Preah Theat Khvav Temple

Located 4 km south of the village of Khvav, it’s a square laterite temple tower preceded by a terrace on the monastery grounds of Wat Preah Serei Rokha Theat.

The site features an incredible collection of ancient temple remnants. The temple tower and terrace (now converted into a more contemporary pagoda) are demarcated by sandstone sema stones along with bollards recycled from an earlier era. Surrounding the tower itself is a collection of stone pieces, parts of statues, and other pieces to suggest it was a much larger site at one time. Around the front of the pagoda are the remnants of stone lions, balustrades, and bollards that have all been numbered and recorded by the looks.

Inside the laterite tower itself, the doorframe carries an inscription, and the central idol is a reclining Buddha statue, behind which are several ancient steles. The laterite tower itself is far from a basic one, featuring four false floors and a sandstone-capped top with an interesting spire.

The site has a connection with one of the last kings of the Angkorian era, Sindra Jayavarman (Khmer: ស្រីន្រ្ទជ័យវរ្ម័ន, also known as Indrajayavarman/ Indravarman IV) who is believed to have been a follower of Theravada Buddhism and to have reigned from 1308-1327. The site is quite fascinating, being of the Angkorian era with continuing development/redevelopment in the late and post-Angkor era under Theravada Buddhism, which continues to this day.

Inscriptions

The site carries an inscription on the doorjamb of the shrine registered under K. 177. According to Coedes (IC VII, p. 37), the inscription features a mix of Angkorian era and later Pali words noting the journey of a monk with a second inscription noting relics positioned in the devagrama (prior Brahmanic temple). A date is noted that Coedes speculated as the 15th century. Saveros Puo (1981) would later provide another reading of the inscription confirming Coedes, noting 57 lines in Khmer relating to the career of a religious dignitary, the second the erection of Buddhist monuments and the installation of relics in India and Cambodia, followed by a stanza in Pali. The inscription also mentions the “Third Buddhist Council” which is certainly something of interest.

Update

visiting the site again in 01/23, about two years since the prior visit, the new pagoda is completed and a lot of items (eg the naga railing) have moved, the lions now have pedestals, the number of remnants appears to have grown. I cannot remember seeing a sarcophagus before. One wonders about the volume of remnants and some pieces, especially the lions, as to whether they originated from the nearby Preah Khan of Kampong Svay. Also, the consecration deposits of the vihara have been excavated, perhaps in readiness for reconsecrating the new pagoda.

Historical Images

Quite superbly, and let’s hope it’s archived, Google Street View has a 360 image from 2014 of the earlier vihara

Via EFEO Fonds Cambodge

Historical Notes

Preah Theat. A few leagues south of this last point and separated by desert plains where limonite often outcrops, another group of hamlets, the southernmost and most important of this district which owes its name to it, is that of Khvao or Khvao Preah. Theat. It is an oasis of sparse rice-fields dominated to the east, in the direction of Prakhan, by numerous mounds rising in the midst of small valleys of black earth which were cultivated in the past and which are now abandoned.

A small ruin, called Prasat Preah Theat “tower of sacred relics”, (Brah Dhat), located one lick south of the village of Khvao, is an isolated tower, eight meters wide, fourteen high, built of limonite on a small terrace. Above the cubic chamber the dome rises in five decreasing courses separated by accentuated constrictions and crowned by the cone of a terminal monolith supporting a metal spire adorned with two apples or balls. The sandstone stones of the door frame and its two canted columns are eaten away by the wear and tear of time. Under sheds built alongside, remains of dragons or red sandstone lions, lingas, Brahmanic statues attest that the monument was originally dedicated to the ancient cult, while its four stone semas, as well as numerous statues of the Buddha, represented standing, seated or reclining, in worm-eaten wood, metal or stone from a good period, indicate that for a very long time this tower has been assigned to Buddhism, of which it has remained a venerated sanctuary. On several detached stelae, bas-reliefs represent the Buddha adored by various Brahmanic gods.

Inside the tower, a statue of a faithful adoring the Buddha represents, say the natives, his disciple Maudgalyana, whose face comes closer and closer, year by year, to the feet of the master. And, another miracle. when the reddish ooze which falls from the vault over those august feet renders them altogether bloody in appearance, and when the worms appear upon them. the kingdom of Cambodia is surely threatened with serious calamities.

On a non-gnawed part of the front face of the left frame from the door of this tower was written an inscription of sixty-six very short lines which is obviously later and much later than the construction of the monument, because it is easy to recognize that the lapicides avoided writing on the worn part . Almost nothing is clear and legible in this inscription. the writing is so coarse, shapeless, badly drawn. Close examination, however, reveals two distinct inscriptions, of twenty-seven and thirty-nine lines, separated by a punctuation mark. Among the scattered words that one can almost guess or reconstitute we read in the first half: “…the Holy Vuddha…merit and perfection…the great king gives…great man…:” and. in the second: “…royal mercy…year…the Lord Muggaliputta disciple…together with the Lord…Vrah S’ri Ratnadhātu…janālayapuri…Vikrantavirendrapura…”. The end appears to be written in the Pali language.

We can say that these fragments already give the current name of this temple and that of the great disciple who is still venerated there: that this inscription which belongs to modern Buddhism seems to date back to this troubled period which followed the decadence of the ancient cults, probably to 13th or 14th centuries. The epigraphic documents of those times. very rare, moreover, are nearly all illegible.

Other remains of ancient monuments exist near the village of Khvao which is located on the passage of the great causeway which led from Prakhan to Beng Méaléa and to Angkor. We can leave aside the Spean Phùm Auv, a limonite bridge about fifteen meters long, built to the east of the village: but we must examine in more detail the two ruins which are close to the Beng Chhnuon. large rectangular basin, one thousand meters long and five hundred wide, which was dug to the northwest and close to where the huts of Khvao are now. These ruins are those of Prasat Ta Ein, a hundred meters to the west: and those of Prasat Pram, a hundred meters to the south of this basin.

Le Cambodge, E. Aymonier, 1900

Rodney Charles LHuillier

Living in Asia for over a decade and now residing in beautiful Siem Reap. Rodney Charles L'Huillier has spent over seven years in Cambodia and is the author of Ancient Cambodia (2024) and Essential Siem Reap (2017, 2019). Contact via [email protected] - more..