Vasudha Narayanan, University of Florida

Kanchi and Kambuja: 

Temple Transfers and Cultural Contacts with the Khmer empire

The story of the Hindu traditions have been narrated without taking into account the hundreds of Saiva and Vaishnava temples in Cambodia and other countries of South East Asia. This paper will focus on Hindu temples in Cambodia built between the ninth and twelfth centuries CE and discuss their similarities with contemporary or earlier structures in India. Specifically, I shall focus on the Kanchipuram area and argue both for the strong connections between the Khmer and Indian temples as well as the distinctive features of the Khmer shrines. 

            My paper will focus on three west-facing temples in the Kanchipuram area—those known popularly as the Vaikuntha Perumal, Yathoktakari, and Ashtabhujakaram temples—and show both structural similarities as well as common tropes in the iconography. The eighth century, three storied, west facing Vaikuntha Perumal temple in Kanchi was probably the prototype for the twelfth century three storied, west facing Angkor Wat built by Suryavarman II in Kambuja.  Carvings of the “reverse-reclining” Vishnu (whose head is to the right, unlike most icons in south India) seen in Yathoktakari and the second floor of the Vaikuntha Perumal temples are found in abundance in Cambodia, as are eight-armed Vishnus like the presiding deity of the Kanchipuram Ashtabhujakaram temple.  The motifs in these three temples which are located very close to each other in Kanchipuram are prominent in the Cambodian temples and are indicative of more than a casual connection between the realms.

            Despite the many similarities, there are many unique and distinctive features of Khmer Hinduism. Temples in Cambodia were nonsectarian, unlike those in ancient Tamilnadu. The Hindu temples here were pluralistic and inclusive with several deities from various sectarian traditions.  Second, stories which were relatively minor in the sub-continent became extremely popular in Cambodia. One such narrative is the churning of the ocean of milk. This story, which is seen in very few panels in India (but which is known in early Tamil literature) becomes the most prominent story in Cambodia. My paper will speculate on the reasons as to why this story becomes significant in Cambodia and showcase it as a symbol of Khmer agency and ability to refashion narratives, concepts, and themes to fit their own interests.

            By studying Vaishnava and Saiva temples in South-East Asia we can understand the Hindu traditions as a global religion.  It prods us to revise our understanding of Hinduism which is based almost completely on Orientalist concepts of a religion congruent with the bounded territories of India and as one where the religion overlaps with the boundaries of the nation-state.