VIDEO OF TEMPLE PHOTOS AND ASSORTED TEMPLE VIDEOS:
The Golden Buddha,
officially titled Phra Phuttha Maha Suwana Patimakon is a gold Maravijaya
Attitude seated Buddharupa statue, with a weight of 5.5 tonnes (5,500
kilograms). It is located in the temple of Wat Traimit, Bangkok, Thailand. At
one point in its history, the statue was covered with a layer of stucco and
coloured glass to conceal its true value, and it remained in this condition for
almost 200 years, ending up as what was then a pagoda of minor significance.
During relocation of the statue in 1955, the plaster was chipped off and the
gold revealed.
The origins of this
statue are uncertain. It is made in the Sukhothai Dynasty style of the
13th-14th centuries, though it could have been made after that time. The head
of the statue is egg-shaped, which indicates its origin in the Sukothai period.
Given that Sukothai art had Indian influences and metal figures of the Buddha
made in India used to be taken to various countries for installation, this
suggests the Golden Buddha statue may have been cast in parts in India.
Some scholars believe the
statue is mentioned in the somewhat controversial Ram Khamhaeng stele. In lines
23-27 of the first stone slab of the stele, "a gold Buddha image" is
mentioned as being located "in the middle of Sukhothai City,"
interpreted as being a reference to the Wat Traimit Golden Buddha.
At some point, the statue
was completely plastered over to prevent it from being stolen. The statue was
covered with a thick layer of stucco, which was painted and inlaid with bits of
coloured glass. It is believed that this plastering-over took place before the
destruction of Ayutthaya kingdom by Burmese invaders in 1767. The statue
remained among the ruins of Ayutthaya without attracting much attention.
In 1801, Thai King Buddha
Yodfa Chulaloke (Rama I), after establishing Bangkok as a new capital city of
the Kingdom, and after commissioning the construction of many temples in
Bangkok, ordered that various old Buddha images should be brought to Bangkok
from the ruined temples around the country.
At the time of King Rama
III (1824-1851), the statue, still covered with stucco, was installed as the
principal Buddha image in the main temple building of Wat Chotanaram in
Bangkok.
When Wat Chotanaram,
located near Chinatown, fell into disrepair and was closed, the statue was
moved to its present location at the nearby Wat Traimit in 1935. At the time,
Wat Traimit was a pagoda of minor significance (like hundreds of other Buddhist
temples that exist in Bangkok). Since the temple didn't have a building big
enough to house the statue, it was kept for 20 years under a simple tin roof.
The true identity of this statue had been forgotten for almost 200 years.
In 1954, a new Viharn
building was built at the temple to house the statue. It was moved to its new
location on 25 May 1955; there are a variety of accounts of what exactly
happened next, but it is clear that during the final attempt to lift the statue
from its pedestal, the ropes broke and the statue fell hard on the ground. At
that moment, some of the plaster coatings chipped off, allowing the gold
surface underneath to be seen. Work was immediately stopped so that an evaluation
could be made.
All the plaster was
carefully removed and during the process, photos were taken and are now
displayed in the Temple for visitors. Pieces of the actual plaster are also on
public display. When all the plaster was removed, it was found that the gold
statue consisted of nine parts that fit smoothly together. A key was also found
encased in plaster at its base, which can be used to disassemble the statue,
allowing for easier transportation.
The golden statue was
discovered very close to the commemoration of the twenty-fifth Buddhist Era
(2500 years since Gautama Buddha's passing) so the Thai news media was full of
reports and many Buddhists regarded the occurrence as miraculous.
On 14 February 2010, a
large new building was inaugurated at the Wat Traimit Temple to house the Gold
Buddha. The building also contains the Bangkok Chinatown Heritage Centre and an
exhibition on the origin of the Gold Buddha.
The statue is 3 metres (9.8 ft ) tall and weighs 5.5
tonnes (5.4 long tons; 6.1 short tons). (According to another account, the
statue measures 3.91
meters from base to top and 3.10 meters across the
lap from knee to knee.) It can be disassembled into nine pieces. The statue was
housed in a Wat in Ayutthaya until the mid-19th century, and its provenance
from Ayutthaya excludes the possibility of it having been made after about
1750.
At US$1,400 per troy
ounce, the gold in the statue (18 karat) is estimated to be worth 250 million
dollars. The body of the statue is 40% pure, the volume from the chin to the
forehead is 80% pure, and the hair and the topknot, weighing 45 kg, are 99%
pure gold.
The Buddha is represented
in the traditional pose of Bhumisparsha Mudra (touching the earth with the
right hand to witness Shakyamuni Buddha's enlightenment at Bodh Gaya). The
original statues of Sukhothai sit on a common pedestal form. The flame that
crowns the ushnisha is an innovation of Sukhothai that symbolises the splendour
of spiritual energy. The line of the hairdressing forms a "V" shape in
the root of the hairs, underlined by the elegant curve of the eyebrows that
join above the aquiline nose, all according to the prescribed rules. The three
wrinkles in the neck and the much-elongated ear lobes, signs of his former
status of a Prince, also form part of the code, as do the wide shoulders and
the chest inflated.
