Bayon Temple in Medieval Cambodia

Behold the Bayon Temple, one of several built under King Jayavarman VII (d. 1219) of the Khmer Empire of Medieval Camodian fame.

Many consider Jayavarman VII the most important ruler of Medieval Cambodia — the sheer amount of building projects he undertook illustrates why this is so. Unifying his Empire and defending its borders, Jayavarman built up a new capital city at Angkor Thom, connecting his region with an infrastructure of miles of roads, over 100 hospitals and even more rest houses, and massive water reservoir projects.

Bayon Temple looks like a towering mud pile from a distance (see second photo), but up close is a unique structure with 54 towers from which are carved 216 heads of smiling Buddha faces.

This is the Buddha Lokesvara (aka Avalokiteśvara), the compassionate Bodhisattva of the Mahayana tradition. Jayavarman VII might well have identified with this Buddha — he had converted from Hinduism to the tradition of Buddhism that tells of beings who have been enlightened and elect to appear in this mortal coil to help others with their suffering. These beings — Bodhisattvas — have numerous expressions, but Jayavarman VII might have fancied himself to be a sort of Lokesvara. One contemporary writing (The _Say Fong inscription_) shows this: “Seeing that his kingdom, which his wisdom had transformed into heaven on earth, was oppressed by death, he produced a divine elixir that brought immortality to all”.

Incidentally, Lidar (“light detection and ranging”) maps taken from helicopters revealed several years ago that the Cambodian jungle today has buried a vast network of cities from the Khmer Empire — it was actually world’s largest empire in the 12th century.

(Cue “Ozymandius” poem here.)