Back in Siem Reap after two and a half years, I’ve found myself reviewing all my old photos and videos to see what I missed and what I’d like to revisit. The first time I was at Angkor and its surrounds, it was genuinely overwhelming- there was so much to see and understand, all of it of course totally foreign to me. Looking back through my snapshots, I’m reminded daily that I indeed have forgotten more interesting places than most people have ever been. That’s not a humblebrag- it’s a disappointment- I wish my mind was a highlight reel of all the amazing things I’ve experienced rather than a checklist of daily necessities like everyone else’s.

I really struggled with how to format this post, but settled on FAQ.

is it far from town/what transportation do i need?

My first visit to Kbal Spean is a perfect example of the unfortunate phenomenon mentioned above. I vaguely remembered it being a bit of a hike, that’s all. Upon looking into it, the Kulen hills are 60 km from Siem Reap proper, 30 km slightly northeast of Angkor, in Phnom Kulen National Park. Banteay Srei is about the halfway point between Angkor and Kbal Spean. I remember it as a long ride on mostly good but some sort of rough dirt roads, which we definitely did in a remorque, not a car; motorcycles would work too. Apparently, those traveling with an official tour guide can park at an army base camp and hike for about 2km. Those going solo are not necessarily permitted at the army station and might have to start hiking 1.5 km further down the mountain.

Also, prepare your victuals- water, snacks, etc.- pack them in a cooler before leaving town. You can definitely get some fruit and something grilled from roadside sellers on the way, but there’s no one selling drinks anywhere near/in the national park.

is the hike long/difficult?

It’s an intermediate-level 45 to 60 minute hike. It is not handicap accessible. Though the trail is only 2 km, it’s entirely uphill, on slippery and rocky terrain, through the forest. I only seem to have taken two photos of the walk- one from a clearing where I could finally get a view of the surrounding hills, and one of what I think (I could be wrong) is the biggest tamarind I’ve ever seen, open and desiccated. Just by the correct spot, there’s a rickety wooden staircase that brings you down beneath a small waterfall to the site.

when should i visit?

Starting in December, after the southwest monsoon season ends, and the water starts dropping, the carvings become visible in a150 m stretch of riverbed. It does take a while for the water to dry up though. So, the best time to visit is between January and April; as it gets dryer and dryer, more carvings are visible. I went in November, and looking back, it’s unclear to me how much I didn’t see because it was underwater.

It is relatively safe to go in the water, and the weather is obviously incredibly hot, so most tour guides invite you to. The fall pool is shallow, and you can walk along the carved riverbed, but it is very rocky, and the water was running quickly when I went in November anyway, so use common sense and wear hiking sandals or swimshoes. It’s an odd mix of visitors; big tour groups and local kids, bikini clad Europeans and Hindu pilgrims, there are no rules per se.

how old is it and who built it?

The oldest lingas are from the 800s, but most of it’s 900-1000 years old, with carving beginning under King Suryavarman I of the Khmer Empire (who ruled from 1006 to 1050), and continuing under his successor King Udayadityavarman II (who ruled from 1050 to 1066). According to the rock inscriptions, many of the carvings were done c. 1054. There are also a few later carvings, from the 13th and possibly 14th centuries.

bas-relief from Baphuon Temple, circa 1060

what religion is it?

King Suryavarman I and King Udayadityavarman II were both Buddhist converts, but at the time the majority of Khmers were Hindu, and they did practice both. At that time, Buddhism wasn’t recognized as a wholly different religion from Hinduism. The Cambodian royal family is still, nominally, Hindu, actually. Both kings built, and authorized others to build, Hindu, Buddhist, and half-and-half monuments. Kbal Spean is a Hindu site, primarily devoted to Shiva but also depicting Vishnu, Brahma, Lakshmi, Rama, and Hanuman, as well as symbolic animals including cows and frogs. The thousand lingas were carved during Suryavarman I’s reign by hermits patronized by one of his ministers. Most of the figural carvings, and of course additional lingas, were carved during Udayadityavarman II’s reign. Inscriptions on the site tell us Udayadityavarman II personally consecrated a golden lingam here in 1059.

Two Khmer golden lingas date 7th - 12th c., auctioned off at Sotheby’s Hong Kong in 2022.

what does kbal spean mean?

Kbal Spean means Head Bridge in Khmer.

The bridge part of the name is obvious; a block of natural rock spans the stream, and the heavily carved ‘thousand lingas’ resemble a cobblestone road.

The second thing I noticed was the “bridge” with the thousand lingas and some linga-yonis. To quote the venerable wikipedia:
The lingam of the Shaivism tradition is a short cylindrical pillar-like symbol of Shiva. It is often represented within a disc-shaped platform. The yoni- its feminine counterpart- consists of a flat element, horizontal compared to the vertical lingam, and is designed to allow liquid offerings to drain away for collection.

The origin of Kbal is less clear; the obvious interpretation is that the bridge is at the source of the river, just as we say headwater in English.

However, Kapala is the Sanskrit word for skull, or more specifically, a ritual skull cup. Further, the Kapalika, or skullmen, are a now extinct but once widespread monastic order of ascetic, tantric, non-puranic Shaivists who used human skulls as begging bowls. Though not incredibly well attested, their popularity seems to have been at its height when Kbal Spean was carved.

Aghoris are the sole remaining Shaivist sect still using human skulls in their religious rituals.

To wit, in Act III of a popular Sanskrit play of the time, Prabodha Chandrodaya (Rise of the Moon of Intellect) by Shri Krishna Mishra, a male Kāpālika ascetic and his consort, a female Kāpālini, disrupt a dispute on the "true religion" between a mendicant Buddhist wanderer and a Jain Digambara monk, with both ending up convinced by the Kāpālika couple to give up their vows of celibacy and renunciation by drinking red wine and indulging in sensual pleasure with women. In the end, both the Buddhist and Jain reject their former religions, and convert to Shaivism, having embraced Shiva Bhairava as the Supreme God along with his wife Parvati.

a 16th century Nepalese copy of *Rise of the Moon of Intellect* held at the British Library

From the 8th through 15th centuries most Khmers were Devaraja cult Shaivite Hindus, the national god being Shiva Bhadreshvara. So what’s the link between Bhadreshvara and Bhairava? Bhadreshvara is a highly venerated phallic image associated with Lord Shiva. This depiction holds significant religious importance, symbolizing the divine attributes of Shiva and his role in the spiritual practices of worshippers. The thousand lingas of the riverbed are Shiva Bhadreshvara. The sexual leniency of the Kapalikas, though widely despised by other Hindu sects, may have been perceived neutrally or favorably in Cambodia.

Tantric goddess Bhairavi and her consort Shiva depicted as Kāpālika ascetics, sitting in a charnel ground. Painting by Payāg from a 17th-century manuscript (c. 1630–1635), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.

Further, the Cambodian Devaraja type of Shaivism emphasizes God-King worship. Bhairava, as the “fearsome” aspect of Shiva (produced just from the anger channeled in a furrowed brow) cut off Brahma’s fifth head, killing him temporarily, to punish Brahma’s deceit and arrogance in declaring himself the supreme creator, and challenging Shiva’s position as the ultimate reality— exactly the type of victorious, vengeful, omnipotent, rivalless God-King the Khmer kings hoped to be.

To quote Philip Coggan:
Six hundred years of Khmer kings disguised as gods (6th through 14th centuries). All were done during the lifetime of the king. They represent the king as devaraja, god-king, so that the king could be represented as Shiva (the god with a third eye in the middle of the forehead) in a statue in a Shivaite temple, Vishnu (four arms) in another temple, and as Buddha in Buddhist temples (Buddhism was not regarded as a distinct religion).
Devaraja statues had two purposes, to identify the king as the legitimate source of power, derived from the god, and, through copies set up in temples throughout the kingdom, to mark his domains. Hence the need for recognisable portraits – they were identifying individual kings. If the kingdom fractured, as it sometimes did, rival claimants to the throne would set up their own statues, but these would be destroyed when the kingdom was reunified.
The devaraja cult lives on today – the king is still an incarnation of the god Vishnu, which accounts for the popularity of the Vishnu shrine on the Riverfront in front of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh.

Additionally, in the Mahayana Buddhism of the time, which is what Suryavarman I and Udayadityavarman II would have been exposed or partially converted to, not the Theravada Buddhism that swept Cambodia three hundred years later and remains the country’s main religion today, skullcups were also tantric ritual implements used to hold bread and wine, symbolizing flesh and blood, when making offerings to wrathful deities. Presently, such skullcups remain in use only in Tibet and Nepal.

18th-19th century Tibetan skullcup, held at the Walters Art Museum.
This ritual vessel, made from the upper section of a human skull, belongs to the tantric Buddhist traditions of Tibet and neighboring regions. The skull serves as a reminder of death and impermanence, and it symbolizes wisdom and emptiness—the true nature of reality, according to Buddhist teachings.
In practice, such skull cups are used to prepare and contain a sacred liquid (usually tea mixed with dissolved herbs), which is consecrated as the nectar of enlightened bliss, then consumed or used to sanctify ritual offerings. The imagery on the metal cover and stand of this skull cup relates to the mental imagery visualized by the practitioner as he or she prepares the nectar: The skull sits above a triangular fire, the corners of which are marked by three human heads. In the visualization, their colors correspond to three mental states that immediately precede the light of pure mental clarity: white (luminosity), red (radiance), and blue-black (near-attainment). Within the skull, the practitioner visualizes five bodily substances and five types of meat, which are purified through the heat of the fire, then transformed into nectar when combined with the substance of a tantric staff, which melts into the skull cup from above. Each element of the visualization appears first as a sacred syllable before morphing into its respective object; the letters of some of these syllables appear on the lid, interspersed with deities.

Finally, in this era it was a status symbol among rulers to sponsor various esoteric gurus to visit, preach, and, if liked and admired, found monastic orders in sacred places, gifted villages, or populous cities.

All this to say that while it is not known, there’s a distinct possibility that Kbal refers to the hermits who carved Kbal Spean being Kapalika monks, clearly Hindu but perhaps with a few Buddhist monks with similar tantric practices thrown in.

late 19th/early 20th century Bhutanese thangka depicting Milarepa, the 11th century siddha. Note the skullcups throughout.

How is it holy water?

This river is considered the Ganges of Khmer mythology and religion. The Kulen hills it springs from were considered the mountain home of the gods. Hindus believe that by flowing over the religious scultpures, the water is blessed before it divides into the Siem Reap river and Puok river, which feed into Tonlé Sap, which literally means ‘fresh river’ or ‘great lake,’ before flowing south, watering Angkor and its moats along the way. The Linga-Yonis symbolically "fertilize" the plains of Angkor, with holy water flowing to its soil, giving the power to grow rice.

As you can see, there’s been quite a bit of theft and erosion. Carvings recorded by Jean Boulbet in 1968 are broken and missing. The river flows over the thousand lingas.

Jean Boulbet’s photo of the same section in 1968.

The upper reclining Vishnu is gone entirely; the lower one is missing its upper half.

what should i look for?

Depending on water level, you may or may not see certain carvings well.

The first sculpture I photographed was Lord Brahma on a lotus flower. In Hinduism, Brahma is the god of creation, knowledge and the Vedas. Lotus flowers symbolize purity, as they rise from the mud to bloom beautifully. ‘Brahma lotus-born’ is a standard Hindu depiction of the god, symbolizing the creation of the universe with a pure and spiritual nature.

Beyond, Lord Vishnu in a reclining repose lying on the serpent god Ananta, with Goddess Lakshmi at his feet and Lord Brahma on a lotus petal. In the fully dry season, this is totally dry. This is a depiction of the Khmer creation myth: the lotus flower emerging from Vishnu’s back (particular to Khmer art; in other traditions the lotus grows from his navel) bears god Brahma, the divine craftsman who creates the fittings of the world. Vishnu is sleeping on the serpent Ananta on the ocean. This creation myth emphasizes the necessity of undisturbed rule to transform the churning sea into an orderly world.

A matching reclining Vishnu, with Shiva and Uma mounted on Nandi alongside. Nandi means ‘joy’ or ‘satisfaction’, and symbolizes virility. Nandi grew up as an ardent devotee of Shiva and he performed severe penance to become his gate-keeper, as well as his mount, on the banks of the river Narmada.

Looking upstream, lingas in profile and from a bird’s eye view. In the foreground is a smaller mandala carving. to quote Britannica:
In Hindu and Buddhist Tantrism, a symbolic diagram used in the performance of sacred rites and as an instrument of meditation. The mandala is basically a representation of the universe, a consecrated area that serves as a receptacle for the gods and as a collection point of universal forces. Man (the microcosm), by mentally “entering” the mandala and “proceeding” toward its centre, is by analogy guided through the cosmic processes of disintegration and reintegration.

Obviously it’s been stolen, but it was a rare carving of Shiva as an ascetic.

Jean Boulbet’s picture of same from 1968. According to Boulbet, the last hermit to live here, Grû Tep Mei, who only left in 1962, told him that “the central character standing under a crocodile represents the Buddha, a perfect sage, who, imperturbable and upright, triumphs over seductions, pitfalls and insidious questions. For other Khmers of the region, it could be Krai Thun, a hero-prince who conquered his princess by fighting her off with a kidnapping crocodile.”

Yoni surrounded by lingas. The layout of the yoni is the same as the main temple building in Angkor.

The inscriptions primarily document the construction and dedication of the site to the Hindu god Shiva, and attribute different sculptures to either of the two kings.

The inscriptions are in small caves along the river.

where can i learn more?

The seminal texts on the site are:

Jacques Claude. Les inscriptions du Phnom Kbal Spãn (K 1011, 1012, 1015 et 1016). In: Bulletin de l’Ecole française d’Extrême-Orient. Tome 86, 1999. pp. 357-374. CLICK HERE

Boulbet Jean, Dagens Bruno. Les sites archéologiques de la région du Bhnaṃ Gūlen (Phnom Kulen). In: Arts asiatiques, tome 27, 1973. pp. 3-130. CLICK HERE

Looking through Jean Boulbet’s photographs taken in March 1968, I noticed many carvings that I did not spot on my visit. At first I didn’t know why; maybe my guide was in a rush and didn’t show me some things, or there was too much water flowing in November for me to see or photograph them, or they’ve been eroded, stolen, vandalized, etc. Upon reading Boulbet’s 1973 paper, I learned that these are almost always underwater and barely visible, and that he actually roughly dammed the river and drained the basins in order to photograph them in March 1968.

Boulbet calls this the “upstream wall of basin #4”.

He calls this a “view of Basin #5 from the northwest.”

Boulbet calls this “linga carved on the ledge separating the two downstream reaches of the carved river.”

Is it possible I only saw one branch of the river and not both?

Another “Naissance de Brahmā” sculpted on the bed of the “intermediate reach”.

I think I did see this, but water was flowing over it.

One interesting thing about Kbal Spean is that unlike other sites near Angkor, which were discovered and studied by the French as early as the mid-19th century, no academicians were aware of the place until February 1968, when Jean Boulbet, an ethnologist who and been living among and studying the local Khmer Loeus for about 5 years, was introduced to it by a local shaman. The story is charming. To quote Danny Blao, Boulbet’s grandson (translation mine):

One day, after reconciling a broken couple, he treated the wife, who was sick with dengue fever, with quinine. He could take glory from it. However, he did nothing and went to see the village sorcerer, whom he advised to use his medicine. There she was, cured. Jean Boulbet was right. He allowed the sorcerer to retain all his authority. To thank him, the sorcerer decided to reveal a secret to him. "I know that you love our people and I want to give you a gift. Go to the mountain of O'Kbal Spean. It is a place that is cursed, no one dares to venture there. But the gods will be merciful to you. I know that you are interested in old stones....Find the hermitage under the Frog waterfall".

Jean Boulbet complies. He goes to the place. It is the river that waters Angkor. He discovers it entirely sculpted over nearly 200 meters. Waterfalls, basins, natural bridges: everything has been decorated, one could say illuminated, by the Angkorian hermits.

CLICK HERE to read the blog Blao dedicated to Boulbet’s work.