Page 4 - Cambodia Destination Guide - Alluring Asia

Funan was among the earliest Asian kingdoms to Sailendra dynasty on the island of Java. Several of embrace the Hindu culture which still profoundly Chenla's rulers spent time at the Sailendra court, shapes the history, art, and political landscapes of not including Jayavarman II, who returned to Cambodia only Cambodia but all of Southeast Asia. Although around 800 to establish the civilization of Angkor. The populated by indigenous peoples and by immigrants political connections between Java and Cambodia from Indonesia and southern China, Funan accepted explain many of the architectural and sculptural much of its knowledge of religion and political similarities between the two civilizations. organization from Indian merchants and theologians who arrived about 2,000 years ago. Eventually, these THE KHMER EMPIRE Hindu elements merged with original designs to create Cambodia's most famed empire was that of the the first true Cambodian empire and the cultural Khmers, founded in 802 by King Jayavarman II at his godfather to Angkor. capital of Angkor just north of the Tonle Sap. Renowned for its brilliant achievements in art and THE CHENIA EMPIRE architecture, Angkor was also an immensely powerful The empire of Funan was slowly displaced by the rising nation which, between the 9th and 13th centuries, powers of Chenla, a Hindu-based dynasty originally controlled most of Southeast Asia from Burma to located near Stung Treng and in southern Laos near wat Indochina, from China to Malaysia. Phu. Diplomatic marriages subsequently gave rise to Chenla strongholds at Kampong Thom, in the center of The introduction of Mahayana Buddhism, which Cambodia and Angkor Borei in Takeo. undermined the prestige of the king, combined with the extravagance of the throne, which bankrupted the Chenla survived as a united dynasty until the 7th nation's elaborate irrigation system, finally led to the century, when disputes between feuding families led to decline and fall of the Angkor civilization in the 13th the creation of "Land Chenla" near the Tonle Sap and century. Angkor fell to the Siamese in 1431. "Water Chenla" on the lower Mekong. The Water Chenla empire is famed for its use of hydraulic FRENCH RULE techniques for cultivation, a sophisticated system later The next 500 years - from the fall of Angkor to the exploited in the complex and highly successful systems arrival of the French in 1863 - was an undistinguished of Angkor. period marked by Siamese control and the flight of Cambodian power to various capitals. In 1863, after a The rise of Srivijaya in southern Sumatra, and new series of devastating battles between Siamese and trade routes which favored Indonesian over Cambodian Vietnamese forces, the French seized Cambodia to entrepots, eventually made Chenla a vassal state of the counter British and Thai expansion up the Mekong River. Although the French did little to develop the country, private-sector investors developed vast rubber states while the government ensured the survival of the Cambodian state by supporting the king in a splendor unequaled since Angkorian times. It was this support of the Cambodian throne which stifled any nationalist activity comparable to that of Vietnam. The Japanese seizure of Indochina in WW II left the French in nominal control; In 1941 they crowned the 18-year old schoolboy Prince Norodom Sihanouk the final king of Cambodia. In March 1944, Japanese forces ousted the French and persuaded Sihanouk to declare independence. The French returned after the war and in 1946 abolished the absolute monarchy, though Sihanouk remained titular head of state. Dien Bien Phu was the site of the 1954 defeat of French forces in