually collapsed in the first half of 1 5th century . The Khmer people seem to be the obedient students, as they did not raise doubts about the religious teaching of the original doctrines. We can see in Khmer history that the religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism were not div ided into the different sub-sects in the land of Khmer, as they were so in some other civ ilizations. In addition to Hinduism and Buddhism, the Khmer people also had their own indigenous beliefs such as the local deities, ancestral spirits, as well as the ev il spirits. There are no inscriptions or manuscripts to describe these beliefs,

i like most of the infos though. Very informative.

in Ancient New Zealand

nice article and posts!! My only comment is, why is the Philippines in the Oceana continent and not with its southeast asian neighbors?
in Ancient Philippines

You used to have a fantastic interactive map of Mesoamerica. Wheres it gone? The site is not the same without it.
in Ancient Mexico

This is a fascinating subject. Ive been interested in Native American civilization for years. Ive read an account of one tribe of people who came to America about 600 BC from the Israel area

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howev er, it can be found to be prev alent in modern Cambodia, especially in the remote v illages. These beliefs are passed on from one generation to another through the words of mouth.

from the Israel area and set up a civilization under the Law of Moses. Its called the Book of Mormon and gives some background into the formation of the Native American tribes, ancient military history on the continent, and some of the ruins found in MesoAmeria. Its quite interesting.
in Ancient America

Ancient Khmer Art

The idealized faces the sculptors of ancient Cambodia so skilfully managed to draw forth from stone represent strikingly realistic portraits that capture the majesty and impassiv ity of gods, as well as the compassion of div inities imbued with a gentle inner smile. In their bas-reliefs, these artists dev oted their talent not only to depicting the deities, but to realistically reproducing the secular world as well: the temple gallery walls are lined with military processions, raging battles, or simple ev ery day scenes carv ed with an amazing sense of mov ement and composition. Starting with the first Preangkorean masterpieces which can be traced from as early as the 6th century AD - and continuing during the Angkorean This im age shows how the carvings were not one stone, but m ultiple stones pieced carefully together by Khm er artisans

What a shame! You used to have a fantastic interactive map of Mesoamerica. Wheres it gone? The site is not the same without it. Sadly, R. Nathan (Teacher at Laguna Blanca School in Santa Barbara, CA)
in Ancient Mexico

period from the 9th to the 1 5th centuries as well as during the Postangkorean period, Khmer stone sculptors looked to religion for inspiration. It is in glorification of their gods or deified kings that the artists, forev er condemned

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to anony mity , created their temples, statues, and bas-reliefs. Indeed, their works represent genuine professions of faith and honor with respect to India's two main religions, Hinduism and Buddhism, introduced to Cambodia during the first centuries of the Christian era. In the sanctuaries, the statues were sculpted in a contemplativ e sitting pose or standing upright, and were represented holding out in their hands the attributes by which they could be identified. They were ex pected to be inhabited by a deity (mainly Shiv a and V ishnu, but Buddha too), from whose protection and blessing believ ers hoped to benefit. It is the Brahmanist belief that Shiv a, god of both regeneration and destruction, incarnates the cosmic order of things. The images of this god dancing, with one head and two arms, with fiv e heads and ten arms, in the form of a lingam, etc... - translate his complex ity . Shiv aism remained the most steadfast of Cambodia's religions during the Preangkorean and Angkorean periods. V ishnu, the god of preserv ation, also inspired a major religious mov ement. Iconographically , he is most often represented as a four-armed god, with at first a cy lindrical mitre as headdress and, later, a sort of stone diadem. The discus, conch, mace, and sphere (sy mbolizing the world) are this god's emblematic attributes. In Khmer tradition, Buddha is often depicted in a meditativ e pose, seated on a base in the form of either a spread out lotus or a serpent whose sev en heads fan out abov e him to afford protection.

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