THE FOUNDER OF ANGKOR CITY

Jayavarman II

According to Sdok Kok Thom inscription, circa 781 Indrapura was the first capital of Jayavarman II, located in Banteay Prei Nokor, near today's Kompong Cham. After he eventually returned to his home, the former kingdom of Chenla, he quickly built up his influence, conquered a series of competing kings, and in 790 became king of a kingdom called "Kambuja" by the Khmer. He then moved his court northwest to Mahendraparvata, far inland north from the great lake of Tonle Sap.

Jayavarman II is widely regarded as a king who set the foundations of the Angkor period in Cambodian history, beginning with a grandiose consecration ritual that he conducted in 802 on the sacred Mount Mahendraparvata, now known as Phnom Kulen, to celebrate the independence of Kambuja from Javanese dominion. At that ceremony Prince Jayavarman II was proclaimed a universal monarch (Cambodian: Kamraten jagad ta Raja) or God King (Sanskrit: Deva Raja). He declared himself Chakravartin, in a ritual taken from the Indian-Hindu tradition. Thereby he not only became the divinely appointed and therefore uncontested ruler, but also simultaneously declared the independence of his kingdom from Java. According to some sources, Jayavarman II had resided for some time in Java during the reign of Sailendras, or "The Lords of Mountains", hence the concept of Deva Raja or God King was ostensibly imported from Java. At that time, Sailendras allegedly ruled over Java, Sumatra, the Malay Peninsula and parts of Cambodia, around the Mekong delta.

The first pieces of information on Jayavarman II came from the K.235 stone inscription on a stele in Sdok Kok Thom temple, Isan region, dating to 1053. It recounts two and a half centuries of service that members of the temple's founding family provided for the Khmer court, mainly as chief chaplains of the Shaivite Hindu religion.

Archers mounted on elephants

According to an older established interpretation, Jayavarman II was supposed to be a prince who lived at the court of Sailendra in Java and brought back to his home the art and culture of the Javanese Sailendran court to Cambodia. This classical theory was revisited by modern scholars, such as Claude Jacques and Michael Vickery, who noted that Khmer called chvea the Chams, their close neighbours. Moreover, Jayavarman's political career began at Vyadhapura (probably Banteay Prei Nokor) in eastern Cambodia, which makes more probable long time contacts with them (even skirmishes, as the inscription suggests) than a long stay in distant Java. Finally, many early temples on Phnom Kulen shows both Cham (e.g. Prasat Damrei Krap) and Javanese influences (e.g. the primitive "temple-mountain" of Aram Rong Cen and Prasat Thmar Dap), even if their asymmetric distribution seems typically khmer.

Bakong, one of the earliest temple mountains in Khmer architecture

In the following years he extended his territory and eventually, later in his reign, he moved from Mahendraparvata and established his new capital of Hariharalaya near the modern Cambodian town of Rolous. He thereby laid the foundation of Angkor, which was to arise some 15 km to the northwest. Jayavarman II died in the year 835 and he was succeeded by his son Jayavarman III. Jayavarman III died in 877 and was succeeded by Indravarman I.

The successors of Jayavarman II continually extended the territory of Kambuja. Indravarman I (reigned 877 – 889) managed to expand the kingdom without wars, and he began extensive building projects, thanks to the wealth gained through trade and agriculture. Foremost were the temple of Preah Ko and irrigation works. Indravarman I developed Hariharalaya further by constructed Bakong circa 881.Bakong in particular bears striking similarity to the Borobudur temple in Java, which strongly suggests that it served as the prototype for Bakong. There must have been exchanges of travellers, if not mission, between Khmer kingdom and the Sailendras in Java. Transmitting to Cambodia not only ideas, but also technical and architectural details.

:Writing by follow up Khmer King and Khmer Histories Book.