An Angkoran Ruin in Laos

 Vat Phou temple’s ancient history

October 19th, 2011

In the fifth century, Champasak was thought to be the centre of the Laotian universe. Today it’s a drowsy one-car village clutching the western bank of the Mekong River in southern Laos and home to the tiny Hindu-built Vat Phou, which some archaeologists believe may have been the first Angkor temple ever built.

At a glance, Vat Phou doesn’t seem like the kind of structure that would initiate an empire. A tiny prayer hall at the top of a precarious stone stairway, with two reception halls on the plains below, Vat Phou lacks the jaw-dropping awesomeness of temples in Cambodia’s Angkor Archaeological Park. But as with the Angkor temples, its symbolism is extraordinary.

Tucked under the phallic-shaped mountain peak of Phu Kao – thought to represent Mount Meru, the sacred mountain at the centre of the Hindu cosmology – Vat Phou was worshipped as the embodiment of Shiva. The spring nearby was associated with Shiva’s wife, the goddess Parvati. Water runs underground from Phu Kao’s peak, rising through Parvati. From here, passing a series of barays (man-made dams) and linga (phallic statues), water flows into the Mekong, blessing everything on its journey south.

UNDER THREAT: The ruins of Vat Phou in southern Laos hold secrets that are being destroyed by development.

In the fifth century, Champasak was thought to be the centre of the Laotian universe. Today it’s a drowsy one-car village clutching the western bank of the Mekong River in southern Laos and home to the tiny Hindu-built Vat Phou, which some archaeologists believe may have been the first Angkor temple ever built.

At a glance, Vat Phou doesn’t seem like the kind of structure that would initiate an empire. A tiny prayer hall at the top of a precarious stone stairway, with two reception halls on the plains below, Vat Phou lacks the jaw-dropping awesomeness of temples in Cambodia’s Angkor Archaeological Park. But as with the Angkor temples, its symbolism is extraordinary.

Tucked under the phallic-shaped mountain peak of Phu Kao – thought to represent Mount Meru, the sacred mountain at the centre of the Hindu cosmology – Vat Phou was worshipped as the embodiment of Shiva. The spring nearby was associated with Shiva’s wife, the goddess Parvati. Water runs underground from Phu Kao’s peak, rising through Parvati. From here, passing a series of barays (man-made dams) and linga (phallic statues), water flows into the Mekong, blessing everything on its journey south.

I learn this while poring over a satellite map with Daniel Davenport, an articulate but debated Australian archaeologist working in Champasak and author of the Vat Phou Guide: Following in the Footsteps of Angkor’s Pilgrims, a tourist compendium on the area that Davenport is self publishing.

“Vat Phou could quite well have been the first, the pre-eminent, Angkor temple,” he says, explaining that early worshippers took a piece of Vat Phou stone and placed it under every subsequent temple they built.

On the map, Davenport points out a well-defined line leading from one of the reception halls at Vat Phou to the temple of Angkor Wat. “This used to be a pilgrims’ road during the Khmer Empire,” he says, referring to the kingdom that reigned over much of south-east Asia between the ninth and thirteenth centuries and used the Angkor Archaelogical Park as the capital. “They had roadhouses every six miles (nine kilometres) with accommodation, food, shelter for the animals and hospitals; six miles being the average distance a bullock cart could travel in a day.”

However, archaeologists at Vat Phou know a lot less than they would like to. “We have excavated about 5 per cent of the area,” says Laurent Delfour, a French architect who has been working with UNESCO to manage the site for the past three-and-a-half years. “That translates as 5 per cent knowledge on the area. We believe that Vat Phou marked the beginning of the Angkor Empire but nothing is certain.”

What is certain is the race against time Champasak’s hidden treasures face. A new highway linking the town with the regional capital of Pakse and the Thai border post of Chong Mek, has already disturbed six ancient temples beneath the ground. Champasak was designated a World Heritage zone in 2001; building without assessments, and approval, is not permitted.

“The Laos Ministry of Information and Culture did a little research into the area where the road was going,” says a long-term Champasak resident who requested anonymity. “But the findings were just pushed aside and work on the road accelerated.”

The local government is hoping the road, which will extend to the Cambodian border, will bring in busloads of tourists.  Full story here.

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