Sitting between Phrathat Kham Kaen (7.5km away) and the King Cobra Village (12km), two of Khon Kaen’s most popular tourist destinations, you’d expect Ku Prapha Chai (กู่ประภาชัย) to attract a fair number of visitors, but you will usually have this small Khmer ruin all to yourself. Made mostly of laterite, Ku Prapha Chai was built by King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219) as a temple for one of the 102 arogayasala… Read More
The Khon Kaen National Museum (พิพิธภัณฑสถานแห่งชาติ ขอนแก่น), opened in 1972, has four small but interesting historical galleries with artefacts from around Upper Isan and is worth a look for anyone visiting Khon Kaen. Its most famous object, standing in the center of the Dvaravati wing, is a bai sema boundary stone of the Buddha’s wife, Princess Yasodhara (aka Bimpa Devi) cleaning the Buddha’s feet with her hair that was found… Read More
Centered on eight traditional Thai teak buildings (four old and four new) in a quiet garden, the Suan Pakkad Palace Museum (พิพิธภัณฑ์วังสวนผักกาด) is an underappreciated exhibition of Thai art, from khon masks to Ban Chiang pottery. Once the home of Prince Chumbon of Nakhon Sawan (son of King Rama 5) and his wife, and before that a vegetable farm, the “Cabbage Patch Palace” is a great place to visit, though… Read More
Many people visiting the amazing Prasat Phimai temple are unaware that in its day it stood at the heart of a large important city. Lying on the Mun River and along overland trade routes to the north and south, as well as having abundant salt deposits (there are none near Angkor), Phimai city prospered on trade during its time in the Khmer empire. And many remnants of the town infrastructure… Read More
Kuti Ruesi Noi (กุฏิฤาษีน้อย), just 450m south of the southern city gate, was the temple for one of the 102 arogayasala (hospitals) that King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219) had built around the empire. It follows the standard arogayasala design in most regards. It faces roughly to the east, in line with Phimai temple and town. It’s quite incomplete – none of the walls are tall and some are gone entirely… Read More
Noen Wat Khok (เนินวัดโคก) was a small temple in its day, but it was likely quite an important one. Like West Mebon in the Angkor region, Noen Wat Khok sat prominently on an island in the middle of a massive baray. Now almost entirely silted in and used mostly for agriculture (though it’s still clearly recognizable when seen from above), the old Phimai Baray stretches 750m by 1800m, the biggest… Read More
Just over a kilometer south of Phimai city’s southern gate and directly centered along the axis of the temple and town, Tha Nang Sra Phom (ท่านางสระผม) is the only preserved Khmer-era boat landing known in Thailand. Likely built by King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219), it’s a simple cruciform platform made entirely of laterite with very steep stairs on three of the sides. When it was excavated the archaeologists found post… Read More
Less than 100m from the south shore of the old Phimai Baray, San Pu-Ta Ban Wang Hin (ศาลปู่ตา บ้านวังหิน) is lined up with the Prasat Phimai’s soaring prang, 3.6km away, instead of being lined up with the baray, suggesting it may have once been an important temple. It’s age and purpose are unknown and nothing ancient – no pottery shards, bricks, or building blocks – is visible now. The few… Read More
Sra Pleng Quarry (ลานหินตัดสระเพลง) is hidden away in a forest at the foot of the Sankamphaeng Mountains in the south-central part of Ta Phraya National Park. A geologist from the Ministry of Mineral Resources who visited identified this grey sandstone as from the Phu Kradung Formation, which dates to around 150 million years ago. Geological maps of Thailand I’ve seen show this area to be the younger Sao Khua or… Read More
A temple for one of the 102 arogayasala (hospitals) built by King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219), Prang Phon Songkhram (ปรางค์พลสงคราม) follows the standard design of arogayasala, including being built primarily with laterite, using sandstone only for trim. The only original entrance is through an eastern gopura. It’s cross-shaped with small chambers to the east, south, and north (which still have their roofs) and an uncarved lintel over the outer front… Read More
At the foot of Phanom Rung mountain, Kuti Ruesi Ban Nong Bua Rai (กุฎิฤษีบ้านหนองบัวราย) was the temple for one of the 102 arogayasala (hospitals) built by King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219) around the empire. Like a lot of his projects, it was not fully completed. Like other arogayasala, it’s built with laterite using sandstone for the trim and has a single east-facing tower for the main sanctuary with a single bannalai to its southeast, both… Read More
Just 750m away from Prasat Muang Tam, Kuti Ruesi Ban Khok Mueang (กุฏิฤาษีบ้านโคกเมือง) was built much later by King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219) for one of the 102 arogayasala (hospitals) he opened across the empire. It has the standard arogayasala design: a single east-facing tower, a single bannalai southeast of the tower, an enclosure with just one gopura, and a rectangular pond outside to the northeast; all built of laterite with sandstone only for trim. The main prang,… Read More
Prasat Ban Bu (ปราสาทบ้านบุ) is one of the 17 dharmasala fire shrines King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219), a devout Buddhist, built along the road from Angkor to Phimai, and one of only two in Thailand that have been restored; Prasat Ta Muean being the other. The clear color difference shows that over half of the laterite blocks used to rebuild it are new. Prasat Ban Bu is a single east-facing… Read More
One of the great things about visiting Khmer temples is that most have their own unique style. But in Thailand there are two exceptions to this, the arogayasala (hospital) and dharmasala (resthouse) temples, all of which have the same general layout and design as the others. Both of these were specialized temples commissioned by King Jayavarman VII (r. 1182-1219). One of the greatest Angkor kings, he restored a beleaguered empire… Read More
In 1964 Dr. Phra Ariyanuwat Khemacharee, the former abbot of Wat Mahachai, saw foreigners coming to Isan to buy ancient artifacts – Buddhas, Khmer stone carvings palm-leaf manuscripts, etc. – so he requested people bring these things to the temple to protect them. Later the two-story Northeastern Local Culture Museum (พิพิธภัณฑ์วัฒนธรรมท้องถิ่นภาคตะวันออกเฉียงเหนือ วัดมหาชัย) was built to house the diverse collection that had resulted, including a lot of Khmer-era sandstone statues and… Read More
At first glance, all you’ll see of Ku Khu Khat (กู่คูขาด) is a large Buddha on a small, tree covered hill. But get closer and you’ll find that the hill is a pile of laterite blocks and brick covered almost completely by dirt and leaf debris. Some laterite is still visible and a few bricks can be seen sticking out of two places under the big tree. Just enough rubble… Read More
Virtually unknown, Khao Hin Tat Ancient Quarry (แหล่งตัดหินเขาหินตัด) lies a kilometer away as the crow flies (by road it’s either two or three kilometers, depending which direction you’re driving due to needing to U-turn on the Mittraphap highway) from the well-known Si Khio Ancient Quarry, and naturally they share similar characteristics and histories. The grey sandstone is of the Phu Phan Formation, which is around 120 million years old. The stone… Read More
Don Ku (ดอนกู่) consists of a jumble of laterite blocks mostly buried in a two-meter-tall hill. The only structure still visible is a bit of the platform under a tree on the west side. Although no proper excavation has been done here, the shape of the mound leads to the assumption that it was a single tower facing east (tilted off-center to the south by about 15 degrees) since not… Read More
Si Khio Ancient Quarry (แหล่งโบราณหินตัดสีคิ้ว) is in the Phu Phan Formation, which was laid down about 120 million years ago. The sandstone here is grey and rather course but lacks conglomerate, making it good for carving. For unknown reasons, work here stopped abruptly so various stages of the cutting can be seen, from the beginning of carving the grooves to make the blocks to a field where all the stone… Read More
Although Prasat Ban Bu Yai (ปราสาทหินบ้านบุใหญ่) lies in total ruin and most significant carvings are gone, when you see the size of the lotus-bud top (several pieces of it are visible in the rubble) you can tell that this was once a large temple. It had a single sandstone tower that can only be said to have been built in the 11th to 13th centuries. There is a second, smaller… Read More