Angkor Wat: a reflection of the solar system?

The discovery I'm about to describe stems from a deep familiarity with the temple, a series of intuitions and a major synchronicity that occurred spontaneously, without prompting. I (Patrick Kersalé) spent thirteen years exploring the galleries of Angkor Wat temple, looking for musical instruments, dancers and the sound universe that animated this period of Cambodian history.

The West likes to compare King Suryavarman II to Louis XIV, the Sun King, because of their respective megalomanias. He doesn't think so, since Sūrya (Sanskrit: सूर्य, from the Sanskrit root sur or svar, to shine) is the Sun god. In line with the discoveries revealed above, it was a safe bet that there was a direct relationship between the name of the builder of Angkor Wat and the solar system itself. The Khmer mountain temples, with their five towers, are symbolically linked to Mount Meru, but the central part of Angkor Wat has not five but nine towers, like the nine planets sculpted in the north-west corner pavilion of the third gallery. Let's accept this hypothesis and consider the central tower as the Sun and the other eight as the other eight planets. It would have been architecturally and aesthetically unthinkable to build nine towers of different diameters. A second hypothesis is that the four towers adjacent to the main tower represent the four phases of the Moon, since the ancient Khmers operated on a lunisolar calendar. Hypothetically and theoretically, we could expect to find a proportional relationship involving the number 108 in the diameter of these towers and the dimensions of the land on which the temple is built. We began with a theoretical approach based on Google Earth satellite images:

• Length of land within the moat: 1,117 meters (1,221.2 yards).
• Width of land inside moat: 900 meters (984.3 yards).

For simplicity's sake, we express the values in meters, as it's the ratios that matter, not the units of measurement.

• Theoretical diameter of the central tower (Soleil): 1,117 / 108 = 10.34 meters (11.29 yards).
• Theoretical diameter of the four adjacent towers (Moon): 900 / 108 = 8.33 meters (9.11 yards).

On 26/08/2020, we went to the Bakan (Angkor Wat's central massif) to check the diameter of the towers (our photo): the measurement confirms these two theoretical values (to within a few centimeters; a negligible margin of error implies all four measurements). But that's not all. We know from the Veda that the number 21 symbolically represents the Sun. At the start of our presentation, we saw that the royal fathom was set at 2 metres (real or idealized). We will now determine various probable dimensions (again, real or idealized) of the king and compare them with this finding, using the average proportions defined by scientific research for Homo sapiens :

• Theoretical size of King Suryavarman II: 2 meters (1 fathom) / 1.033 = 1.94 m (76.38 inches).
• Theoretical size of the great royal cubit (distance between the tip of the middle finger and the elbow): 1.94 m x 0.254 = 0.49 m (19.29 inches).

Let's now try to determine the relationship between the diameter of the central tower (Sun) and the great royal cubit, knowing that the number characterizing the Sun is 21:

• 10.34 m (diameter of the central tower) / 0.49 m = 21.

So the central tower is equal to 21 great royal cubits! We can now understand why King Suryavarman planned to rest at the center of the solar system, i.e. in the central tower. This discovery lends credence to the theory of French researchers in the early 20th century, who already considered Angkor Wat to be a mausoleum and not simply a state temple. This intuition/reason came to them because the temple faces west (the direction of sunset and death) and the bas-reliefs in the third gallery invite visitors to circumambulate in a senestrogyric manner, i.e. in the opposite direction to the sun's path. This is how circumambulations are performed in funeral rituals in Southeast Asia (and elsewhere, generally speaking). 

Another hypothesis concerning the diameter of the four towers is linked to the "royal cubit", i.e. the distance between the end of the closed fist and the elbow. We noted that there were two kinds of pillars supporting the roof of the third gallery: those whose sides corresponded to a "large cubit" (no longer the "royal cubit" but that of the workmen or foreman) and others measuring a "small cubit". The ratio between the two cubits is of the order of 0.8. However, the diameter ratio between the central tower and the four adjacent towers is the same. In short, the diameter of the central tower is 21 large royal cubits and the four adjacent towers are 21 small royal cubits.

To find out more about my archaeological research at Angkor Wat, click here (In French. Translate- it with Google Translate).