Heritage site

Wat Ounalom

វត្តឧណ្ណាលោម

Wat Ounalom (វត្តឧណ្ណាលោម) is a Buddhist monastery on the riverfront in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and the seat of the Mahanikaya order's patriarch.[1][2][3] Its name refers to the ounalom, the tuft of hair between the Buddha's eyebrows, and its main stupa is believed to hold an eyebrow hair of the Buddha.[4][3] The name is also written Wat Unnalom and in several other ways.[2][5]

History

Wat Ounalom grew up around an Angkorian-era temple that predates the monastery; French researchers and Khmer historians count it among the oldest monuments in Phnom Penh.[6][7] Its founding is dated to 1443 (Wikipedia and Hotels.com), 1442 to 1443 (tour-cambodia.com), 1422 to 1443 (Kupi.com) and 1422 (Tourism Cambodia).[1][3][4][8][9] Hotels.com credits King Ponhea Yat with building it to hold the Buddha's eyebrow hair, and Tourism Cambodia counts it among five original monasteries he built in Phnom Penh after the capital moved from Angkor.[3][9][8] Khmer sources name the builder as King Barom Reachea Ponhea Yat, who founded it among seven monasteries in his new capital and had them consecrated in 1442.[7][6]

The large Ounalom Stupa was built over an older stone sanctuary of the Angkorian era.[2][6] French engineers had noticed the ruined tower by the middle of the 19th century, and by the 15th century it had already been turned into a cetiya, a Buddhist reliquary monument.[2]

Prah Maha Vimaladhamma (Thong) entered the monastery as a novice at 17 and took his vows there four years later. He spent his monastic life at Unnalom studying and teaching, became director of Cambodia's new Pali School in 1914, and supported the teaching of Sanskrit to the Buddhist clergy.[2] Venerable Preah Vanarat Chan, a member of the commission that prepared Chuon Nath's Khmer Dictionary, belonged to Vatt Unnalom, as did Achar It-Hak, a professor at the Higher School of Pali, under the title Preah Silasangvar, Rajagana.[5]

A new vihara was inaugurated at the monastery in 1936.[7] Hotels.com dates the main temple to 1952, as a modern recreation of the 15th-century shrine.[3]

After the Khmer Rouge captured Phnom Penh in 1975, Wat Ounalom suffered severe destruction.[1][4] Its monks were expelled or executed, and many buildings, statues and religious symbols were damaged. The regime also damaged the temple's artifacts and book collection.[4][9][3] Samdech Huot Tat, the fourth patriarch of Cambodian Buddhism, was killed under the Pol Pot regime, and the Khmer Rouge threw his statue into the Mekong River.[4][3] The eyebrow relic survived.[3]

After the regime fell in 1979, the monastery was quickly restored.[1][4] The statue of Huot Tat was recovered from the Mekong in 1979 and set up again at the monastery. A marble Buddha image on the upper floor, shattered in the same period, was put back together.[4] Important Pali texts that survived the Khmer Rouge years were kept at Wat Ounalom and later digitized.[2] The monastery housed the Buddhist Institute for a time while its collections were reorganized, until the Institute moved to a larger site on Sihanouk Boulevard in 1999.[4][3][10]

Architecture and layout

A tall golden stupa carved in tiers, rising against a deep blue sky.
A gilded stupa in the grounds of Wat Ounalom, Phnom Penh, 2019. Photo: No(0)GoodNamesLeft, CC BY-SA 4.0

The complex has 44 buildings, used as a temple, schools, libraries and living quarters.[1][9] The grounds include halls, monks' quarters, two large modern stupas in Angkorian style, sculptures, and a shelter showing Buddhapada (footprints of the Buddha), standing Buddha images and a stone carving of a reclining Buddha.[2] Gardens are set among the buildings.[4] The monastery of the Supreme Patriarch lies north of the main temple.[3]

The main temple, the three-story ordination hall, is the chief ceremonial building. Visitors can go through all three levels, and the upper floors look out over the meeting of the Tonle Sap and Mekong rivers.[1][4]

The temple takes its name from the Ounalom cetiya, a five-spired stupa behind the main hall, to its west.[7][2] This large chedi at the rear of the site hides an Angkorian tower believed to date from the 12th or 13th century.[2] The tower is built of uniform sandstone blocks with none reused. Researchers take this, and its high standard of work, to mean it was built no later than the 12th or early 13th century.[2] Olivier de Bernon published a study of the tower in 2001.[2] The chedi's central room holds a seated Buddha and two standing bodhisattvas, with a reclining Buddha carved above its doorway. Two side rooms hold more seated Buddha images and other ritual objects, and the statuary is post-Angkorian, of the Middle period.[2] Hotels.com calls the stupa Chetdai and notes four bronze seated Buddha images inside, each facing one of the cardinal directions.[3]

Wat Ounalom is among the Cambodian pagodas with royal stupas, whose style differs from that of Thai chedis.[11] Its grounds also hold a shrine-stupa of Chuon Nath.[5]

Art and inscriptions

Several dark standing statues of figures lined up in front of a carved white wall and a small stupa.
A row of dark statues along a wall at Wat Ounalom, Phnom Penh, 2019. Photo: No(0)GoodNamesLeft, CC BY-SA 4.0

An inscription on the older monument records events from 1867 to 1890.[2] The walls around the ancient stupa show Hindu gods, among them Vishnu, Garuda and Yama on his buffalo.[3] The main temple holds paintings, statues and objects telling the life of the Buddha.[3][4] An image of Huot Tat stands at the northeast corner of the main temple.[3] Local people call the site Brah Lom or Preah Lom, "gods' hair."[2]

Religious life

Golden statues of seated monks with flowers and offerings in front of them inside a temple hall.
Gilded statues of seated monks with offerings in a hall at Wat Ounalom, Phnom Penh, 2019. Photo: No(0)GoodNamesLeft, CC BY-SA 4.0

Wat Ounalom was the seat of Cambodia's Mahanikaya order, and Cambodia's patriarch, the chief abbot, lives there.[1][9] Before 1975 it housed more than 500 monks, and the Buddhist Institute's library there held more than 30,000 books.[10][9] The community is smaller now, and the monastery remains a working center of monastic teaching and training rather than only a historic monument.[4] Novices, monks and devotees gather in the gardens to leave offerings.[4]

Significance and conservation

It has long been one of the two most powerful Mahanikaya monasteries in Phnom Penh, home to Chuon Nath and Huot Tat, and Tourism Cambodia calls it the most important monastery in Cambodia.[12][9] Its rebuilding since the early 1980s has closely followed the recovery of Buddhism in Cambodia as a whole.[9] Most of the damage from the Khmer Rouge years has been repaired.[9] Hello Angkor lists it as heritage site HA12814, with Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts ID 1674 and IK number 80.19.[2]

Visiting

Wat Ounalom stands on Sisowath Quay along the Tonle Sap riverfront in Daun Penh District, near the National Museum of Cambodia.[1][4] It lies about 200 meters (660 feet) north of the Royal Palace (tour-cambodia.com), or about 250 meters (820 feet) (Tourism Cambodia).[4][9] Kupi.com gives the address as Samdach Sothearos Boulevard and Preah Ang Eng Street 13, Phnom Penh 12206.[8] In 2026, Hotels.com listed entry as free.[3] In 2024, Kupi.com listed opening hours of 8:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. daily and noted that interiors may be closed during services or the monks' lunch break.[8] Shoulders and knees must be covered.[8]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 Wikipedia
  2. ↑ 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 Hello Angkor, Rodney Charles L'Huillier, Wat Ounalom (updated January 1, 2026)
  3. ↑ 3.00 3.01 3.02 3.03 3.04 3.05 3.06 3.07 3.08 3.09 3.10 3.11 3.12 3.13 3.14 Hotels.com, Wat Ounalom in Phnom Penh - One of Cambodia's Oldest ... (2026-09-10)
  4. ↑ 4.00 4.01 4.02 4.03 4.04 4.05 4.06 4.07 4.08 4.09 4.10 4.11 4.12 4.13 4.14 tour-cambodia.com, Wat Ounalom, Phnom Penh: practical guide - Seripheap (2026-03-28)
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Angkor Database, Chuon Nath's Khmer Dictionary (2023-04-22)
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Fresh News, An Angkorian temple hidden at Wat Ounalom may be the oldest monument in Phnom Penh, in Khmer (February 17, 2025)
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 Koh Santepheap Daily, Sok Veasna, The origin and name of Wat Ounalom, in Khmer (September 15, 2018)
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 8.4 Kupi.com, Wat Ounalom Monastery Guide - Phnom Penh (2024-04-04)
  9. ↑ 9.00 9.01 9.02 9.03 9.04 9.05 9.06 9.07 9.08 9.09 tourismcambodia.org, Ounalom Monastery (2024-01-01)
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 Expedia.com.hk, Wat Ounalom in Daun Penh (2026-09-26)
  11. ↑ Angkor Database, Factors that Led to the Change of the Khmer Capitals from 15th to 17th Century (2021-09-30)
  12. ↑ Ian Harris, The Monk and the King: Khieu Chum and Regime Change in Cambodia, Udaya no. 9
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This page was last edited on 10 October 2026, at 15:25.