Phum Prasat Temple (Kampong Thom)

Also recorded as Prasat Phoum and Prasat Pagoda (on Google Maps), it is a tall rectangular brick temple of the 8th century located on the grounds of a contemporary monastery. The ancient temple was restored in 2007 and still preserves much of the beautiful artwork of that time which is attributed to “Kampong Preah style” according to the old French artistic chronology. A statue of Harihara was discovered here and can now be seen in the Phnom Penh National Museum.

As mentioned, the ancient temple has a rectangular layout and features a barreled roof with beautiful arched pediments at either end, the faint outline of which can still be seen, and if you scroll to the bottom of the page there are some wonderfully illustrated institutions by Henri Parmentier.

While much of the decorative carving has been lost to time thankfully there are still some very well-preserved sections including ornate pilasters with three types of floral patterns, decoration around the molding of the base, and also up the centerline of the temple above the doorways.

The temple opens to the east with a sandstone doorframe flanked by round decorated columns with ornate bases and topped by a beautiful decorative lintel. On the doorframe, there is an inscription registered under K. 145 that is part Khmer, part Sanskrit dated to 706 AD noting donations made to the temple, more at the bottom of the page.

Around the site, there are several remains including pillar bases belonging to the pagoda/vihara that preceded the one we see today, along with remnants of the ancient temple including a large pedestal and doorstep (moonstone).

Fronting the pagoda on the south-eastern corner there is mound (Tuol Po) wonderfully engulfed by a tree and preserving the remnants of an ancient shrine (see historical notes below) with numerous sandstone remnants including what may be doorframe slabs, a water schist/somasutra, and other buried pieces.

There is another mound (Neak Ta Boran) that is topped by a contemporary shelter to the east featuring also featuring a sandstone plinth and pedestal fragment. Also interesting is the row of small bell-style chedi/stupa on the eastern side of the pagoda which may be contemporary to the original vihara/pagoda.

Another mound did not appear to have any remnants apart from scattered bricks, but we were deterred by the cobra that calls it home!

Around 180m north of the pagoda and 60m south of NR6 is another mound also featuring sandstone door frame remnants and a small contemporary shelter.

Historical Notes

What follows is a translated excerpt from the Chronique of BEFEO Number 28

The Prását Phum Prását, located near the road from Phnom Penh to Kompong Thom, and 32 km. of this last city, is a small sanctuary of primitive Khmer art which threatened at the same time the ruin of its walls. and the encroachments of the adjoining pagoda. The French School having decided to repair it, M. L. Fombertaux, Inspector of the Archaeological Service, was in charge of this work. It began on July 16, 1928.

The soil was first cleared to the level of the start of the basement of the tower, i.e. to an average depth of 2 m. 20 to the East and 1 m. 60 on the other three sides. This stripping revealed, at A and A’, the foundations of two square aedicules, 2 m. 50 to the side and whose E. face was in line with the O. wall of the tower. They were then backfilled and the North and South retaining walls were established above.

The false North door of the tower must have had a staircase, indicated by the cut-out covered in the clearing of a step in brace and by the interruption of the moldings of the base.

The monument has been consolidated on all four sides, from the base to the start of the road, which has not suffered (pl. XXXI). This consolidation was executed in brick masonry mortared with cement mortar and reinforced with concealed iron strapping as far as possible. At the same time, the retaining walls of the terrace were being built using bricks taken from the demolition of the wall of the western terrace of the pagoda, supplemented by new bricks.

The exploration of the surroundings of the existing sanctuary revealed the remains of other constructions (fig. 8).

1. To the south of the pagoda and parallel to its East-West ave is a levee of land which ends in the East in a mound from which emerge from the ground door jambs and an overturned lintel.
2. To the east and perpendicular to this levee line up from north to south. 5 mounds A, B, C, D, E. Only the first four have been probed, in A, B, C. has exposed brick walls, the last mound also presenting as its summit half-buried abutments and an overturned altar on the slope; in D. the sounding on the E face revealed the start of a staircase of more than 1 m. wide accessing a door buried under the scree, but of which we could recognize the S. abutment with part of the brick masonry of the wall. Above this mound are buried two abutments in situ and a sandstone lintel, without sculptures, reversed. To the east of these mounds are two basins with edges arranged in tiers: one, square, faces mounds A, B, the other, rectangular, the other three. We can suppose that there were two groups of temples there, the second formed of three towers with a central staircase in the minor axis of the long basin.
3. 200m away. to the NE of the pagoda are, in a clump of trees, two mounds about ten meters apart, each of which reveals sandstone abutments; under a shelter, a linga.

The work of M. Fombertaux, completed in September 1928, thus had for result, not only to save from ruin an interesting edifice of primitive art, but still to show that this sanctuary was part of an important group of temples.

BEFEO, 1928

The following comes from L’Art Khmer Primitif, again translated from French

The building which responds to this uncompromising name: “the sanctuary of the village of the sanctuary”, is a small brick tower in an extraordinary state of conservation. It has a re-dented rectangular plan and no false doors. The interior room is covered by a vault with successive drums; continuously projecting bricks supported the ceiling. Only part of the pedestal elements remain; they are of no interest.

Outside, the building has four floors: exceptionally, the terminal vault is complete.

Above a base with sober profiles, the main body offers a base decorated with dentils, pearls and lotuses. The walls are decorated at the corners with pilasters that are not very protruding, but chiseled. Those of the body show near the edge a row of pearls and the scroll is closed there; those of the redents have two rows of pearls, but a simpler scroll. On the W. and N. faces the decoration becomes a series of flowered motifs similar to those of Sambór-Prei Kük S₁. The cornice is important; in addition to the usual row of balusters, it shows pearls, lotuses and oblique leaves. Nothing remains of the terrace that it supported, but the other floors indicate its appearance.

The door, which unfortunately lost its pediment, was of the simple system. Its wooden doors, quite interesting, are not very old. Columns and lintel of the intermediate type II are admirably preserved. The decorations of the columns are reminiscent of those of C at Sambór-Prei Kük. A frieze of large oblique leaves sculpted in the brick brought the rear plane of the lintel to the bare surface of the large face which terminates the cornice of the pilasters; these are decorated like the steps and supported this reduced cornice similar to that of the body. Nothing remains of the pediment. This door was preceded by a staircase whose large access step in a brace adorns a neighboring step and whose lions lie a little to the north, deformed by the sharpening of the cutters.

The three floors above the body are almost identical in layout and dimensions. They include a small base with a slight projection, base, pilasters, cornice and terrace; this is treated more like an upper face, a little recessed and decorated with triangular florets that are alternately upright and inverted. The plan of these floors appears more complicated than that of the main body; its simple step is replaced by a mass with three planes, a large reduction of the building which takes the place of a false bay; contrary to usual, the interpilasters here receive a decoration of suspended building reductions; we usually only see them in the lower body; they have two floors which rise on a base decorated with a staircase; in the door which forms a niche, there is a standing figure; their upper pediment is finished with a large antefix.

The second floor, a little higher, was also a little more ornate. The building reductions, of a softer design, have lost their character. The base of the floor shows, near the corners, real sconces and the terrace is decorated with head niches. On the S face, the pattern which takes the place of a false bay is very distinct. It is a large reduction of a building with three planes treated as the body of the floor itself. But the anterior plane ends with an are crowned by an antefix; there is a front body on the small building; the intermediate plan offers gables seen from the edge, it is the very mass of the building; and the third appears to correspond in profile to the anterior body, thus representing two lateral forebodies. The whole would therefore repeat the layout of a rectangular building, with four long cross fronts.

The third floor is barely smaller than the first, but its base is of higher proportions. On all four sides, the wall projects uniquely above the pre-formed triple pattern yield. The considerable advancement of the base allows the installation in front of this plan on the N. and S. faces of a semi-circular crowning; it is clearly visible to the South.

On this third floor rests the terminal vault of the building. It has retained its two gables E. and W. which are vertical; they stand out with a slight projection on the long faces. These gables consist of arches of the ordinary shape, decorated with two rows of pearls, with the usual spring projection and rosette decoration. The center is occupied by a very simple reduction of the building which rests on the central projecting body of the third floor; on its own base we see the same semi-circular damping, finishing as on the lateral faces the lower composition. The new building ends in a terrace, decorated with two niches, which carries a reduction with two planes, the first ending with a curved gable, the second with a less precise motif.

On the side faces the thickness of the gables is decorated at the base with headed niches. The entire vault rests on a terrace or plinth, which shows, like the previous terraces, an alternation of triangular decorations. At the bottom of the extrados, the central motif of the third floor ends with a terrace decorated with two niches, from which rises a long vault adjoining the extrados and ending in two semi-circular gables, seen through the edge.

The top of the building presents a delicate problem. It has been repaired and at the top is perched a square mass having the appearance of a pedestal. The first impression is that this arrangement is not old, and the crudeness of the repair seems to indicate an addition. But it would be very strange if someone had fun hoisting such a heavy mass with the mediocre bamboo scaffolding that monks usually have at their disposal. On the other hand, Professor Sakhla and Professor Andét seem to indicate a similar disposition. It seems that it has been preserved in place here, consolidated only by a sloppy repair. The presence of a pedestal would call for an idol ending and the linga seems to indicate everything. Cham art displayed by the S. tower of Nhatrang that the fact is not impossible.

The S. jamb of the door shows at the bottom an inscription of five lines dating from before the 9th century, the few legible words of which mention a dedication to Harihara.

L’Art Khmer Primitif, 1927, Henri Parmentier

Inscription

• K. 145 – 8 lines of Khmer – IC VI, p. 72

The southern jamb of the Prasat Phum Prasat entrance, in the srok of Santhuk, province of Kompon Thom, bears an inscription in very poor condition, 5 lines of which are still recognizable. The first three and the beginning of the fourth are in Khmer, the end of the fourth and the fifth in Sanskrit. What remains of this fragmentary text contains the date 628 çaka (706 A.D.), the name of the donor Mratan Medhāvi, and that of the god Çankaranarayana to whom rice fields, slaves, rice, and milk are offered for sacrifice.

The Sanskrit text seems to have been an imprecation, because we read there the name of hell Avici.

Inscriptions du Cambodge, 1954, G Coedes

Photos from site visits in 2021 and mid 2022