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Angkor - 2003
Angkor - 2003
Jacek Pałkiewicz2006-06-25 13:29:32
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to venture into it, because they believed that it harboured ferocious beasts. But Mouhot, a man who sought not only adventures but antiquities, braved the sea and endured a twelve day’s journey on an elephant’s back until he arrived at Ohnom Penh. Here, the king signed a letter for him that would facilitate his expedition. He crossed the Tonie Sap river and, after a journey of only a few days, following the river Siem Reap, he came upon the forgotten city, which became one of the most important archaeological findings of the last century.
On his return from the expedition, seated between the skin of a tiger and one of a monkey, with a trunk nearby containing insects waiting to be catalogued, Mouhot wrote down his thoughts by the light of a torch. “The monuments of art that I have seen are gigantic and in my opinion represent a higher level than any other human work left by the ancients”. And again, “I have never been so happy as now in this grandiose tropical scene and, even if I knew that I would die here, I would never change this existence for the joys and the comforts of the civilized world”.
Perhaps it was a presentiment. In the autumn of the same year, he came down with malaria, fought it for twenty-two days and then died. After his burial at Luang Prabang, two faithful servants entrusted his precious notes to a British diplomat, who had them sent to Mouhot’s family.
However, it was only in 1898 that the Ecole Francaise d’Extreme-Orient Foundation, set up in Saigon, compiled a list and a summary description of the Indochinese monuments. Following this, the same institute created the Conservation d’Angkor, whose first big assignment was the eradication of the vegetation which was suffocating the two most important constructions, Angkor Vat and Bayon; after this the same work was to be carried out with the others. This done, the work of restoration was to be promoted. The Society for the Preservation of Angkor was
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See photographs from:
Cambodia Gallery
