Most Angkor Cambodia

the pillars are square with huge square cut capitals stepped out to accept the weight of their great architecture.

Today most Angkor Wat Temples

are not in good conditions, sometimes more or less only a pile of rubble.The salient pairs of columns, which carry the typical Khmer carved lintels, are cut to suggest quadruple compound columns. The base plinths are horizontally molded, and under the eaves run courses of restrained ornament. Only on the towers do the accumulation of molding and the multiplication of carved motifs become dense, with repetitions of the flamboyant gable-cartouche. The whole Wat, in fact, is a single massive sculpture. The technique of its construction consisted of erecting the plain masses, and then setting the sculptors to work to finish them in situ. At Angkor Wat there are indeed numerous free-standing sculptures, including the massive guardian figures incorporated into the architecture.

A Apsara is probably

one of the most interesting relief art. There are also images from other parts of Angkor, including bronzes, in the style of the Wat. One might say that the Wat is a repertory of some of the most magnificent relief art the world has ever seen. The open colonnaded gallery on the first storey contains over a mile of such work, six feet high. Elsewhere appear those occasional groups and figures of divinely beautiful female courtiers, celestial courtesans, known to Hindu tradition as apsaras who are an essential ingredient in the Hindu image of heaven, where all is pleasure without pain.

The style of the apsara relief and sculptures

is certainly Khmer. But possibly other influences have been at work in its formation; notably the style of Borobudur in Java, which at some times in the past - at Banteay Srei for example, and at the Baphuon -perhaps contributed the overlapping series of bodies extending into deep space. But it is generally accepted that Chinese art of some kind has also made its contributions, if at a rather superficial level, more.

Not so long time ago they cut out Apsara sandstone carvings and sold them to collectors and museums. Actually this was more or less Angkor Wat looting. Lastly, bullet holes and bomb damaged many of the temple walls — a legacy of lunatic communist Khmer Rouge.

The monuments are somehow like the pyramids in Egypt and the Mayan ruins in Central America, Angkor in Cambodia is the relic of an ancient civilization that was far advanced for its time. Here is a Angkor Map. In general the places have lots of similarities with Myanmar Bagan, the main difference is, temples have strong Hindu influence like the temple of Borobudur and the temples of Bali. Where Bagan has strong influence of Buddhism visible in the famous Buddhist temples and pagodas.

Chinese sources indicate that Suryavarman’s palace, probably the Wat, had ceilings tented with Chinese textiles. The flowery ground in low relief, against which some of the apsaras are set, suggests the silk brocade for which China was always famous. The fluid linearism of the style of the figure relief again suggests comparable Chinese work of a slightly earlier date, though the comparative material is scanty. It would not be surprising if Suryavarman did require his artists to Sinize their style, since the emperor of

eastern India. The Cham were not willing to remain subservient, and regained their independence in 1149. Suryavarman died in 1150 after a further disastrous attempt to conquer Annam, when his armies were destroyed by fever on the long march through the jungle-clad mountains.

His death left the kingdom exhausted, divided and weak. In 1177 the Cham seized their chance of revenge. Their fleet sailed up the Mekong river into Angkor Wat, and sacked it.

They carried off the wealth it had accumulated over the centuries, and burned the wooden city to the ground. Never before had Angkor experienced attack. It is true that a distant relation of Suryavarman's, Jayavarman VII, resurrected Angkor in a final blaze of glory but on a different metaphysical basis. The extinction of the line of god-kings in 1177 marked the end of an epoch

was the final riposte of the hard pressed Cham people, who suffered continuous oppression at the hands of King Suryavarman II (1113-50). During the first decade of the eleventh century, the Khmer empire was taken over by a usurper who may have originated in the Malayan provinces of the empire. He took the name Suryavarman I. His energy and skill were evidently considerable, for he annexed to the empire large tracts of territory; Champa had already been subdued, but he now dominated the whole of southern Siam as far north as Lopburi, as well as most of southern Laos.

He himself adopted the Hindu royal cult of his predecessors, holding himself a representative of Shiva ; but the land he came from was imbued with Buddhism. So during his long reign - he died in tosci - he permitted or even assisted the growth of

Mahayina Buddhism in his country.

Buddhist sculptures

appeared quite frequently in and around Angkor. Suryavarman's son, Udayadityavarman II succeeded him on the throne, and reigned until ro66. He expanded and consolidated the Khmer empire still further. In order to increase yet again the agricultural resources of Angkor, he built the five mile-long western baray with its associated canals on the same pattern as the others, submerging the ninth-century city under it, and covering the old Ak Yum temple with its dyke.

This king was followed by his younger brother, Harshavarman II, who ruled until io8o, but gradually lost the empire his predecessors had gained.

Angkor history showed great advancments

Under this trio of Angkor kings the political and social fortunes of the Khmer were advancing towards a peak. The continual expenditure involved in constructing the long series of massive buildings, means Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom plus their associated cities indicates that the opulence of the Khmer empire was immense.

For sheer size this dynasty's monuments are eclipsed only by Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom.  Nothing earlier can match their ambitious extravagance. Yet the fact that the dynasty were usurpers from a distant province did not affect the character of their art at all. The builders and sculptors of Angkor continued to work for them in their own deeply ingrained tradition.

The main work of Suryavarman's reign was the temple mountain Ta Keo.

He continued to work on the Phimeanakas and did a great deal outside the capital,