Prasat Kapilapura

ប្រាសាទកបិលបុរៈ

Province: Siem Reap
Period: Angkor period (802–1431 CE)
Condition: Ruined
Access: Motorbike required
Visited: 5 February 2025
Coordinates: 13.41981, 103.87415

How to find it

Walk round the north bank of Angkor Wat's moat to its north-east corner. From there, take the path heading north-east into the forest. At the fork after about 100 m keep left. After another 150 m, step off to the right where the ground rises slightly and the trees thin out; the stones are about 100 m further on.

In the rainy season the path is often overgrown and muddy. The site is inside the Angkor park, so an Angkor pass is needed.

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Field notes

The name means "city of Kapila", a revered sage of Hindu tradition, and it comes from the site's own inscriptions. Kapilapura and Kutisvara are the only two ancient sites at Angkor still known by their original Sanskrit names. When French researchers found the ruins in the early 20th century there was no local name to use, so they took the one carved in stone. Surveys also record a local name, Neak Ta Moha Russei, "the great hermit" spirit.

What remains sits on a low mound in the forest, about 300 m north-east of the north-east corner of Angkor Wat's moat: two small east-facing towers of brick and laterite, one with a porch, and a third, west-facing building, probably a library. They stand on a laterite platform, with traces of a moat around the mound. Stone pieces from before Angkor suggest people were here earlier still.

Three Sanskrit inscriptions come from Kapilapura. A stele (K. 579) dated 890 Śaka, 968 CE, records an order from King Jayavarman V, son of Rajendravarman, to his general Vīrendravarman and the royal guru, to set up the inscription "at Kapilapura". It opens in praise of Vishnu. A second inscription (K. 578) is on a doorjamb.

The third (K. 300) is a large stele long misnamed "the Inscription of Angkor Wat". George Cœdès pieced it together from fragments found here and a broken stele kept at Angkor Wat. In it a royal guru records his gifts: a dedication to Shiva, ponds dug, offerings at the East Baray. It is 14th-century, naming the priest Vidyeśadhīmant, who served the last three kings of Angkor's inscriptions, and it is one of the last Sanskrit inscriptions of Angkor.

When Angkor Wat was built in the 12th century, it went up right beside this far older shrine without building over it. A small bronze Vishnu in the Angkor Wat style, found here, is now in the National Museum of Cambodia.

Angkorbrick templeinscriptions

Nature recorded here

Sources

Inventaire Khmer IK 492; CISARK 1013. Inscriptions K. 300, K. 578 and K. 579. Louis Finot, BEFEO 25 (1925). Dominic Goodall and Kunthea Chhom, edition and translation of K. 579 for the DHARMA project.

Photographs

A stone marker reading Kapilapura Temple, Mid 10th Century, West Entrance, in Khmer and English, with a motorbike on the forest track behind — The marker at the west entrance gives the temple's Khmer name, ប្រាសាទកបិលបុរៈ, and dates it to the mid-10th century.

Low ruined brick walls in dappled light on a leaf-covered mound among trees — The ruins stand on a low mound in the forest, about 300 m north-east of Angkor Wat's moat.

Weathered laterite foundation blocks of a small building among thin trees and fallen leaves — Laterite footings. The buildings stood on a laterite platform, with brick walls above.

The collapsed brick walls of a small tower, green with moss, a carved stone post standing behind — What is left of one of the two brick towers. Both faced east.

A moulded sandstone pedestal with a square socket, tipped on its side in front of low brick walls — A pedestal tipped on its side. The square socket held the tenon of a statue or linga.

A carved octagonal sandstone colonnette with moss at its base, a second ringed colonnette lying behind it — Octagonal colonnettes like these framed a tower doorway, carved in bands of leaf motifs.

The spout of a stone yoni lying in the leaves, a channel running down its centre and ending between two carved spirals — The spout of a yoni, carved with a pair of spirals. Most yoni in Cambodia are plain geometric blocks; ornate ones like this are rare. The only other I know of is at Banteay Kdei.

A pale fragment of pottery with incised lines lying in dry earth — A fragment of pottery with incised lines, in the earth of the mound.

A pale, beaded entrance tube rising like a straw from the blackened hollow of a tree trunk, an older brown tube beside it — A stingless bee colony in the hollow of a tree at Kapilapura. The pale entrance tube stands out from the charred wood; the brown one beside it is older.

Close view of the rim of a pale, beaded entrance tube crowded with small dark stingless bees — Guard bees on the rim of another colony's entrance tube at Kapilapura, a still from a video. The tube is cerumen, wax mixed with plant resin.

A cluster of dark grey, finger-shaped fungi rising from a rotting stump among dry leaves, a strand of spider silk across them — Dead man's fingers on a rotting stump at Kapilapura. Each finger is a hard, woody club, and the older ones are already pitted and worn.

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