ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the state-of-the-art summary of research on the Angkorian World for a general readership. The annual flooding of Cambodia’s great lake, the Tonle Sap, fed large populations across the Khmer state, and surrounding regions held myriad forest products that the Chinese sought throughout the polity’s lifespan. New approaches to the study of sandstone, the building material of choice for the Khmers from the 11th century onwards, also reveal the complex and dynamic interplay between resource availability, architectural transformations, and the historical trajectory of the Khmer Empire. The contributions here survey belief systems that underpinned Angkor’s merging of religion and state and examine key structuring principles like gender, ideology, and social organisation. A recurring theme in accounts of Angkor, from the earliest times until the present day, has been amazement and fascination with the prodigious scope of what was achieved, which by certain measures appears to be without parallel in the pre-industrial world.
