Northern Baray

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Coordinates: 13 ° 27 ′ 48 ″  N , 103 ° 53 ′ 41 ″  E

At about twelve o'clock on the menu, Preah Khan is found; Immediately to the east, between the road to the north and the river to the south, lies the Northern Baray area, with the island of Neak Pean in the center.

The Northern Baray , also Baray of Preah Khan , is a reservoir in Angkor ( Cambodia ) that was restored in 2007 .

investment

King Jayavarman VII had the 3500 m by 900 m Northern Baray built around the year 1200; thus the Western and Eastern Baray are much larger and a century and three centuries older, respectively. Apparently these two were not enough to supply the capital Angkor Thom and the huge settlement around it, the largest settlement area before the industrial age with a good 1000 km².

The Northern Baray was built shortly after the Buddhist temple complex and provisional capital Preah Khan and at the same time as Angkor Thom. It is immediately east of Preah Khan; the Siem Reap River flows along its south side ; the Eastern Baray borders on the other bank of the river. Like the other Baray of the Angkor area including the small Srah Srang , the Northern Baray lies as an elongated rectangle across the compass . There are two reasons:

  • In Khmer architecture , an alignment in the cardinal points stands for a harmonious relationship with earth and sky.
  • Since the Angkor area slopes down to Lake Tonlé Sap (approximately to SSW), and since a Baray is a dammed reservoir, the builders chose the east-west orientation; so the lower dams did not have to rise much higher than the upper ones.

In the middle of the Northern Baray lies the artificial fountain island Neak Pean .

Information base

literature

  • Michael Freeman and Claude Jacques: Ancient Angkor . Bangkok 1999 (River Books), ISBN 974-8225-27-5 .
  • Nick Ray: Cambodia . Victoria 2005 (Lonely Planet Publications), ISBN 1-74059-525-4 .
  • Johann Reinhart Zieger: Angkor and the Khmer temples in Cambodia . Chiang Mai 2006 (Silkworm Books), ISBN 974-9575-60-1 . A paperback with full details, available in Thailand.
  • Marilia Albanese: National Geographic Art Guide. The treasures of Angkor . Hamburg 2006 (National Geographic), ISBN 978-3-937606-77-4 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Peou slope: Water & Heritage in Angkor, Cambodia. The monuments, the ancient hydraulic network and their recent rehabilitation . In: Willem JH Willems and Henk PJ van Schaik (eds.): Water & Heritage. Material, conceptual and spiritual connections . Sidestone Press (Leiden 2015), ISBN 978-90-8890-279-6 , pp. 71–86, here pp. 80/81.