Prasat Preah Vihear Temple

The Preah Vihar Temple is located in Cambodia and is dedicated to God Shiva. The Preah Vihear Temple is an antiquated temple that has been fabricated throughout the rule of Khmer Domain that is arranged on a 525 metre (1,722ft) bluff in the Dangrek Mountains, in the Preah Vihear territory, Cambodia. In 1962, accompanying a protracted question between Thailand and Cambodia over proprietorship, the International Court of Justice in The Hague granted the temple to Cambodia. It is a Khmer temple situated atop a 525-meter cliff in Dangrek ranges, Cambodia, just across the border from Thailand. Affording a view for many kilometers across a plain, the temple has the most spectacular setting of all the temples built during the six-century-long Khmer Empire. As a key edifice of the Empire's spiritual life, it was supported and modified by successive kings and so bears elements of several architectural styles. The Saivite (Bhadresvara version) Preah Vihear was a Hindu temple dedicated to Shiva in his personification as Shikharesvara (the God of the Summit) and a Bhadresvara linga was installed in the main shrine. Prasat Banteay Srey, Prasat Sek Ta Tuy, Prasat Trapang Khyang from the 10th century were all dedicated to the linga Tribhuvanamahesvara, which is the name of the god of Lingapura. Preah Vihear is unusual among the Khmer temples because it has been constructed along a long north-south axis, rather than the conventional rectangular plan with an orientation towards the East. The temple gives its name to Cambodia's Preah Vihear province, in which it is located. The Sacred Site of the Temple of Preah Vihear was built somewhere in the 9th-12th centuries by successive Khmer kings. The construction of the first temple on the site began in the early 9th Century. The earliest surviving parts of the temple, however, date from the Koh Ker period in the early 10th Century, when the empire's capital was at the city of that name. Today, elements of the Bantey Srei style of the late 10th Century can be seen, but most of the temple was constructed during the reigns of the kings Suryavarman I (1002–1050) and Suryvarman II (1113–1150). An inscription found at the temple provides a detailed account of Suryavarman II studying sacred rituals, celebrating religious festivals and making gifts, including white parasols, golden bowls and elephants, to his spiritual advisor, the aged Brahman Divakarapandita. The Brahman himself took an interest in the temple, according to the inscription, gifting it with a golden statue of a dancing Shiva. The construction of Preah Vihear went on continuously from the 9th to the 12th century. The first construction of Preah Vihear is credited Yasovarman I, who reigned from 889 to 910, but ''a son of Jayavarman II (who reigned from 802 to 850) may have founded Preah Vihear even earlier when he took a fragment of rock from the Lingaparvata Mountain of Wat Phu in Laos to the site of Preah Vihear '' (ROVEDA, 2000:10). (Wat Phu = Vat Phou). No inscriptions inform about the year of construction. The first stone-construction was probably done in the last part of the 9th century, but the north-south orientated layout of the temple could well have been in use in older structures made by lighter materials.