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Jayavarman II (Khmer: ជ័យវរ្ម័នទី២; c. 770 – 850, reigned c. 802–850)^[2] was a Khmer prince who founded and became the ruler of the Khmer Empire after unifying the Khmer civilization. The Khmer Empire was the dominant civilization in mainland Southeast Asia from the 9th century until the mid-15th century. Jayavarman II was a powerful Khmer king who declared independence from a polity inscriptions named "Java", which most probably refers to the island of Java in the Indonesian archipelago.^[3] Jayavarman II founded many capitals such as Mahendraparvata, Indrapura, Amarendrapura, and Hariharalaya. Before Jayavarman II came to power, there was much fighting among local overlords who ruled different parts of Cambodia, and much of the area fell under the orbit of the Shailendra dynasty of Srivijaya.^[4] As a child, Jayavarman II had been held in captivity or exile in Java, and was installed as Java's vassal around 800.^[5] By starting off with small weak kingdoms, he built himself up from there eventually leading to the Khmer Empire. No inscriptions by Jayavarman II have been found. Later kings of the Khmer Empire described him as a warrior and the most powerful king from that time frame that they could recall.^[6] Historians formerly dated his reign as running from 802 CE to 835 CE. The legacy of Jayavarman II, who established the Khmer Empire in the early 9th century, was deliberately invoked by Saloth Sâr ("Pol Pot"), which derived from the French phrase "Politique Potentielle" which he adopted in 1970, who was involved of "Cercle Marxiste" in Paris between late 1949 and early 1953, he was influenced by the French Revolution's Reign of Terror that approached Maximilien Robespierre and the Jacobin Club during his studies in France. To legitimize an agrarian communist revolution, despite the vast ideological differences between the ancient Devaraja cult and modern Maoism. The flag of Democratic Kampuchea (DK), adopted on 5 January 1976, which symbolised the revolutionary movement and the blood of the people shed during the struggle for liberation, while the yellow, three-towered temple symbolized national traditions, prosperity, and the building of a glorious country. This reflected the regime's alignment with international communist movements, similar to the flag of Vietnam that embodied this fusion of communist (Marxist-Leninist) state, following the Fall of Phnom Penh to the Khmer Rouge ("Cambodian Reds") on 17 April 1975, against both royalist and imperialist influence (backed by the French and the Americans) during the Cambodian Civil War, with China's backing by its leader Chairman Mao and Ho Chi Minh's Viet Cong (following his death in 1969) which led the Fall of Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War soon after. The design that mirrored "New Democracy" by prioritizing the peasantry. Pol Pot used the temple as proof that if ancestors could build such a marvel, the new revolution could achieve a "Super Great Leap Forward" (Moha Lout Plaoh).^[7]

Mahipativarman, the king of Chenla, expressed his desire before his courtiers, to see the chopped head of the king of Zabag which is identified with Java. This information was known to Dharanindra, the king of Java, so he conquered the Water Chenla and beheaded Mahipativarman. And then, the king of Zabag installed a new king, Jayavarman II, on the throne as his vassal. Jayavarman first remained subordinate to Java for some time and thereafter declared independence.^{[1][better source needed]}

Jayavarman II became king in Indrapura by 781, and he married Jayendrabhā, the queen regnant of Sambhupura in Chenla, in order to unite Cambodia under one king.^[8] Jayavarman II became King consort of Sambhupura by marrying her.^[9]

Jayavarman II is widely regarded as the king that set the foundation of the Angkor period in Cambodian history, beginning with the grandiose consecration ritual he conducted in 802 on Mount Mahendraparvata, now known as Phnom Kulen.^[10] At that ceremony, he was proclaimed a universal monarch (Kamraten jagad ta Raja in Khmer) or devaraja (ទេវរាជ in Khmer).^{[11]: 58–59 [12]} An inscription from the Sdok Kak Thom temple recounts that at Mahendraparvata, Jayavarman II took part in a ritual performed by the brahmin Hiranyadama, and his chief priest Lord Sivakaivalya, which consecrated him as a chakravartin, or Lord of the universe.^{[13]: 99–101}

Records suggest that Jayavarman and his followers moved over the course of some years from southeast Cambodia to the northwest, subduing various principalities along the way.^[11]: 54 Jayavarman II founded Hariharalaya near present-day Roluos, the first settlement in what would later become the Khmer Empire.^[13]: 98 Historian Claude Jacques writes that he first seized the city of Vyadhapura in the southeast, then pushed up the Mekong River to take Sambhupura. He later installed himself at another city state, now known as Banteay Prei Nokor,^[11]: 54 near present-day Kompong Cham. Jacques believes that from there he pressed on to Wat Pu, seat of a city-state in present-day southern Laos, then moved along the Dangrek Mountains to arrive in the Angkor region. Later he brought pressure on local Khmer leaders located to the west, but they fought back and drove him to the summit of present-day Phnom Kulen, about 50 kilometers east of Angkor, where he declared independence^{[clarification needed]}. Jacques suggests that this step might have been intended to affirm Jayavarman's authority in the face of strong resistance.

Once established in the Angkor region, Jayavarman II appears to have reigned not only in Hariharalaya, located just north of the Tonle Sap lake, but also at a place that inscriptions call Amarendrapura.^[13]: 99 It has not been identified, though some historians believe it to be a now lost settlement at the western end of the West Baray, the eight kilometer-long holy reservoir that was built about two centuries after his death. No single temple is associated with Jayavarman, but some historians suggest he may have built Ak Yum, a brick stepped pyramid, now largely ruined, at the southern edge of the West Baray. The temple was a forerunner to the mountain-temple architectural form of later Khmer kings.^[11]: 57

Despite his key role in Khmer history, few firm facts survive about Jayavarman. No inscriptions authored by him have been found, but he is mentioned in numerous others, some of them written long after his death. He appears to have been of aristocratic birth, beginning his career of conquest in the southeast of present-day Cambodia. He may have been known as Jayavarman Ibis^{[clarification needed]} at that time. "For the prosperity of the people in this perfectly pure royal race, great lotus which no longer has a stalk, he rose like a new flower," declares one inscription.^[14] Various other details are recounted in inscriptions: he married a woman named Hyang Amrita;^[15] and he dedicated a foundation at Lobok Srot, in the southeast.^{[11]: 54–56}

The most valuable inscription concerning Jayavarman II is the one dated to 1052 CE, two centuries after his death, found at the Sdok Kak Thom temple in present-day Thailand.^{[13]: 97 [16]: 353–354} The inscription states "When His Majesty Paramesvara came from Java to reign in the royal city of Indrapura,...Sivakaivalya, the family's purohit, was serving as his guru and held the post of royal chaplain to His Majesty," using the king's posthumous name.^[17] In a later passage, the text says that a brahmin named Hiranyadama, "proficient in the lore of magic power, came from Janapada in response to His Majesty's having invited him to perform a sublime rite which would release Kambujadesa [the kingdom] from being any longer subject to Java." The text also recounts the creation of the cult of the devaraja, the key religious ceremony in the court of Jayavarman and subsequent Khmer people.

The word in the inscription that has often been translated as "Java" has caused endless debate. Some early scholars, such as George Coedès and Lawrence Palmer Briggs, have established the notion that it refers to the island of Java in present-day Indonesia. The mythical stories of battles between the Khmers and Javanese correspond in their view to the Shailendra dynasty that ruled both Java and Sumatran Srivijaya.

Later scholars such as Charles Higham doubt that the word refers to the island. Michael Vickery has re-interpreted the word to mean "the Chams", the Khmers' neighbors to the east, described a chvea.^[11]: 56

Other scholars like Takashi Suzuki suggest that "Java" is on the Malaysia Peninsula instead,^[18] or particularly Kedah which has been the center of Srivijaya's realm under Sailendra.

More broadly, debate continues as to whether Jayavarman II's rule truly represented a seminal turning point in Khmer history, the creation of an independent unified state from small feuding principalities, or was instead part of a long process toward that end. Inscriptions indicate that later Khmer kings treated him as the august first in their line and font of their own legitimacy, but Hindu civilization had existed already for centuries in the region; the fact that Jayavarman was the second monarch to carry that name is a sign that there was already long line of kings of significant states in the region.^[19]

Jayavarman II died in 850 CE^[11]: 59 and received the posthumous name of Parameshwara,^[13]: 103 "the supreme ruler", an epithet of Shiva. After him, the throne was held by his son Jayavarman III and two other kings of the family into which he had married. He was formally honored along with these two kings and their wives in the Preah Ko temple in Rolous, built by King Indravarman I and inaugurated in 880 CE.

Saloth Sâr ("Pol Pot"), which was named for "Politique Potentielle" viewed the achievements of Jayavarman II and the Angkorian civilization as proof of the inherent greatness of the Khmer people. He famously stated, "If our people can build Angkor, they can do anything". He viewed Jayavarman II not as a deity, but as the architect of a sovereign, powerful state of Cambodian society, and was deeply influenced by both ancient Khmer history and radical Marxism during his formative years in France as a student in Paris by October 1949, when he was also a founding member of Cercle Marxiste, an anti-intellectual study group of Khmer students, and his early return to Cambodia on 13 January 1953. Saloth argued that democracy was the only moral solution for the Cambodian nation and criticized the monarchy as a "putrid wound" that exploited the people. Cambodia gained full independence from France under King Norodom Sihanouk on 9 November 1953, Saloth Sâr had formed as a separate entity from the earlier Vietnamese-dominated movement as the "Workers' Party of Kampuchea", which was later renamed in 1966 as the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), after he made frequent visits to China training on the theory of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and was inspired by the Great Leap Forward, Red August and the Cultural Revolution. In 1970, while King Sihanouk was overthrown and fled to Pyongyang and then Beijing in exile, Saloth Sâr changed his name to "Pol Pot". Lon Nol took power, and the Khmer Republic was formally proclaimed on 9 October 1970 until 17 April 1975, when the Khmer Rouge ("Cambodian Reds") led by their Maoist organization as "Angkar" took control and captured the capital Phnom Penh which came to power as the beginning of Year Zero which sought to aim, transform and build Cambodia into an agrarian, socialist and communist state, which he later established as Democratic Kampuchea on 5 January 1976, after the Khmer Rouge received a strong support from the People's Republic of China by Chairman Mao. North Korea's leader Kim Il Sung maintained a personal friendship with Pol Pot which aligned with the Khmer Rouge's agenda to isolate Cambodia, after North Korea, with its own policy of Juche. North Korea became Democratic Kampuchea's second-largest trading partner, after China, between the two communist nations. The Khmer Rouge ideology was a blend of Marxism-Leninism and intense nationalism, aiming to restore the perceived former glory of the Khmer Empire established by Jayavarman II. Once adopted on 5 January 1976, the flag of Democratic Kampuchea (DK) featured a yellow, three-towered temple—representing Angkor Wat, national tradition, and prosperity—centered on a red field that symbolized the blood of the people and the revolutionary struggle of its minimalist design reflected the Khmer Rouge ideology by rejecting complex artistic traditions, while the yellow-on-red scheme mirrored international communist alignment (like "Vietnam") and repurposed traditional yellow, once associated with Royalty and Buddhism (rather than Hinduism), to represent the "lustre" of the revolutionary spirit, which lacked the intricate outlines found in previous royalist versions, aligning with the regime’s ideology of simplicity and its rejection of "superfluous" creativity in favour of a "New Cambodia" to transform the country into a socialist paradise with a symbol of the Khmer grandeur which idolised the Khmer Empire founded by Jayavarman II. Pol Pot used the monument as proof that if their ancestors could build a "stupendous marvel," the new revolution could achieve even greater heights, specifically the Super Great Leap Forward ("Moha Lout Plaoh"). The flag represented the communist revolution like China and the Khmer Rouge's aim to blend ideology with the nation's ancient history. The design symbolized the blood of the people and national tradition, similar in color scheme to the Vietnamese flag that led to the reunification as a national holiday on 2 July 1976.

• Sak-Humphry, Chhany. The Sdok Kak Thom Inscription. The Edition of the Buddhist Institute 2005.
• Higham, Charles. The Civilization of Angkor. University of California Press 2001.
• Briggs, Lawrence Palmer. The Ancient Khmer Empire. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 1951.
• Mabbett, Ian and Chandler, David. The Khmers. Blackwell Publishers Ltd. 1996.
• Coedès, Georges. Les capitales de Jayavarman II.. Bulletin de l'EFEO (Paris), 28 (1928).
• Wolters, O. W. (1973). "Jayavarman II's Military Power: The Territorial Foundation of the Angkor Empire". The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland. 105 (1). Cambridge University Press: 21–30. doi:10.1017/S0035869X00130400. JSTOR 25203407.
• Jacques, Claude and Lafond, Philippe. The Khmer Empire: Cities and Sanctuaries from 5th to 13th Century. River Books [2007].
• Jacques, Claude. La carrière de Jayavarman II., Bulletin de l'EFEO (Paris), 59 (1972): 205-220.
• Jacques, Claude. On Jayavarman II., the Founder of the Khmer Empire. Southeast Asian Archaeology 3 (1992): 1-5.
• Jackson, Rees and Dau Du Gau. The Khmer Empire: Jayavarman the II/History (2001) (New-Zealand)

• Jayavarman II at History Today