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Activity 4: Use the National Geographic website and your textook to complete the worksheet.

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Explore the National Geographic website - use this resource adn your textbook to help you work on the Angkor Wat worksheet.<br>

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National Geographic stories take you on a journey that's always enlightening, often surprising, and unfailingly fascinating. This month-Answers From Angkor

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Activity 5: After watching the documentary briefly sum up what we can learn from the mistakes made during
the Khmer Empire.

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Alexandra Cousteau - Expedition Blue Planet 2009 - Angkor

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Explore the Angkor Wat prezi based on Mrs Gerrard's visit.

Activity 2: Record 6 facts about Angkor Wat.

Reflect upon why the temples of Angkor Wat were and
are important to the people of Cambodia and to the rest of the world.

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Angkor Wat visit
Introduction
I hope to give you a brief taste of the temples of Angkor - you will learn more with your History teachers too

The photographs from the slideshow were taken when I travelled to Cambodia in 2008

I stayed in Siem Reap, the closest town, and spent 3 days walking/cycling around the ancient city and its temples

I only saw about a very small section of the city in this time despite arriving at sunrise on two mornings and staying til sunset - there was lots to see!

Most of the photos on this slideshow are my own

A few quick facts...
- A series of small kingdoms in Southeast Asia unified and became known as the Khmer Empire
- Between the 8th and the 13th centuries AD (700 - 1200 AD) a succession of Hindu and Buddhist kings of the Khmer Empire created magnificent temples, gates and buildings in stone at the empire's capital of Angkor
- The kings were known as devaraja (god-kings) and as an act of devotion to their gods they built the biggest religious building in the world: Angkor Wat
- Up to 1 million people lived in the city (London only had 50,000 inhabitants at the same time)

- It was the largest preindustrial city in the world
- However, the kingdom eventually weakened and was sacked by the Thais in 1432
- The city was abandoned and the capital moved to its current place, Phnom Penh
- The city of Angkor was left to ruin
- Thai and Vietnamese kingdoms occupied Cambodia until 1864 when the French controlled the country
- Cambodia became independent in 1953
Why is Angkor Wat important?

The buildings are an example of elaborate carving and intricate sculpture

Angkor Wat (as the largest religious building) is an example of the spiritual devotion of the Cambodian people

The Cambodian people are incredibly proud of the city of Angkor and its rich history

It is an important site giving us an insight into another era and culture

Backstreets of Siam Reap
on the way to the Angkor
Temples
As the city is so spread out,
over 1000 square km, one of the
ways locals and tourists
get around is on bicycle
The fortified city of Angkor is marked by five gates (East, West, South, North and Victory Gate)

Each are topped by four faces of Avalokiteshavara (the Buddha of compassion)

The city's walls are 6m high and 8m wide and stretch over 12kms

As you pass through the city gates you cross over a moat

The bridge is lined with statues of gods and demons engaged in battle/tug of war

Unfortunately lots of the heads of these statues have been stolen and sold to antique dealers or on the black market

After Angkor was sacked by the Thais, it fell into ruin.
The wooden buildings rotted but the stone buildings remained.

Over hundreds of years the vegetation started to grow on, around and through the buildings

In the 1860s Europeans became interested in the 'lost city' of Angkor after French explorer Henri Mouhot wrote an article about the ancient city

Ta Prohm - one of the temples left in its natural state - the way it would have looked to French explorers in the 1850s

Silk cotton trees and strangler figs have grown through the buildings, breaking some of the stone

Ta Prohm has been used in a number of films including Tomb Raider and Two Brothers

It took an incredible 80,000 people to build and maintain this particular building!

Although the Angkor city is a UNESCO Heritage Listed site (protected historical site),
many of the buildings are not roped off and you can literally climb amongst the stone remains

Many locals live in and around the Angkor complex and their livestock
can be seen grazing amongst the temple ruins

The Bayon temple features 216 heads of the god Avalokiteshavara (the Buddha of compassion)

There are also 11,000 figures carved into the building

The carvings show scenes from 12th century Cambodian life including cockfighting and kickboxing

Some bas-reliefs (means raised sculpture) from the Bayon temple showing battles between the Khmer empire and other kingdoms and processions of armies

Historians have been able to learn about the lives of the people of the Khmer empire
by studying the weapons, tools, clothing and modes of transport portrayed in these carvings

Angkor Wat Temple
The largest religious monument in the world
Built in 1112-52 by the king Suryavarman for the god Vishnu and as a funerary temple for himself
A 55m central tower is surrounded by other towers, courtyards and a bridge and a moat
These buildings were seen as a way to honour and show respect to the gods

Some believe the walk from the outer causeway to the inner temple is a trip symbolic of the creation of the universe

Others believe it is a symbolic journey connecting man to the gods

Many Cambodians make the pilgrimage to this important spiritual site

After facing years of hardship, mass murder at the hands of Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, and political unrest,
many Cambodians live in poverty and visit the Angkor temples to beg the visiting tourists for money

Children as young as five sell food, drinks and souvenirs to help their family survive

Often these children and withdrawn from school and forced to work to help their family make a living. Some rise early to work, attend school and return to work at the end of the day

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Angkor Wat visit IntroductionI hope to give you a brief taste of the temples of Angkor - you will learn more with your History teachers too The photographs from the slideshow were taken when I travelled to Cambodia in 2008 I stayed in Siem Reap, the closest town, and spent 3 days walking/cycling around the ancient city and its temples I only saw about a very small section of the city in this time despite arriving at sunrise on two mornings and staying til sunset - there was lots to see!

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Take a virtual tour of the temples of Angkor Wat.

Activity 3: Draw a bird's eye view sketch of Angkor Wat.

Write a paragraph describing  some of the different features of Angkor Wat (mention bridges, towers, etc)

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Angkor includes a number of majestic temples complexes, the most famous of which is the "Temple City" of Angkor Wat. It was built as a temple and mausoleum for King Suryavarman II in 1112-1152. It's considered to be one of the biggest cult buildings in the world...

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Ancient capital of Angkor (near Siam Reap)

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Ancient capital of Angkor (near Siam Reap)

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Study the map of Cambodia

Activity 1: Why do you think this location was chosen for the capital of the Khmer Empire?