Academic literature on the topic 'Khmer Sampot'

The Khmer Sampot: An Evolving Tradition examines the history of the Khmer hip-wrapper, specifically the sampot. and its place within Khmer society. The thesis suggests that the continuation of the tradition of making and wearing the sampot is an indicator of what is important within Khmer society. Evidence of the sampot's early form comes from many sources, including Angkorian sculpture and inscriptions; from notes made by the Chinese emissary Chou Ta-Kuan who lived at Angkor in 1296AD; traders in the region around the fifteenth century; later European explorers such as Henri Mouhot; early twentieth century travellers, scholars and French administrators; later twentieth century anthropologists notes, Cambodian journals, interviews with Cambodian people and visits to Cambodia. Using the above evidence, the sampot's forms and functions within Khmer society from ancient times to the present day are examined and discussed. The varieties of sampot. the motifs, colours, types of cloth and methods of weaving are considered. Also considered are the sampot's functions, ie as everyday dress, ceremonial dress and the economic function of the sampot within Khmer society. The thesis notes that during the twentieth century alone there have been two events which could have caused the demise of traditional sampot weaving, one of which was the flood of imported goods to Indochina during the early years of the twentieth cntury, resulting in a lack of interest in local goods and the subsequent lack of production of local goods such as cloth. The other event was Pol Pot's reign of Cambodia during 1975-79, when the population wore a black uniform. In the case of the first event, it was the French who realised that encouraging the traditional skills to resurface was essential if these skills were not to be lost. However in the case of the second event, it appears to have been the Cambodian people themselves who, after the devastating events of the late 1970's, recommenced their tradition of making and wearing sampot as a way of expressing their cultural identity.

Active pendant près d’un millénaire, la métallurgie du bronze khmère se distingue par une remarquable continuité et par la production aussi bien d’images sacrées que d’objets les plus divers et le plus souvent cultuels. Cette tradition métallurgique sera appréhendée dans le cadre de notre thèse à travers l’analyse d’une période de production spécifique comprise entre la fin du XIe et le début du XIIIe siècle, celle-ci ayant l’intérêt d’avoir fourni la plupart des vestiges en bronze jusqu’ici conservés. Sans négliger les approches "classiques" généralement retenues pour étudier les bronzes khmers, ce travail aura pour principal objectif de caractériser les savoir-faire techniques alors maîtrisés par les bronziers angkoriens. Après un nécessaire ancrage historique au sein d’un royaume khmer dominé par la dynastie de Mahīdharapura et par plusieurs grands centres politico-religieux dont Yaśodharapura / Angkor, la production étudiée sera présentée dans ses grandes lignes sous deux angles complémentaires, typologique et fonctionnel. L’épigraphie khmère sera ensuite sollicitée afin de fournir des premiers éléments quant aux pratiques et aux savoirs métallurgiques attestés au cours de l’époque angkorienne, à la fois pour le bronze, ou saṃrit en vieux khmer, et pour d’autres métaux. Un corpus raisonné de 167 statues et objets en bronze, issus de plusieurs collections muséales et soumis à diverses techniques d’examen et d’analyse, aidera enfin à reconstruire les séquences de travail de la chaîne opératoire présidant à la réalisation d’un bronze. Parmi celles-ci, les pratiques de fonte, bien documentées grâce aux résultats apportés par de récentes analyses élémentaires, feront l’objet d’un développement particulier
Active for almost a millennium, Khmer bronze metallurgy is characterized by a remarkable continuity and by the production of sacred images as well as of objects of the most varied kind, but usually for ritual practices. This metallurgical tradition will be considered in the framework of our thesis through the analysis of a specific period of production that lies between the late eleventh and early thirteenth century, the latter having the advantage of providing the most numerous bronze remains conserved thus far. Without neglecting the "classical" approaches generally used to study Khmer bronzes, this work will serve primarily to characterize the technical know-how then mastered by Angkorian bronze craftsmen. After a necessary anchorage in history in a Khmer kingdom dominated by the Mahīdharapura dynasty and several major political and religious centers including Yaśodharapura / Angkor, the studied production will be presented in two complementary perspectives, typological and functional. Khmer epigraphy will then be solicited to provide the first elements on metallurgical knowledge and practices attested during the Angkorian period, both for bronze, or saṃrit in Old Khmer, as well as for other metals. An annotated corpus of 167 images and objects in bronze, from several museum collections and subject to various technical examinations and analyses, will finally aid in rebuilding the workflows of the chaîne opératoire governing the production of a bronze. Among these, foundry practices, well-documented by the results provided by recent elemental analyses, will be the object of deeper study

Chapter 8 discusses the impact of the Khmer Rouge regime on the people of Cambodia and the importance of documenting the evidence of violence. This study focuses on the important work being done at the Choeung Ek Genocidal Center analyzing the skeletal remains of the victims. In particular, a recent study performed on a sample of Khmer Rouge victims is discussed and, through analysis of the perimortem trauma, confirms eyewitness accounts that blunt force trauma to the base of the skull was often utilized to execute the victims.