Royal Square - Angkor Thom

Royal Square, Angkor Thom

Only north of the Bayon, two parallel streets running north-south casing a long rectangle of 720 meters by 80, converged towards their center by a street that runs east from the antiquated's pivot Royal Palace and prompts the Victory Gate (the east side of Angkor Thom). These streets serve, on the one side, the landmarks toward the regal's west square so characterized - the Baphuon, the Elephants' Terrace with the Royal Palace and its sanctuary the Phimeanakas, the Leper's Terrace King, Tep Pranam and Prah Palilay - and on the other, the landmarks arranged toward the east - the prasats Suor Prat, the two Kleang and Prah Pithu.

The imperial square thusly, today cleared of the trees which once swarmed it, frames an unlimited court of around 550 meters by 200 that more likely than not loaned itself honorably to the showcase of parades and military parades. From the rule of Jayavarman VII, the Elephant's developer Terrace towards the end of the twelfth century, the lord and his retainers had the capacity see these procedures from the Terrace - that was presumably adorned with rich light-weight tribunes.

In 1296, towards the period's end of greatness, the Chinese agent Tcheou Ta-Kouan composed an educational depiction for us of some of these celebrations:

"Before the imperial royal residence an awesome stage is raised, adequate to hold more than a thousand individuals, and finished from end to end with lamps and blooms. Inverse they develop a high timber platform on top of which rockets and fireworks are masterminded. As sunsets, the King is besought to participate in the display. The saltines are set off and the rockets, large as guns, are shot - shaking the entire city with their blasts...

"Consistently a celebration is held. In the ninth month the whole populace of the kingdom is summoned to the money to go in audit before the castle. With the fifth month comes the function of "washing the Buddhas". At that point Buddhas are conveyed from everywhere throughout the kingdom, water is secured and the ruler helps out in the purging ...

"... At the point when the King leaves his castle the parade is going by mounted force - then come the banners, the standards and the music. Three to five hundred merrily dressed royal residence young ladies, with blooms in their hair and decreases in their grasp, are massed together in a different gathering. The decreases are land even without trying to hide. At that point come different young ladies conveying gold and silver vessels from the royal residence and an entire accumulation of trimmings, of an extremely specific outline, whose uses were unusual to me. At that point come still more young ladies, the royal residence's bodyguard, holding shields and spears. They, as well, were independently adjusted. Tailing them come chariots drawn by goats and stallions, all embellished with gold. Clergymen and sovereigns, mounted on elephants, are gone before by incalculable bearers of red parasols. Not far behind come the regal wives and courtesans, in palanquins and chariots, or mounted on steeds or elephants, to whom are appointed no less than a hundred parasols mottled with gold. At last the Sovereign shows up, standing erect on an elephant and holding the sacrosanct sword. This elephant, his tusks sheathed in gold, is joined by bearers of twenty white parasols with brilliant shafts. All around is a bodyguard of elephants, drawn near one another, and still more troopers for complete insurance, walking in close rank."

Will we not see such a parade spoke to on the bas-reliefs of the Bayon?

We prescribe that a visit is best made in the morning to the landmarks arranged on the fundamental's west street, where one can meander along the Elephant Terrace - obtaining entrance by its focal stairway - to then visit progressively the Leper's Terrace King, the Buddha of Tep Pranam, Prah Palilay, the Royal Palace with Phimeanakas, to complete with the Baphuon. The landmarks arranged on the eastern side of the square ought to then be seen toward the evening, when the light is more positive.