Gilberte de Coral-Rémusat supposed that wooden models were the common ancestors of both Indian and Khmer decorative ornamentation.
[4] She believed that the particular sandstone employed by the Khmer was so easily manipulated that the adaptation from wood to stone decorative techniques was made with little impediment.
However, Henri Marchal believed that Cambodians were not accustomed to working according to texts and that the oral traditions were enough in the majority of the cases to be used as starting point.
The ornamental sets are not limited to the sole figuration of a decor: they reflect the laws of rhythm and balance presiding over the harmonious composition of a whole.
The center, generally exploited in a large circular motif, distributes along the diagonals, four fusiform florets, and along the mediators, four shafts with scalloped ends.
The central figure of the motifs, including the particular nature of each (Rahu, lotus flower, ...) individualizes analogous structures in a way, can still add to the subtlety of these sets.
Here are some examples of the most famous ones: These standard basic shapes are internally divided into more complex ornaments using one of the styles of division characteristic for a specific school of kbach.
These moldings are covered with a very busy decoration: button or lotus petals, geometric and floral ornaments sometimes mixed with small figurines and animals.
Today workshops are paid in cash for the outputs of their labour, but in medieval Cambodia, where there was no system of easily exchanged currency, the inscriptions tell of a system of commerce where donations, payments, and taxes were exchanged between temples, individuals, and the state in numerous forms, including land, grain, livestock, textiles, and metals.
Kbach designates a visual esthetic composition, whether it be engraved in stone or more in the more ephemeral gestures of the Khmer royal ballet.
[16] In this sense, Kbach Khmer is a "system of dance gestures"[17] used in one of the three main theatre genres, all dating back to the Angkorian period—and all based on the Khmer version of the Rāmāyana—the Reamker: lakhon khol (male masked dance mime); sbek thom or sbek touch (Shadow theater) and lkhaon preah reach trop (theatre belonging to the royal family or Royal Ballet of Cambodia) which was renamed lakhon kbach boran after the monarchy was overthrown in 1970.
While the Indian karana is seen as the framework for the "margi" (pan-Indian classical) productions which are supposed to spiritually enlighten the spectators, the kbach of the Khmer Royal Ballet is an ornament or a detail, not a general frame.
Kbach were applied beyond decorative arts and dance to a variety of applications, including textiles,[20] which used ornamental patterns for the Khmer hul.