Browsing by Author "Phon, K"

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    A brief history of Angkor’s iron: reconstructing multi-scalar chronologies in the Phnom Dek metallurgical landscape, Cambodia
    (Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, 2021-11-17) Hendrickson, M; Hua, Q; Cai, S; Tauxe, L; Leroy, S; Phon, K
    Iron was an essential commodity in the rise of Angkor, the largest and most influential state in mainland Southeast Asia between the 9th to 13th centuries. Multidisciplinary research around Phnom Dek in northern Cambodia revealed an extensive metallurgical landscape spanning over 1300 years of production activity and a dramatic increase in the scale of smelting correlating with the expansion of the Khmer Empire. Extensive AMS radiocarbon dating of in-slag charcoals from across the Phnom Dek region and materials recovered from furnaces and occupation at the site of Tonle Bak are used here to reconstruct the multi-scalar chronologies of production (furnace, mound, site, region) during this important time in Southeast Asian history. By integrating geomagnetic intensity data from furnace bases, we demonstrate that it is possible to identify temporal differences between ‘contemporary’ smelting sites within a single mound. At the scale of the slag mound and site we posit that the terminal use relates to ritual while the regional pattern indicates the Khmer state’s desire to increase production and improve access to iron resources needed for temples, warfare and daily life.
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    The Iron Kuay of Cambodia: tracing the role of peripheral populations in Angkorian to colonial Cambodia via a 1200 year old industrial landscape
    (Elsevier, 2014-07) Pryce, TO; Hendrickson, M; Phon, K; Chan, S; Charlton, MF; Leroy, S; Dillmann, P; Hua, Q
    The Industries of Angkor Project (INDAP) is the first scientific study combining investigation of the chronology, supply network and technology of raw and finished iron within Angkorian (9th to 15th c. AD), Middle Period (15th to 19th c. AD) and Colonial (1863–1953) Cambodia. This paper is concerned with the production technology employed at five iron smelting sites in the northern province of Preah Vihear, three loci within the enclosure walls of the Angkorian Preah Khan complex and two, c. 30 km east, near Phnom Dek or ‘Iron Mountain’. The Phnom Dek area is a historic homeland of the ethnic minority Kuay people, who continued to smelt iron from local mineral sources into the 1940s. With the aim of testing a previously proposed ‘Angkorian Kuay’ hypothesis, that Kuay ancestors were responsible for Angkorian period iron smelting at Preah Khan of Kompong Svay (Preah Khan), the objective of this preliminary study was to establish whether any technological continuity could be detected across a 1200 year old industrial landscape, and thus if any socio-culturally homologous relations could be proposed for the ironmakers respectively responsible. Our preliminary results suggest that the iron smelting remains at Preah Khan date from Angkor's terminal phase and into the subsequent Middle Period, whereas as the two studied production sites near Phnom Dek range from the 9th–11th c. AD and to the 19th/20th c. AD. Preah Khan and Phnom Dek production systems appear to have used different iron ore sources but, in the absence of well-preserved furnace remains, statistical analysis of slag chemistry indicates a technological conservatism spanning more than a millennium. At this stage the ‘Angkorian Kuay’ model can be neither rejected nor sustained but the complexity of Preah Vihear province's settlement and industrial history is becoming increasingly apparent and will only become clearer with further excavation and study of chronologically and geographically intermediate sites. © 2014, Elsevier Ltd.