Reliefs of Angkor Wat, Cambodia
Tuesday, October 23 2007 @ 11:27 AM | Contributed by: Oliver | Views: 825
 | Next to the fabulous buildings, Angkor Wat is famous for its reliefs. Not only can you find figures carved above and besides doors like in other sites in Angkor, but almost every surface of the long galleries and uncounted pillars are covered in a high variety of ornaments, guardians, repeating patterns and complete sagas, myths and historic events. |
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| The first thing you disover when entering the buidlings are the repeased patterns all over the pillars that hold the ceilings. You will find flower-patterns as well as phoenixes and even some parts where the carving is still in progress and you can discover how the artists have been proceeding through the stone to get the repeating patterns to match into each other. | ||
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| In other places, you will find inscriptions, partly original, partly by tourist from the 18th century and other dates, here you can see fonts in Khmer, Japanese and Chinese, all very old. | ||
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| Next to some Apsara Dancers which do not have great detail, you can see the other extreme of stone carving: Endless galleries with highly detailed scenes of fight between gods and demons. The figures are famous for beeing 3-dimensional, with rounded edges and often shown in several layers behind each other, overlapping, interlocking and stacked when several rows of soldiers attack. | ||
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| Still, the guardian monkeys are found. The shift through 3 religions of the temple's inhabitants left a wide variety of Hindu, Vishnu and Buddhist symbols all over the place, showing for example heaven & hell with its delights and tortures (last image). | ||
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| The centerpiece of attraction is the gallery showing the Churning of the Sea of Milk by alsmost 200 demons and spirits, with Vishnu in the center, all beeing held together by a giant Naga-Snake | ||
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| Scattered all over are of course more Apsara-Dancers with elaborate head-ornaments and other jewlery that should not be mistaken for digital cameras.... | ||
Please see also these articles about Angkor Temples:
Angkor Wat | Sunrise at Angkor Wat | Reliefs of Angkor Wat
Banteay Srei Temple | Preah Palilay Temple | Bayon Temple | Ta Phrom Temple
These are more articles from Cambodia:
Khmer Dance | Floating Village | Royal Palace | On the road | Hotel de la Paix
Angkor Wat | Sunrise at Angkor Wat | Reliefs of Angkor Wat
Banteay Srei Temple | Preah Palilay Temple | Bayon Temple | Ta Phrom Temple
These are more articles from Cambodia:
Khmer Dance | Floating Village | Royal Palace | On the road | Hotel de la Paix
