Roads of the Khmer Empire

I've been reading recently about the Angkor Civilization, a.k.a. the Khmer Empire, which included most of what is today Cambodia and Thailand during the Middle Ages (ca 800-1300 AD). The size and stretch of the empire has often forced nearly a century of inventive scholars to use a broad based settlement pattern type study: the most recent of which is focused on the road system.

This photo is of an approach road to the temple of Banteay Srei, and it hints at the construction process of Khmer roadways. While the roads themselves were fairly straight, flat and unpaved, there were numerous temples and resthouses and bridges and reservoirs and other accoutrements for the travelers between the capital city of Angkor and the cities of Phimai, Vat Phu, Preah Khan, Sambor Prei Kuk and Sdok Kaka Thom, in an interconnected web of roads some 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) in length.

• Khmer Road System
• Angkor Civilization
• More Ancient Roads