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A victory
Preah Khan was built on the site of a victory over the Chams
Preah Khan was built in the 12th century for King Jayavarman VII to honor his father. It stands on the site of his victory over the invading Chams in 1181.
The name
The name means holy sword, from an original meaning city of victory
The modern name, meaning holy sword, is unusually derived from the meaning of the original, Nagara Jayasri, or holy city of victory. The site may earlier have held the royal palaces of Yasovarman II and Tribhuvanadityavarman.
A whole city
It combined a city, a temple and a Buddhist university
The stele lists 97,840 attendants and servants, including 1000 dancers and 1000 teachers. Another 430 deities had shrines on the site, each given food, clothing, perfume and even mosquito nets.
97,840attendants and servants listed on the stele
The wall
The laterite outer wall carries 72 garudas holding nagas
The outer wall is laterite and bears 72 garudas holding nagas, at 50 m intervals. The temple measures 800 by 700 m inside a moat, and a landing stage to the east gave access from the Jayatataka baray.
“We're basically running a glorified maintenance program. We're not prepared to falsify history”
a former World Monuments Fund employee
Left wild
Preah Khan has been left largely unrestored, with trees among the ruins
Initial clearing took place from 1927 to 1932, and partial anastylosis followed in 1939. Since 1991 the World Monuments Fund has kept a cautious approach, believing that to go further would involve too much guesswork.
Day 2, afternoon
It comes after Banteay Kdei. Then Neak Pean.
More stories from this trip idea
The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Preah Khan, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.