PHIMEANAKAS TEMPLE

PHIMEANAKAS TEMPLE “Golden Tower”
- Location : it located inside The Royal Palace, north of Baphuon and Bayon.
 - Access : enter and leave it from the Terrace of Elephant by using the east gate of the Royal Wall. - Date : end of the 10th century to the 11th century.
 - King : Rajendravarman 2nd (944-968), “Sivaloka”. Jayavarman 5th (968-1001), “Paramasivaloka”. Suryavarman 1st (1002-1049), “Nirvanapada”.
 - Religion : Hinduism (dedicated to Siva).
 - Art-style : Khleangs.
 - Clearance worked by Mr. Jean Commaille 1908 and Mr. Henri Marchal (1916-1918).
- Excavation work of the north pool by Mr. Maurice Glaize 1944.

 1. AREA
The Royal Plaza covers an area of about 15 hectares, surrounded by a strong laterite wall is (250 meters wide by 600 meter long and 5 meters high), with 5 gates, 7 meters high built by king Rajendravarman 2. Inside the Royal area there are 2 pools. West pool : is (45 meters wide by 125 meters long and 5.5 meters deep) for the men. East pool : is (25 meters wide by 50 meters long and 4.5 meters deep) for the women. They found 2 inscriptions on the second level of the temple that talking about the king Jayavarman 7th. - The first inscription : said about the religion that practiced by the Khmers, it also mentioned about the fig tree as “Trinity”, (the root is for Brahma, the trunk is for Siva, the branch is for Vishnu). - The second inscription : said about those who obtained Nirvana after having diffused a number of kindnesses and practiced the virtue of priest.

 2. BACKGROUND
The temple situated at the right center of The Royal wall. It was formerly covered by a Golden Pinnacle as “Chinese Diplomat Zhou Da Guan in 1292” described it as the golden tower. According to the legend believed that inside the golden tower, “there was a serpent with 9 heads, which was the earth master of the kingdom. It appears every night under the form of a beautiful lady with whom the king had to sleep with her every night in the main tower before he joined his wives and concubines in the palace. If the snake did not appear for one night, it would be the end of the king’s life. If the king failed to come for only one night he had to suffer the misfortune.

 3. LAY-OUT
The temple stood on a high rectangular laterite base (28 meters wide by 35 meters long) with 3 levels 12 meters high “first level is 4.6 meters high, second level is 4 meters high, third level is 3.4 meters high”, built by the king Jayavarman 5. The upper level is (23 meters wide by 30 meters long) which surrounded by a sandstone gallery (1 meter wide by 2 meters long) with 4 doors. The temple had 4 steep stairways one on each side of the base and flanked by sandstone lions and at the corners of all levels decorated with sandstone elephants on their pedestals, but mostly broken.

 4. UPPER PART (Gallery and Central Tower)
The gallery was built at the beginning of the reign of king Suryavarman 1st in (A.D 1002-1049) including the central tower. The gallery enclosed the upper area and the main tower. The main tower stood on a base with 3 levels and opening to the 4 cardical directions.

 A. NOTE
The inscription of the door framed of the east gate of the Royal wall, dated in 1011 under the reign of king Suryavarman 1st, said about “the promise of dignitaries of the kingdom; of which the text is closely attached to them; that is still in practice in the court of Cambodia today.

 B. 5 ZONES
- Southeast : Royal conference hall or home of priests.
 - Southwest : Royal court (king, queen and concubines).
 - Central part : Phimeanakas Temple. - Northwest : Private village of mandarins and nobleman. 
- Northeast : 2 pools.