Heritage site
Ta Nei
បា្រសាទតានៃ
Ta Nei (បា្រសាទតានៃ, Prasat Ta Nei) is a Buddhist temple at Angkor of the late 12th century, attributed to King Jayavarman VII.[1][2] It stands in the forest about 200 meters (660 feet) west of the western dike of the East Baray, the great reservoir of King Yasovarman I.[2][3] Hello Angkor names its carved pediments and its devata reliefs as the highlights of the site.[1]
History
The temple's style, of the second half of the 12th century, is the same throughout. Only the two gateways of the outer enclosure seem a little later, from the end of the Bayon style.[2] Short inscriptions on the door frames name the images of the gods set up inside.[2] Recorded as K. 284, they were published by George Coedès in 1928 and 1951.[1] The surviving inscriptions name seventeen deities.[3]
Ta Nei lies near the northwest corner of the East Baray, south of the reservoir of Preah Khan and across the Siem Reap River from it.[3] The great inscription of Preah Khan mentions halls for fire rituals on the bank of a lake. Thomas S. Maxwell suggested that these halls may have belonged to Ta Nei. Without such a link, he found the temple's position hard to explain.[3]
E. Aymonier described the temple in 1904 and E. Lunet de Lajonquière listed it in his inventory of 1911. In 1926 it entered the list of historic monuments as number 400, a sandstone temple with galleries and inscriptions.[1] Maurice Glaize, in his guide to the Angkor monuments, noted that the temple had been left as it was found but stood in fairly good condition.[2] Finds at the site include guardian figures (dvarapalas), images of Avalokiteshvara and female figures.[1]
Training and conservation
In 1999 the APSARA National Authority opened a training school on the Ta Nei work site to recruit qualified staff. It worked with UNESCO, the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM) and the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization Regional Centre for Archaeology and Fine Arts. The program lasted five months and trained twenty architects, archaeologists and engineers.[4] The Japanese government funded the training, which ran in 1999 and 2000, and 16 of the twenty participants joined the APSARA National Authority. ICCROM renewed the training in 2012 with the Preah Vihear National Authority. The International Co-ordinating Committee for Angkor (ICC-Angkor) credits the research of ICCROM and the APSARA National Authority with making it possible, for the first time, to carve and build in stone again with traditional Khmer techniques. The work was based on the bas-reliefs of the Bayon.[4]
Since 2001, the APSARA National Authority and the National Research Institute for Cultural Properties, Tokyo, have run a joint conservation project at the temple. The project has studied how lichens, mosses and algae affect stone monuments in the Angkor area, and found that mosses on the stone are linked with weathering of the rock beneath. Since 2012 the project has also trained Cambodian staff in architectural survey at Ta Nei.[4]
Architecture
The temple is laid out on an east-west axis. Its main entrance was on the east, but as of 2026 visitors enter from the west.[1]
The wall of the outer (third) enclosure has disappeared[2] or was never finished.[1] Its east and west gateways (gopuras) are small sandstone buildings in the shape of a cross, roughly built and partly ruined, decorated with leafy scrolls, false windows and devatas.[2] Hello Angkor describes the east gateway as restored.[1] Glaize describes a pediment on its east face showing the bodhisattva Lokesvara standing on a lotus among celestial dancers (apsaras) and flying figures. Below him kneel figures with large bellies who seem to beg him for help. Glaize asked whether they were sick people seeking a cure or the "rice thieves" shown in the hell relief of Angkor Wat, and left the question open.[2] A terrace and a paved way join this gateway to the temple.[2][1]
The second enclosure, 47 by 55 meters (154 by 180 feet), has a laterite wall, most of which has fallen. Pools lie along its north and south sides.[2][1] Small sandstone porches on its sides imitate gateways, as the plain walls imitate galleries.[2]
The temple itself had a central sanctuary and one "library" on the south side of the inner courtyard. Four gateways stood around them, joined by galleries that meet in pavilions at the corners. The whole formed a rectangle of 26 by 35 meters (85 by 115 feet). At some point the east gallery was shifted outward onto the wall of the second enclosure. The old east gateway became a second sanctuary standing alone inside, and the temple grew in length from 35 to 46 meters (115 to 151 feet).[2] The central sanctuary, also in the shape of a cross, rose in four tiers. Its inner chamber is 2.75 meters (9 feet) square. The galleries have laterite walls and sandstone vaults.[2]
The pediments are Buddhist in theme. One shows a kneeling figure blessing two children in a palace among apsaras. Another shows a horseman raising a weapon above two rows of figures. On the north side of the central sanctuary, a figure standing in a boat makes a gesture of blessing, among flying figures who carry parasols.[2] Two carved lintels lie on the floor of the west gateway.[1] On one of them, two figures bring offerings above the face of Kala. A small Buddha is carved on one of its branches. A lintel in the southwest corner pavilion carries three Buddhas on a head of Kala.[2]
Visiting
A forest path leads north from the temple of Ta Keo to the west gateway of Ta Nei, a walk of about 800 meters (half a mile).[2]
References
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 Hello Angkor, Rodney Charles L'Huillier, Ta Nei (updated January 1, 2026)
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10 2.11 2.12 2.13 2.14 2.15 Angkor Database, Maurice Glaize, The Monuments of the Angkor Group (1944; English translation of the fourth French edition)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Udaya, Thomas S. Maxwell, The Stele Inscription of Preah Khan, Angkor: Text with Translation and Commentary (undated)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 ICC-Angkor, 20 Years of International Cooperation for Conservation and Sustainable Development (undated)