Rules · Plans · Façades · Theory
Build the state temple as a stepped mountain with five towers in a quincunx (one at the centre and four at the corners), representing the five peaks of Mount Meru, surrounded by walls and a moat for the mountains and ocean that ring the world.
Khmer kings expressed their relation to the gods in the temple-mountain, a pyramid of terraces at the centre of their capital that carried the shrine of the state deity. The quincunx of towers appears on the summit of Pre Rup and Ta Keo and reaches its perfection at Angkor Wat, where the central tower rises 65 metres above the ground. The towers are drawn in the Khmer manner, with redented plans and a curving, lotus-bud profile built of diminishing tiers.
Read the diagram from the centre outward: Brahmā at the heart, then a ring of the gods, a ring of human concerns, and on the outside the lesser spirits; the holiest function goes at the centre and the most worldly at the edge.
81 padas = 9 (Brahmā) + 16 + 24 + 32
Enclose the central mountain in rectangular galleries, one within the other, each on a higher terrace, with gopuras at the cardinal points and pavilions at the corners.
Angkor Wat: galleries ≈ 187 × 215 m, 100 × 115 m, 60 × 60 m
Angkor Wat reverses the usual eastward orientation: its entrance, causeway and principal approach face west.
Divide the ground inside the walls by embankments into a regular grid of blocks, each with its ponds and its raised mounds for houses.
Cite this page Chris Paton, “The temple as Mount Meru”, The Textbook of Architecture, https://textbookofarchitecture.com/rule/temple-mountain. Text, drawings and models licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0.