Historical figure
Indravarman II
Indravarman II was a king of the Khmer Empire. He was the son of Jayavarman VII, followed him on the throne at Angkor and reigned until 1243.[1][2] Peter Sharrock wrote that he apparently stayed loyal to his father's Buddhism.[3]
Reign
The sources differ on when his reign began. Maurice Glaize's list of kings has Jayavarman VII reigning until about 1210, and dates the reign of his son Indravarman II from before 1210 to 1243.[1] Yoshiaki Ishizawa, in a book on the Buddhist statues found at Banteay Kdei, gives his reign as 1220 to 1243.[2] Both sources name Jayavarman VIII as the next king, from 1243 to 1295.[1][2]
Ishizawa set out a common belief about this period. In that view, the great building works of Jayavarman VII had put too heavy a load on the people. Together with the growing power of Siam in the west, this led Angkor into a slow decline under Indravarman II and Jayavarman VIII. Ishizawa argued that the Banteay Kdei find gives a different picture, at least of Jayavarman VIII's reign.[2]
Buddhism
Sharrock used George Coedès's term, the Mahidharapura dynasty, for the northern Khmers, preponderantly Buddhist, who ruled Angkor from 1080 to 1270, counting Jayavarman VII and Indravarman II among them.[3]
Behind the Terrace of the Leper King in the royal square of Angkor stands a series of carvings that once ended balustrades. They show a deity seated in a bodhisattva's posture, holding a vajra to his chest, ringed by the crested heads of naga serpents. Sharrock wrote that one possible reading is Vajrapani with the Eight Great Naga. He wrote that these carvings should probably be dated to the reign of Indravarman II. They share the style of the Terrace of the Leper King, which the scholar Stern took to be the last phase of the Bayon style.[3]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Angkor Database, Maurice Glaize, The Monuments of the Angkor Group (1944; English translation of the fourth French edition)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Angkor Database, Angkor Buddhist Treasures from Banteay Kdei (undated; a record of Yoshiaki Ishizawa's 2007 book)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Peter D. Sharrock, Garuda, Vajrapani and Religious Change in Jayavarman VII's Angkor (February 2009)