HTML clipboardEnter Angkor Wat city from the W by crossing the
causeway over the moat. This causeway was, in fact, built more than a century
later than the temple, as evidence the style of its round columns. Ahead is the
W entrance gopura with the remains of three towers. At the left and right of
this 230m-broad gopura are entrances large enough to have taken vehicles and
elephants, and these may originally have been approached by wooden bridges
across the moat. On entering the gopura, you can make a short detour to the
right to the shrine under the southern tower, where an eight-armed statue of
Vishnu (restored many times) fills the space. This image, which seems too big
for this location, may originally have been worshipped in Angkor Wat's central
sanctuary.
Return to the main entrance; the doorway leading to the enclosure frames a
magnificent view - the towers of the temple at the end of a 350m causeway. At
sunrise they are silhouetted against the morning sky, in the late afternoon they
glow almost orange. As you step through onto the causeway, you can appreciate
the scale of the city, which extended to the left and right. The balustrades of
the causeway are in the form of naga serpents, their bodies raised on short
square columns. At six points along its length, about 50m apart, steps lead to
the ground level of the enclosure, and here the balustrades turn and end in
rearing naga heads. These steps gave to the streets of the original city, which
was laid out in a grid, and, thanks to Groslier's restoration in the 1960s, the
outline of some can bi seen through the grass and trees.
Before walking down the causeway, however, turn round to examine the
E-facing wall of the entrance gopura and its exquisite bas-relief carvings. The
apsaras at the base of the wall are particularly fine, and look their best in
early morning sunlight. Several metres S of the main entrance, the smile of one
of these celestial maidens reveals a full set of teeth - uniquely among the
almost 2,000 apsaras at Angkor Wat.
Continue along the causeway towards the temple proper. On either side are
two large so-called 'libraries'. With four doorways at the cardinal points,
these would have been shrines of some kind rather than repositories of
manuscripts. Closer to the temple, also on either side, are two ponds (added
later, perhaps in the 16th century); the views of the temple from their banks is
one of the most popular. Just before the temple, steps lead up from the causeway
to a cruciform terrace. From its architectural elements, it was probably built
after the original design.
You now face the entrance gopura of the temple itself, with galleries
extending to the left and right. At this point, you have the choice of
continuing up towards the towers of the central sanctuary, or of first walking
around the Gallery of Bas-Reliefs. It is entirely a matter of personal
preference, but for the first-time visitor we recommend leaving the bas-reliefs
until later. We continue, for the sake ol simplicity, with the architecture.
Enter and climb the steps which lead, in semi-darkness, to the temple's'
second level. These steps, together with four rectangular stone basins perhaps
made water-tight with a layer of clay, are part of a structure known as the
'cruciform cloister'. This is an interesting architectural invention to connect
the galleries of the first and second levels, and if you step to either side
along the edges of the ponds, you can see how cleverly the three roofed
stairways are stepped upwards to join the upper gallery. On the south side of
the 'cruciform cloister' are the remains of a few Buddha statues, seated and
standing. There were many more, placed in recent centuries by worshippers for
whom Angkor Wat was a Theravada Buddhist pilgrimage site, giving this area the
name 'Hall of the Thousand Buddhas". Most were removed for safety in the early
1970s, others were destroyed by the Khmer Rouge during their reign of terror.
You can enter the enclosure of the second level through N and S doorways
on the axis of the 'cruciform cloister', although only the two 'libraries' are
of interest. Otherwise, continue climbing the steps up to the enclosure of the
second level. You emerge from the darkness to another spectacular view - the
massif of the central towers rising from the courtyard. A footbridge on stubby
round columns, built in the second half of the 13th century, connects the
entrance where you are standing with the central towers and with another two
'libraries' on either side. The clearest view of the towers is from either the
NW or SW corner of this enclosure (at the extreme left or right), as the massif
is set back slightly towards the E Apsaras line the inner wall.
The uppermost level of the temple, which carries the five towers and
surrounding galleries, really does look like the final ascent of a great
mountain, and although the steps rise just 11m, their steep angle and the
proportions of the massif make the climb memorable. The W stairways are less
steep (50°) than those on the other three sides. However the S stairway does
have a hand rail to assist the less able climbers. From the top of the steps,
the view is commanding - the 'libraries' and galleries of the second enclosure
below, and the half-kilometer approach from the W entrance beyond. Phnom Bakheng
rises to the NW; from its summit there is a wonderful view back to Angkor Wat.
The summit is enclosed by a continuous gallery 60m square, four of the
towers rising from the corners, and it is connected to the central shrine and
tower (42m high) by axial galleries. Ail of this creates an effect similar to
that of the 'cruciform cloister' below. The shrine itself has changed somewhat
since its foundation. Originally it was open on all four sides, and contained a
statue of Vishnu (possibly that now found in the W entrance gopura by the moat).
At some point in the 14th or 15th centuries, however, when the temple was
converted to Theravada Buddhist worship, these doorways were blocked by walls
carved with standing Buddhas, and the four vestibules turned into Buddhist
shrines, as they are now. The doorway behind the standing Buddha on the south
side was opened in 1908; inside, the space under the central tower is in pitch
darkness, and dangerous, as the earth floor has been excavated into a 25m-deep
pit. The sacred treasure buried here was pillaged long ago, and all that was
found by the French in their 1934 excavation was a couple of gold leaves. Note
the evidence of 16th restoration when columns from the cruciform terrace were
reused here.
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Vietnam
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