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The state temple at Hariharalya
- constructed by Indravarman I
- classic period, 802-1327
- It takes the form of a stepped pyramid standing within a massive double moat.
- It was a precursor of the great complexes built a few hundred years later at Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom; it also bears more than a passing resemblance to roughly contemporaneous sacred-mountain-pyramid-temple structures in Maya architecture.
- In this case, the association is, again, with Mt. Meru. The temple is faced with sandstone quarried on Phnom Kulen (which, remember, was itself identified with Mount Meru).
- It has eight towers surrounding, built with brick and embellished with stucco.
- The stone tower atop the pyramid (above right) is possibly a later reconstruction, but it and its predecessor would have housed a stone linga emblematic of Shiva.
- Within the moat would have been many other religious structures in wood.
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Lolei temple - Yashovarman I (890-c. 900).
- He embellished Hariharalaya by completing the vast Indratataka baray and by constructing a large ancestral temple on an island in its center.
- composed of four brick towers on a brick platform.
- Texts incised on the sandstone doorjambs explain that Lolei was dedicated to the spirit of Indravarman as personified by the god Shiva.
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The Bakheng temple - dedicated in 907.
- It is more complex than any previously attempted in the Khmer lands, comprising a 5-tiered stepped pyramid supporting a summit platform on which five stone towers stood in a quincunx pattern.
- This pattern constituted a mandala echoing the appearance of the golden peaks on Mt Meru.
- In the center shrine was the linga of Shiva.
- There were also several smaller shrines all around, adding up to 108, a magic number in Hindu thought.
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Banteay Srei complex ("Citadel of Women") - 14 miles NE of Angkor
- Year 967, Yashovarman
- The greatest architectural achievement of his reign
- patronage of a Brahmin guru and intellectual named Yajnavaraha
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| the gopura at Banteay Srei |
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The central shrine at Banteay Srei - is dedicated to Shiva; within it was the main cult object, the linga known as the "great lord of three worlds."
- Here you can see the basic similarity to Indian Hindu temples, with the mandapa leading towards the inner shrine beneath the tower.
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| The Banteay Srei complex is famous above all for its sculpture and decoration, particularly its youthful guardian figures, the young goddesses in 3/4 relief on door jambs and exterior walls, and the pediments and lintels with carved scenes taken from the epics and Puranas. |
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Ta Keo - Jayavarman V (968-1001)
- was a pious Buddhist, though he also paid homage to Shiva and Vishnu.
- near the west bank of the East Baray.
- A massive stone temple-pyramid 72 ft high with summit shrines in the usual quincunx pattern
- It is of interest to us primarily because it is unfinished and thus enables us to glimpse how these structures looked after they were erected but before they were carved (below)
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Angkor Wat - Suryavarman II (1113-1150)
- Situated in the SE quadrant of Yashodharapura (the city founded at Angkor by Yashovarman I)
- Angkor Wat is surrounded by a 200 m wide moat; bordered by sandstone blocks, the moat measures 1,500 m from west to east, and 1,300 m from north to south.
- This approximately square "island" covers about 500 acres.
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The complex at Angkor Wat - consists of a series of three concentric, rectangular enclosures, each in the form of covered galleries or terraces with open space in between.
- The outer gallery is open to the exterior of the complex; its inner wall is covered for its entire length with the longest continuous relief sculptures in the world.
- Passage from the outer gallery to the middle gallery occurs via the Cruciform Galleries to the west. From there, you pass to the innermost enclosure, where at the center the main shrine is located.
The sequence of reliefs in the outer gallery combine to create a kind of symbolic calendar. Hindu cosmology holds that the movement of the sun through the year is counterclockwise; thus in the reliefs, the spring equinox is in the East, corresponding to the churning of the sea of milk (creativity, new life); summer solstice is in the north (cosmic Mount Meru is at the north pole, and this is depicted here in a relief of a battle); autumn equinox is in the west, as the sun begins to set; this corresponds to reliefs of the horrifyingly destructive battle of Kurukshetra; and the winter solstice is in the south, the realm of the death god Yama represented in the "Heaven and Hells" segment. For more on this, read on. |
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The central shrine at Angkor Wat five great conical towers laid out in a quincunx, is highest of all, accessed by stairways which transform the ascent into something like mountaineering. This is not accidental, since, again, the shrine is meant to represent the five heavenly peaks of the cosmic mountain, Mt. Meru. Overall, your trajectory to the heart of the complex involves a long passage from horizontal space to vertical space, where each stage along the route places you in spaces that are steeper, narrower, and higher. |
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