Indian Architecture (Buddhist and Hindu Periods) c43.35

c43.35

From this elementary beginning an advance may be recorded, for about the fifth or sixth centuries A.D. what may be termed the Indianization of the Khmers seems to have taken place, when the Primitive Phase (A.D. 500 to 800) of the Early Period comes into view. Of this stage of development also actual remains are rare, but it is possible that under the influence of Indian culture, buildings of a more substantial nature were erected, and were distributed over a wider area, as the power of the Khmers became more extended. In place of the wooden abodes of the previous period, brick construction was favoured, of which several examples believed to be of this period have been identified. Among these the temple of Tat Panom on the Mekong, although rather distant from the original settlement, may be a clue to the progress of the building art at this stage. Presumed to date from "the sixth or seventh century A.D., at the latest," it is a Buddhist structure, built "of large rectangular red bricks" with the lower story containing a series of carvings in bas-relief of a pronounced Indian character, "a link with the Amaravati school."¹ Here it is worthy of note that about the same time, in India, there was a brick building, Hindu and Buddhist, the technical features of which, such as carving and modelling in brick and terracotta, were not dissimilar from those found at Tat Panom. Among the Indian examples, a temple at Bhitagaon of the fifth century and, more important still, the great Buddhist shrine at Budh Gaya, while, at a later date, the brick temples at Raipur, are all illustrations of this structural method, which may have some bearing on the contemporary development of the brick technique in Cambodia. Such evidences, it is admitted, are however slight, but firmer ground is encountered when the next phase, that referred to as the "Formative" comes to be studied.