Prasat Hin Phimai

Prasat Hin Phimai Review

Prasat Hin Phimai, in the center of town, is one of the great Khmer structures in Isan. Built sometime in the late 11th or early 12th century (believed to predate Angkor Wat), it has been carefully restored and frequently appears in music videos and movies. To enter the prasat is to step back eight centuries. Most fascinating, perhaps, is that the temple was first Hindu when founded by Jayavarman V, then was adapted into a Buddhist temple in the 11th century, when Jayavarman VII of Angkor Thom himself converted to Buddhism. Buddhist images replaced Hindu ones. Some Hindu iconography remains, but a giant phallus at the entrance of the temple, for one, was covered up.

By the time you pass through the external sandstone wall and the gallery, you're swept up in the creation and destruction of the Brahman gods engraved on the lintels. A quartet of gopuras (gate towers) guards the entrances, with the main one facing south toward Angkor. The central white sandstone prang, towering more than 60 feet, is flanked by two smaller buildings, one in laterite, the other in red sandstone. The principal prasat is surrounded by four porches whose external lintels depict Hindu gods and scenes from the Ramayana. Inside, the lintels portray the religious art of Mahayana Buddhism.