Hidden among the sprawling roots and ruins of Ta Prohm, one of Angkor’s most atmospheric temples, lies a carving that has sparked fascination, debate, and a good deal of sensationalism. The temple, commissioned in the late 12th century by King Jayavarman VII, is famous for its massive silk-cotton trees entwined with stone walls. Yet for many modern visitors, one small relief steals the spotlight: a curious animal motif that some claim depicts a dinosaur.
The carving in question is found on a doorway pilaster in Gopura III, east of the central sanctuary. It is one of a vertical series of medallions, each encircling an animal. Within one of these roundels appears a squat, four-legged creature in profile with a row of lobe-like forms on its arched back. At first glance, these lobes resemble the distinctive plates of a Stegosaurus, a dinosaur that lived some 150 million years ago.
A dinosaur carving on a 12th century temple. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Ta Prohm was founded in the late 12th century by King Jayavarman VII as a Buddhist monastery. Originally known as Rajavihara (“royal monastery”), it was one of the largest temples in the Angkor complex, dedicated to the king’s mother. Inscriptions suggest that it once housed more than 12,000 people, including monks, priests, and dancers, with an additional 80,000 inhabitants living in the surrounding villages that supported the temple’s operations.
After the fall of the Khmer Empire in the 15th century, the temple of Ta Prohm was abandoned and neglected for centuries. When the effort to conserve and restore the temples of Angkor began in the early 20th century, French archaeologists decided that Ta Prohm would be left largely as it had been found, in order to preserve the atmospheric interplay of stone and jungle that gave the temple its distinctive romantic character—massive silk-cotton and strangler fig trees embrace crumbling towers, and roots cascade like frozen waterfalls over walls and galleries.
Ta Prohm. Credit: WIL
Ta Prohm is richly decorated with bas-reliefs depicting both real and mythical creatures. Many of the animals are readily identifiable—such as water birds, parrots, deer, and monkeys—but others are more ambiguous, including the much-discussed “dinosaur.” This carving was first brought to wider attention in two books by Claude Jacques and Michael Freeman (1997, 1999), who noted that one of the figures at the temple “bears a striking resemblance to a stegosaurus.”
As references to this stegosaur-like image began to appear in guidebooks to Angkor, young-earth creationists seized on it as evidence that dinosaurs and humans once lived side by side. They argued that stegosaurs must have been known to the inhabitants of Ta Prohm, or at least to the sculptor who carved the image, thus supporting their view that the Earth and all its creatures are no more than 10,000 years old.
While the carving does evoke a superficial resemblance to a stegosaur, this impression rests largely on a single feature: the row of shapes along its back, interpreted by some as dermal plates. Beyond this, the anatomy is inconsistent with that of a stegosaur. Notably, the carving lacks the tail spikes—known as the thagomizer (a term popularized by The Far Side cartoon)—which are among the dinosaur’s most iconic traits. The head is also disproportionately large and incorrectly shaped, and the limbs are out of proportion compared to what palaeontologists know of stegosaurs.
An anatomically correct Stegosaurus. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
The plates along the back—the only feature that might be considered distinctly stegosaur-like—also present anatomical problems. In actual stegosaurs, the plates are more numerous, arranged in double rows, and typically pointed and triangular. They are also larger toward the center of the back and smaller near the head and tail. One might argue that the Ta Prohm sculptor chose to stylize or simplify the plates, but this explanation falters, since similar lobed patterns appear on many other carvings at the temple, including depictions of a bird and what seems to be a water buffalo.
If these lobes are understood not as dorsal plates but as background foliage—a common decorative element in Khmer art—the creature becomes far less enigmatic. Under this interpretation, several more plausible identifications emerge: a rhinoceros, with its heavy build and prominent head; a chameleon or lizard, suggested by the curling tail and arched back; or a boar or water buffalo, both well-known animals in Cambodia.
A less common proposal holds that the sculptor may indeed have based the carving on a stegosaur, but not a living one. Fossilized remains of stegosaurids are known from North America, Europe, Africa, and East Asia, including Jurassic deposits in China. Although fossil discoveries are relatively scarce in tropical, heavily vegetated regions like Cambodia, the massive quarrying required for Angkor’s temples could conceivably have unearthed large bones or unusual stone formations. In such a scenario, artisans may have encountered fossils and incorporated them into their artistic repertoire. Moreover, it would not have been necessary for fossils to be found locally. Ancient peoples often travelled considerable distances, and stories—or even specimens—could easily have been transmitted across regions.
The God Varuna on his mount Makara.
The possibility that the carving is primarily imaginative or religiously symbolic cannot be dismissed. Hindu mythology, which heavily informed Khmer temple art, abounds with hybrid beings combining the traits of multiple animals and deities. These composite figures frequently appear in Angkorian iconography and could easily have inspired the so-called “stegosaur” relief. For example, the mythical Makara—a sea creature often shown with dorsal projections—is sometimes depicted carrying the four-armed deity Varuna. Such fantastical motifs remind us that Khmer sculptors worked as much within a mythic and symbolic framework as a naturalistic one.
Indeed, on the very same pillar as the disputed carving, another puzzling figure appears: a cat- or dog-like creature standing on its hind legs, one foreleg holding what resembles a torch and the other shaped like a wing or bush, yet with a head that looks partly human, partly simian. This illustrates the wide range of imaginative and hybrid figures that populate Angkor’s reliefs, suggesting that literal zoological accuracy was rarely the artist’s goal.
The mainstream scholarly consensus is that the carving does not represent a dinosaur, and certainly not evidence of human–dinosaur coexistence—a notion contradicted by the overwhelming geological and paleontological record. Most researchers interpret the image as either a conventional animal rendered with decorative foliage, or a stylized hybrid in keeping with Khmer artistic traditions. Some writers have proposed, based on stylistic observations, that the relief may have been reworked or emphasized at a later date, given its comparatively lighter surface appearance. However, this remains speculative and is not required to account for the carving’s features.
The pillar where the dinosaur relief is found. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Dorsal-plate-like appendages appear on many carvings in Ta Prohm and other temples in Cambodia, as this collage shows. Credit: Scott E. Burnett
References:
# Glen J. Kuban. “Stegosaurus Carving on a Cambodian Temple?”, Paleo.cc
# Scott E. Burnett. “A Stegosaur Carving on the Ruins of Ta Prohm? Think Again”. Skeptical Inquirer
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