angkor wat- the city that was and will be.pdf

8/16/2019 ANGKOR WAT- The City That Was and Will Be.pdf

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Damaso, Patricia Angeli G. May 13, 2016Maaño, John Emmanuel V. ARCHAEO 2 WFWViray, Grandeur Jared S.

ANGKOR WAT: The City That Was and Will Be

Introduction

Angkor Wat is an extraordinary city-temple, considered to be the largest religious

building in the world. It is 1,500 meters by 1,200 meters across, with a central structure

that measures 215 by 186 meters, rising more than 60 meters above the forest ground.

Angkor means city and Wat means Monastary, when combined Angkor Wat means

“royal city” [that is] a monastery.

Angkor Wat could be reached via plane from the various flight promo packages

from the Philippines. Upon arriving in Siem Reap, it could only take a tuktuk ride from

the city in order to reach it. At the entrance, you have to pay an entrance fee which you

can have access to all the temples inside Angkor Wat. It is good if you arrive before the

sun rises in order to capture the view amongst the numerous temples where the monks

pray. It becomes humid as the day moves on and as you walk from temple to temple.

There’s also an abundance of goods ranging from trinkets, clothes, postcards to food

with Khmers peddling around the temple. There also various monks praying around the

site with monetary donations welcome as they tie red strings around the wrist of tourists

and murmuring prayers for blessing.


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History

In 1113 AD, during the fourth year of Suryavarman II’s reign as king of Khmer

empire, the grand and prestige temple of Angkor Wat was constructed to serve as

temple, and mausoleum for king Suryavarman II, an attempt for the soul of the king to

reach the heavens after his death. This was the reason for the western orientation of the

temple, since the west direction is associated with Vishnu and death.

The Khmer believed that the world consisted of a central continent known as

Jambudvipa, with the five peak cosmic mountain, Meru rising from its center. Angkor

Wat was built to portray the Hindu Universe. The center temple symbolizes Meru, with

the highest tower representing the summit, the home of the gods and asparas (deities)

while the remaining four towers depict Meru’s lesser peaks. The enclosure walls depict

the mountain at the edge of the world, the lower courtyards represents the continents,

and the surrounding moat embodies the oceans. Angkor Wat was dedicated to the

Hindu god Vishnu, the preserver of the universe, contrary to Shiva-centered Hinduism in

the region.

Angkor Wat also shows the four ages or Yuga of Hinduism. A person who walks

from the main entrance of Angkor Wat down to the final tower, where a statue of Vishnu

once erected, is said to symbolically going back to the time the Universe was created.

Unfortunately, the king died in a battle against Vietnam in 1150 AD, not long

before the completion of the temple construction. Though Suryavarman II died earlier

than expected, the efforts of the Khmer people made sure that the Angkor Wat would

still be as what their king wanted it to be.


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But, just as any other glorious and outstanding things in the world, Angkor Wat

was not exempted from being looted by invading enemies. In 1177 AD, twenty-two

years after the construction in Angkor Wat ended, it was sacked by another Hindu

kingdom, the Chams. This made Jayavarman VII, reigning king, to come back to Angkor

to claim his throne which resulted to a big change in the city of Angkor (

King Jayavarman VII successfully defeated the Chams at the end of 12 th century

AD. He made Angkor, the city capital of the Khmer empire, a place for Buddhism. He

made structures that featured Buddha and other things that are related to Buddhism.

Even the Hindu-temple of Angkor Wat was converted into a Buddhist temple. Though

Jayavarman VII changed the whole Angkor in terms of beliefs and traditions, he left the

Hindu imagery in Angkor untouched (Fagan, 2002)

A descendant of Jayavarman VII, Jayavarman VIII reestablished Angkor as the

center of Hinduism in the mid-13th century. In effect, the many Buddhist monuments and

structures were vandalized or eradicated from the city of Angkor (Hall, 1964).

Thousands of images of Buddha were removed in the reign of Jayavarman VIII and

others were remodeled to suit Hinduism. However at the end of 13th century, Buddhism,

in the form of Hinayana Buddhism, became prominent in the place which continued up

to the present time (Hall, 1964)

Years had passed when the glory of Angkor started to wane and by the mid-15

th

century, the city was abandoned due to different factors such as invading enemies and

economic reasons. The Khmer people moved their capital from Angkor to the city of

Phnom Penh. As time passed by, the abandoned temple began was covered by the


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some place nearer West? The West suddenly creates an exotic picture of the East as

though it is a world so much different from theirs. Doing this creates a new identity of

the place and could cause harm to the population or the identity of the place (Privitera

2015). Somehow, this also works for countries in the same continent but with different

living conditions this is shown in Wong Kar Wai’s film, In The Mood For Love. Angkor

Wat become a backdrop of what memories and secrets become. In the final secret

where Chow-Mo-Wan whispers into one of the columns and buries his secret, it serves

as a metaphor for Angkor Wat itself. A place that once flourished but has been

forgotten, like what memories are to man. Angkor Wat becomes romanticised compared

to his hometown of Hong Kong (Biancorosso 2007). Why does he have to go to Angkor

Wat to forget if there are other means to forget? This romanticising of a place only

creates temporality in the character from the highly urbanised space that is Hong Kong.

Recent Developments

In 2013, Angkor Wat underwent restoration that closed most of the sites. Hand in

hand with UNESCO, they planned on restoring past irrigation techniques (Peou 2013).

Since Angkor Wat was surrounded by moats to protect the city itself, it was also used by

the people’s daily lives. They also took note of the population surrounding Angkor Wat

and how they should be able to mesh these communities and coping with the growing

tourism of the city (Khun-Neay 2013). People are still learning more and more about

Angkor Wat and the mysteries of the city. It was an accident that aside form rich

paintings and murals inside Angkor Wat, there would be also ancient graffiti that would


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cover some of the prominent monuments. Using high definition flash in order to interpret

the images, they found out that they were so many of these graffitis scattered in the

temple (Dockterman 2014).


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References:

Albanese, Marilia

2006 The Treasures of Angkor . White Star Publishers, Vercelli

Briggs, Lawrence

1951 The Ancient Khmer Empire. American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia

Biancorosso, Giorgio

2007 Romance, Insularity and Representation: Wong Kar Wai’s In the Mood ForLove and Hong Kong Cinema. Shima: The International Journal of Research Into IslandCultures 1(1): 88-95

Bordewich, Fergus

2000 Lost City In The Jungle. In: Exploring the Past, edited by James Baymanand Mirram Shark. pp. 553-556, Carolina Academic Press, North Carolina.

Charles-Picard, Gilbert

1972 The Far East. In: Encyclopedia of Archaeology. Pp. 399-419. Hamlyn, NewYork

Dockterman, Eliana

2014 Over 200 Paintings Discovered in Cambodia’s Angkor Wat. ElectronicDocument, http://time.com/139251/hidden-paintings-cambodian-temple/ , accessed May12, 2016

Fagan, Brian

2002 Early Civilizations. In: World Prehistory . pp. 270-275. Prentice Hall, NewJersey

Hall, D.G.E


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1964 The Khmers and Angkor. In: A History of South-East Asia 2nd Edition.pp.105-131, Macmillan and Company Limited, London

Khun-Neay, Khuon

2013 Heritage and Population in the Angkor Site. World Heritage 68: 28-30

Kim, Jinah

Unfinished Business: Buddhist Reuse of Angkor Wat and its Historical andPolitical Significance. Electronic Document, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20801633,

Accessed May 11, 2016.

Lawrie, Ben

2014 Beyond Angkor: How lasers revealed a lost city. Electronic Document,http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-29245289 , accessed May 12, 2016

Mason, Walter

2014 The Lost City of Angkor Wat & the Mysteries of a Great Asian Civilisation.Electronic Document, http://www.newdawnmagazine.com/articles/the-lost-city-of-angkor-wat-the-mysteries-of-a-great-asian-civilisation, accessed April 23, 2016

Peou, Hang

2013 The Angkorian Hydraulic System. World Heritage 68: 24-27

Privitera, Donatella

2015 Film and the Representation of the Poverty: Touristic Mobilities inDeveloping Countries. Alma Tourism Special Issue 4: 269-281

Ray, Nick

2016 Angkor what? Getting to know Cambodia's most iconic temple. ElectronicDocument, https://www.lonelyplanet.com/cambodia/travel-tips-and-articles/77381,

Accessed April 18, 2016


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Richter, Ashley

2009 Recycling Monuments: The Hinduism/Buddhism Switch at Angkor.Electronic Document, http://www.cyark.org/news/recycling-monuments-the-

hinduismbuddhism-switch-at-angkor, Accessed April 18, 2016

(No Author)

History of Angkor (In a nutshell). Electronic Document.

http://www.canbypublications.com/angkor-cambodia/angkor-history.htm, Accessed April 23, 2016

(No Author)

Angkor Wat History. Electronic Document.

http://www.siemreapcambodia.org/history, Accessed April 23, 2016

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