Early history of Cambodia
As excavation sites have become more numerous and modern dating methods are applied, settlement traces of all stages of human civil development from neolithic hunter-gatherer groups to organized preliterate societies are documented in the region.
[1][2][3][4] Historical records of a political structure on territory that is now modern-day Cambodia first appear in Chinese annals in reference to Funan, a polity that encompassed the southernmost part of the Indochinese peninsula during the 1st to 6th centuries.
Centered at the lower Mekong,[5] Funan is noted as the oldest regional Hindu culture, which suggests prolonged socio-economic interaction with maritime trading partners of the Indosphere in the west.
[6] By the 6th century a civilization, titled Chenla or Zhenla in Chinese annals, had firmly replaced Funan, as it controlled larger, more undulating areas of Indochina and maintained more than a singular center of power.
A new dynasty of provincial origin introduced Buddhism as changes of religious, dynastic, administrative and military nature, environmental problems and ecological imbalance[10] coincide with shifts of power in Indochina.
Great achievements in administration, and accomplishments in agriculture, architecture, hydrology, logistics, urban planning and the arts are testimony to a creative and progressive civilization - in its complexity a cornerstone of Southeast Asian cultural legacy.
[1][2][18] Recent archaeological finds (since 2012) indicate that parts of the region now called Cambodia were inhabited during the second and first millennia BC by a Neolithic hunter and gatherer culture that may have migrated from southeastern China to the Indochinese Peninsula, responsible for the construction of circular earthworks.
[19] The Iron Age period beginning around 500 BC, the inhabitants had developed complex, organised societies and a varied religious cosmology by the 1st century CE and engaging in maritime trade, resulting in socio-political interaction with the Indosphere.
[23] The Nāga are a pan-Asian mythical race of reptilian beings, who in Cambodia were believed to possess a large empire or kingdom in the Pacific Ocean region.
At about the time that Western Europe was absorbing the classical culture and institutions of the Mediterranean, the people of mainland and insular Southeast Asia were responding to the stimulus of a civilization that had arisen in India during the previous millennium.
Vedic and Hindu religion, political thought, literature, mythology, and artistic motifs gradually became integral elements in local Southeast Asian cultures.
Found in the 1st century CE, Funan was located on the lower reaches of the Mekong River delta area, in what is today southeast Cambodia and the extreme south of Vietnam.
Maritime trade played an extremely important role in the development of Funan, and the remains of what is believed to have been the kingdom's main port, Óc Eo (O'keo) (now part of Vietnam), contain Roman as well as Persian, Indian, and Greek artefacts.
They subjugated central and upper Laos, annexed portions of the Mekong Delta, and brought what are now western Cambodia and southern Thailand under their direct control.
At the same time, king Mahendravarman established peace with the neighbouring kingdom of Champa through marriage arrangements, and Isnavarman, who succeeded him in 616, moved to a new capital, which, according to a Chinese writer, was inhabited by 20 thousands families.
Technical and artistic progress, greatest cultural achievements, political integrity and administrative stability marked the golden age of Khmer civilization.
The ruins of great temple complexes surrounded by an elaborate hydraulic network - the capital cities of Angkor, located north of the Tonle Sap lake near the modern town of Siem Reap, are a lasting monument to the accomplishments of Jayavarman II and his successors.
[25] Indravarman I (877 - 889) extended Khmer control as far west as the Korat Plateau in Thailand, and he ordered the construction of a huge reservoir north of the capital to provide irrigation for wet rice cultivation.
Attacks by Thai and other foreign peoples and the internal discord caused by dynastic rivalries diverted human resources from the system's upkeep, and it gradually fell into disrepair.
He reduced to vassalage the Thai peoples who had migrated into Southeast Asia from the Yunnan region of southern China and established his suzerainty over the northern part of the Malay Peninsula.
Casting himself as a bodhisattva, he embarked on a frenzy of building activity that included the Angkor Thom complex and the Bayon, a remarkable temple whose stone towers depict 216 faces of buddhas, gods, and kings.
Like many other ancient edifices, the monuments of the Angkorian region absorbed vast reserves of resources and human labour and their purpose remains shrouded in mystery.
Preaching austerity and the salvation of the individual through his or own her efforts, Theravada Buddhism did not lend doctrinal support to a society ruled by an opulent royal establishment maintained through the virtual slavery of the masses.
