West Mebon
The western Mebon is a building in Angkor and part of the UNESCO world heritage. The Hindu temple is only partially preserved and located on an artificial island in the western Baray. The western Mebon consisted of a ring of walls and a sandstone terrace in the center. Is well recognized for its larger than life bronze statue of the Reclining Vishnu that was found there.
History
Since no historical inscriptions have been found to Western Baray Mebon and can be closed to the age just because of the architecture and design. More likely builder held in the Baphuon style facility, which was built on an artificial island in the middle of the Western Baray, was from the mid-11th century Udayadityavarman II, the king of the Khmer Empire. After Albanese (2006 ) is the western Mebon not a real sanctuary. Having shifted the center of the Khmer Empire to Phnom Penh in the south in the 15th century, Angkor began to lose its former importance. At this time, the Western Baray, like most other buildings was also no longer used, and fell by overgrowth of tropical vegetation.
1936 saw Maurice Glaize, a French explorer who explored on behalf of the École française d' Extrême -Orient Angkor, in the U-shaped pond within the town walls remains of a colossal statue of bronze, the four-armed Vishnu Anantashayi, ie " Vishnu lying on Ananta " represents. Glaize reported to be there followed the premonition of an inhabitant in the area, which had appeared in a dream at this point buried Buddha. On the basis of the found two right arms, the head and upper parts of the breast can be close to a previous size of 6 m. Perhaps it is the bronze statue of the Buddha, the Zhou Daguan mentioned in his travel report from Angkor to the end of the 13th century. There, the delegates of the Chinese emperor described a bronze Buddha, who was lying in the middle of a lake and from whose navel flowed water. The artifacts are now on display in the National Museum in the capital Phnom Penh.
From 1942 to 1944 Glaize freed the Western Mebon of the luxuriant vegetation and led locally by a Anastylosis. Focus of the restoration works were the two resulting gopuras. The poor state of construction in particular the walls is probably due to the combination of stone and wood beams as building materials, which was common in the mid-11th century in Angkor.
After the construction of the Western Mebon Glaize on a legend returns. Accordingly, the daughter of a king of Angkor was swallowed by a giant crocodile at this point. The crocodile escaped the Western Baray, by digging a large hole in the perimeter wall. When it was finally captured and killed, the princess was alive recovered from his stomach.
Architecture
The existing sandstone wall ring has an edge length of 100 meters and stands on an artificial square pole in the middle of the day in the eastern places silted Western Baray, 10 m above the ground. The western Mebon is accessible year-round by boat only. The ring walls terminating in a broad, like a corbelled cornice acting, represents the final ribbon lotus flowers. On each side resulted in a distance of 25 m and three smaller single storey gopuras between which five windows were arranged in the interior. The tip of the enacting on a square base with side length 2.4 m gate towers was working as eight-petalled lotus flower. The page length inside the gopuras is almost 1.3 m. These features are visible on preserved remains of the Berlin Wall still standing and the central southern and central eastern gopura. The front gable of the towers were surrounded by Nagas and the tympanum provided with realistic lifelike representations of animals within small squares, which are typical features of the Baphuon Temple, and the style of the same name. The same applies to the herringbone pattern of the vertical reinforcements of pilasters and decorated with Volutenranken and small animal figures, vertical bands of the cornerstones. For the most part the reliefs are destroyed. The best preserved are those of the front gable of the eastern gate tower of the north wall, which consist of pure ornaments. Another well-preserved relief is located on the eastern lintel of the central Gopura the east side, and provides three figures represent the branches reach for the center and the surrounding neighborhoods. The door frames were built with winkelhalbierender miter. Remains of the narrow columns ( Colonette ), who carried the door side, point to a rarely used form of hand signals.
Inside the town walls formed a pool, which was surrounded by sandstone steps leading down. The largest part of this basin was occupied by a U-shaped pond, a sandstone terrace arose between the side arms with a Pavilion of perishable material in their midst. The terrace had a side length of 12 m and was 43 m long with a carved out of laterite and sandstone causeway connected to the dike in front of the eastern external wall. In the middle of terrace stood a 2.7 m deep well in the form of an inverted Linga to overcame the helically stairs. The first octagonal base of the fountain with 0.55 m spacing between the opposite sides widened into a circular shape with a diameter of 1 m. To the east front was a square pond with 2 m side length, which was powered by a bronze tube with water from the well. Thus, probably, the water level should be checked in the basin.