Archaeology Wordsmith

Results for Cambodia:

Cambodia: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Kampuchea
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Neolithic peoples inhabited present-day Cambodia during the 2nd and 1st millennia BC. Stone tools have been found in terraces of the Mekong River in possible association with tektites from a shower that fell c 600,000 to 700,000 years ago. In western Cambodia there is an important Hoabinhian sequence from the cave of Laang Spean dating to 4300 BC. A major Neolithic mound site at Somrong Sen yielded elaborate assemblage which seems to predate 100 BC. Khmer civilization developed over several distinct periods, starting with the Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms of Funan and Chenla in the 1st century AD, which extended into the 8th century.
Angkor: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Archaeological site in northwestern Cambodia which was the capital of the Khmer empire in Kampuchia and founded in c 9 AD (c 802). The name, from Sanskrit 'nagara', means royal city the capital". As the capital of the Khmer empire form the 9th-15th centuries its most imposing monuments are Angkor Wat a temple complex built in the 12th century by King Suryavarman II (reigned 1113-c. 1150 AD) and Angkor Thom a temple complex built about 1200 by King Jayavarman VII (1181-c 1215 AD). These monuments were lost in jungle and rediscovered in the last century. In total there are more than 250 monuments built almost exclusively in sandstone. The Thais conquered Angkor in 1431 and it was abandoned."
Angkor Borei: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The site of the capital of the kingdom of Funan towards the end of the 6th century. The rich archaeological site is located south of Phnom Penh, near the Vietnam border, in Cambodia. It appears as Na-fu-na in Chinese writings and is identified with Naravaranagara. There are many stone statuary.
Angkor Wat: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A huge stone stepped pyramid, the best-known monument of Angkor (Cambodia), the largest religious structure in the world. The three-storied construction is surrounded by a moat and surmounted by five vast towers which symbolized the five peaks of Mount Meru. It was built by Suryavarman II (1113-1150 AD) over a 25-year period as his own mausoleum (temple-mountain). The name in Khmer means the capital (which has become a Buddhist) monastery". Angkor Wat is considered to be the highest expression of Khmer classic architecture and sculpture-relief."
Austro-Asiatic: CATEGORY: language
DEFINITION: A family of about 150 languages which includes Vietnamese, Munda (eastern India), Mon (southwest Burma), Khmer (Kampuchea), and several minor language groups including Nicobarese, and Aslian of peninsular Malaysia. Vietnamese, Khmer, and Mon are culturally the most important of these and have the longest recorded history. Khmer is spoken primarily in Cambodia, Mon in Thailand and Myanmar (Burma). Vietnamese and Khmer, with the largest number of speakers, are the national languages, respectively, of Vietnam and Cambodia. Austro-Asiatic was once the main linguistic family of mainland Southeast Asia and eastern India, but its speakers have become geographically split into the Tibeto-Burman, Thai, and Austronesian languages.
Bakong: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The earliest surviving temple mountain in southeast Angkor, Cambodia, the first Cambodian temple to be built primarily of stone (sandstone) rather than brick. It was built by king Indravarman I (reigned 877-c 890 AD) and was probably finished in 881. The central tower of the pyramidal structure in 34 meters high. At the summit of the central shrine was a linga, the phallic emblem sacred to Shiva. Around the base of the terraced pyramid stood eight large shrines inside the main enclosure, with a series of moats, causeways, and auxiliary sculptures guarding the approaches to the exterior. Bakong became the model for many larger royal temples at Angkor. These served as monuments to the greatness of their patrons and, subsequently, as their tombs.
Banteay Srei: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: [Khmer 'the citadel of the ladies']
CATEGORY: structure; site
DEFINITION: A small, beautiful sandstone monument in Angkor, Cambodia, built in 967. Episodic relief (relief panels illustrating various aspects of the royal mythology) sculpture first appears on Banteay Srei. The relief revolves around a series of Indian legends dealing with the cosmic mountain Meru as the source of all creation and with the divine origin of water. The chief artistic achievement of its sophisticated architecture is the way in which the spaces between the walls of the enclosures, the faces of the terraces, and the volumes of the shrine buildings are conceived and coordinated. It seems to have been influenced by the architecture of the Hindu Pallava dynasty in southeastern India.
Baphuon: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Temple mountain built by the Baphuon of Udayadityavarman II (reigned 1050-66 AD) in Angkor, Cambodia, unfortunately almost completely destroyed. It was a vast sandstone monument 480 yards (440 m) long and 140 yards (130 m) wide, approached by a 200-yard (180-m) causeway raised on pillars. Its ground plan shows a fully articulated structure and it was the immediate prototype for the great Angkor Wat. It was, at the time, the most massive artificial mountain of classical Cambodia and the second largest monument after Angkor Wat.
Bayon: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: An enormous sandstone monument in northwest Angkor, Cambodia, built c 1200 by the Buddhist king Jayavarman VII (1181-c 1220), the last great ruler of the Khmer empire. It was his temple-mountain and the center of his restored capital Angkor Thom. Bayon had a central circular sanctuary, situated within two bas-relief covered galleries, which vividly depicted the king's battles with Cham forces. Bayon was a distinctively Mahayana Buddhist central pyramid temple designed to serve as the primary locus of the king's royal cult and also as his own personal mausoleum.
Chenla: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: A kingdom of the Khmers of the 6th-8th centuries AD in what is now southern Laos. It expanded to absorb the territories formerly occupied by Funan (now Cambodia). At the beginning of the 8th century it split into Water Chenla" and "Land Chenla". Chenla ceased to exist when the kingdom of Angkor was established in 802. From local inscriptions remarkable sculptures architectural remains and Chinese sources it is clear that it was an Indianized kingdom. There was an important cult site called Wat Phu (Laos)."
Funan: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The Chinese name for an early kingdom of Southeast Asia, founded in the 1st century AD and recorded as a trading partner of China from at least the 3rd century AD. Located in the lower Mekong region of Cambodia and southern Vietnam, this Indianized state was strategically situated on the trade routes between India and China. It was conquered by the Khmer state of Chenla in the 7th century. There is abundant information about the material culture of Funan from excavations, notably those of Oc-eo, thought to have been its main port, and from Angkor Borei.
Indrapura: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A city and dynasty in Cambodia that was the first capital of king Indravarman II (the sixth in Champan history) before he founded the kingdom of Angkor. It served in that capacity from 875-986; when the capital was then transferred to Vijaya, further south.
Kambuja: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Kambuja-desa
CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: The Khmer kingdom founded in Cambodia by Jayavarman during the pre-14th century phase known as Angkor. It is the ethnic name of the people of that first kingdom of the Khmers. Jayavarman was Cambodia's first nationally oriented king.
Khmer: CATEGORY: culture
DEFINITION: The ethnic name of a linguistic group inhabiting Cambodia, southern Vietnam, and parts of Thailand. Late in 6th century AD, they annexed the declining Funan Empire of south Cambodia and extended westwards. The Khmer were linguistically related to the Mon and at the height of their power ruled most of Thailand and southern Laos. The empire had its capital at Angkor in Kampuchea and it was destroyed by the Thais in about 1400 AD. Khmer was one of the most impressive civilizations of southeast Asia, known for spectacular and monumental religious architecture.
Laang Spean: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Cave site in western Cambodia, occupied between c 7000-500 BC, which has yielded a Hoabinhian sequence with an appearance of ground stone tools and pottery by perhaps 4300 BC. Succeeding layers contain more elaborate pottery and flaked stone tools.
Mlu Prei: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Prehistoric sites in north-central Cambodia, including O Yak, O Pie Can, and O Nari, occupied in the transition between the Neolithic to bronze and then iron. There were polished stone adzes, flaked sidescrapers, and bone projectile points during the Neolithic. Bronze items and clay crucibles followed and then the iron axes and other artifacts.
moated site: CATEGORY: structure
DEFINITION: A class of sites in places like Thailand, Cambodia, England, Ireland, and Flanders. In the first two, they are known from protohistoric and early historic sites and are settlements encircled by one or more irregular moats. In England, Ireland, and Flanders, they were built during the late medieval period. There was a tradition of building defensive moats around castles and manorial establishments and it was taken up by wealthy farmers later. In marshy areas, a moat provided an extra means of drainage when the climate was deteriorating and acted as a source of both dry-season water and edible aquatic flora and fauna.
Moi fort: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Cham fort
CATEGORY: structure
DEFINITION: Small circular earthen-walled enclosures set in series along the foothills of the middle Mekong valley in Cambodia. They are considered late Neolithic, c 2500-2000 BC, with polished stone adzes and no metal.
Preah Vihear: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: A large mountaintop temple built by the Khmer king Suryavarman, located on the border of Thailand and northern Cambodia. It has been described as one of the most beautiful natural sites of the whole of Asia.
Sambor Prei Kuk: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Zhenla
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Early historic center southeast of Angkor, Cambodia, likely the capital of the pre-Angkor Khmer state of Isanapura (7th-8th centuries AD).
Samrong Sen: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Late prehistoric settlement site in central Cambodia, c 1000 BC, with polished stone adzes and bronze implements.
temple mountain: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: temple-mountain
CATEGORY: structure
DEFINITION: A form of monument which occurred only in Cambodia from the 9th-13th centuries AD. They are a series of artificial mountains on the Cambodian plain at Angkor, each crowned by shrines containing images of gods and of Khmer kings, their family, and their ancestors. The huge platforms of earth on which these buildings were founded are oriented east to west, the main gates facing east. Each king tried to outdo his predecessor in the height, size, and splendor of his temple mountain. The earlier ones are relatively small, though beautiful, while the later ones, such as Angkor Wat and the Bayon, are of stupendous size. It originated from the belief that the main temple of the king, which is the ritual center of the kingdom and eventually becomes his mausoleum, must be situated on a mountain or at least a hill. The architecture of the shrines themselves is relatively simple; it is based upon patterns invented in India, though the ornament of the shrines is often highly developed and characteristically Cambodian. On some of the temple mountains there are also relief panels illustrating various aspects of the royal mythology. The earliest surviving temple mountain at Angkor itself is the Bakong, probably finished in 881.
Vyadhapura: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: Sanskrit for 'City of Hunters', capital city of the ancient Hindu kingdom of Funan, which flourished from the 1st-6th century AD in an area that comprises modern Cambodia and Vietnam. It is 120 miles (190 km) from the mouth of the Mekong River, near a landform called Ba Hill in southern Cambodia.
Yashodharapura: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The first city in the Angkor, Cambodia, area founded by king Yashovarman in 889 AD. It was Cambodia's capital until it was abandoned in the 15th century. His temple mountain, now called Bakheng, was built on a natural hill that overlooked the city, the rice-growing plain, and the Tonle Sap. Yashovarman built a large reservoir nearby; the city wall of Yashodharapura measured 2.5 miles (4 km) on each side.
Zhenla: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Chenla
CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: The name used for an early Khmer state in southeast Cambodia and south Vietnam, probably established during the 6th century AD in the upper-middle reaches of the Mekong River, in what is now Laos. The leaders of Zhenla descended from the Funan. Zhenla was later divided into 'Land Chenla' and 'Water Chenla' which vied for recognition from China. The Funan-Chenla tradition produced some of the world's most magnificent stone cult images.

Another Dictionary Search