Body of head found in 1927 discovered at Angkor

The body of a Buddha statue whose head was found in 1927 has been unearthed at the Angkor temple complex in Cambodia. Archaeologists discovered the statue in an excavation at Ta Prohm temple last month. The head, which is kept at the National Museum in Phnom Penh, was scanned and digitally rejoined to the neck almost a century after it was discovered.

While was missing its head, feet and right hand, the body is 1.16 meters (3.8 feet) tall and 56 cm (1.8 feet) at the widest point. It is finely carved with jewelry, a robe and a sash in the intricate Bayon art style, dating it to the 12th or 13th century. The left hand is placed on the chest, a gesture that is very uncommon in Khmer art and sculpture.

When the head was discovered, Cambodia was a protectorate inside French Indochina. The precise find site of the head was documented, so we know that the body was unearthed 164 feet away from where the head was found in 1927. How the two came to be so separate from each other is unknown. Fragments of the statue’s body were found all around it, but somehow, the head ended up far from the

The examination of the statue revealed that two other missing parts — a hand and a foot — were found during last summer’s excavation. They too were scanned, and together with the head from 1927, the statue was almost entirely reassembled virtually. Only the right hand is still missing. National Authority of Apsara archaeologist Neth Simon has asked Cambodia’s Minister of Culture and Fine Art for authorization to make the virtual reconstruction a physical one, and reattach the head, hand and foot to the body for public display.