PHNOM PENH, Jan 24 (NNN-AKP) – Archeologists from the APSARA National Authority (ANA), planned to restore an ancient pond at the centuries-old Bayon Temple, in north-west Cambodia’s famed Angkor Archaeological Park, said an ANA’s news release, yesterday.
The experts are currently conducting an excavation in the south-eastern part of the Bayon Temple, formerly believed to be the structure of an ancient pond, to study the sediments and size of the pond, in order to restore this reservoir, the news release said.
Khieu Chan, an archaeologist at the ancient pond excavation project, said, the excavation is being carried out by the working team of the Department of Water, Forestry and Infrastructure Management, to find out the pond’s exact size and structure.
He added that, the excavation was to determine whether water brought soil to fill into this pond, or the pond was filled in with soil, after Angkor was abandoned as a capital city.
“The excavation aims to study the connection between the ancient pond and the ancient wall, in order to determine the pond’s exact size and structure,” Khieu Chan said.
“When our experts have studied the size of the pond, the shoreline, and the depth of the ancient pond according to history, the team will restore this ancient pond to store water again, as it was in the ancient times,” he added.
Meanwhile, another ANA archaeological team is restoring the first terrace platform of the Bayon Temple, in the south-east corner that has collapsed and is unstable, the news release said.
Lim Hak, a technical staff member of the Department of Conservation of Monuments and Preventive Archaeology, said, the renovation of the 10-metre-long sandstone platform started in Nov, last year and will take several more months to be completed.
Built during the reign of Jayavarman VII, in the late 12th century and early 13th century, Bayon is one of the key temples in the 401-square-km Angkor Archaeological Park, in the north-west Siem Reap province.
The Angkor Archaeological Park, which was inscribed on the World Heritage List of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1992, is the most popular tourist destination in the country.
The ancient park attracted almost 800,000 international visitors last year, up 177 percent from only 287,454, a year earlier, the state-owned Angkor Enterprise said, adding that, the park earned a gross revenue of 37.1 million U.S. dollars from ticket sales in 2023, up 222 percent from merely 11.5 million dollars in the year before.– NNN-AKP
