A l'ombre d'Angkor | In the Shadow of Angkor
by George Groslier
An inspired and perceptive exploration of the remains of the Ancient Khmer civilization at the start of the colonial era.
Type: paperback
Publisher: Augustin Challamel, Paris
Edition: Facsimile Gyan Books, New Delhi
Published: 1916
Author: George Groslier
Pages: 190
ISBN: 4444006601339
Language : French
ADB Library Catalog ID: HIS7/GRFR
These “Notes et Impressions sur les temples inconnus de l’ancien Cambodge” (Kompong Cham, Vat Phu, Tonle Repou, Preah Vihear, Beng Maelea, Ta Prohm, Loley, Bakong, Bantei Chhmaar) were taken during the 1913 – 1914 mission that brought George Groslier from South Laos to the Tonle Sap lake and down the river to Phnom Penh.
In these often lyrical pages, the author, then traveling as a famed painter and budding archaeologist, expresses the profond impression Cambodia left on him when he was still a carefree author, to become later the founder of the Phnom Penh National Museum, burdened with responsibilities and a passionate promoter of Khmer culture.
Groslier’s Itinerary, April 1913-January 1914.
Tags: French explorers, art, Banteay Chhmar, Beng Mealea Temple, Angkor Wat, Wat Phu
About the Author
George Groslier
George Groslier (4 Feb. 1887, Phnom Penh-16 June 1945, Phnom Penh), the first child with French citizenship born in modern Cambodia, artist, novelist, historian, archaeologist, ethnologist, architect, photographer, founder and curator of the National Museum of Cambodia, was the ultimate “Cambodian scholar”.
While organizing the School of Cambodian Arts (nowadays the Royal University of Fine Arts) in the 1920s, he has extensively portrayed and studied the country, its people and its traditions, in his writings, paintings and erudite communications. He founded the Phnom Penh Albert Sarraut Museum in 1919, later to become the Cambodia National Museum. Groslier’s wife, Suzanne Poujade (1893−1970), was a niece of Albert Sarraut, former Governor-General of Indochina and then French Minister of the Colonies and future Prime Minister.
George Groslier died prisoner in a Japanese concentration camp when Japan — although formerly an ally of Petain’s French government — occupied vast swaths of South East Asia. With Suzanne Poujade, he had three children, Nicole, Gilbert and Bernard-Philippe, the latter following his father’s steps and becoming an eminent researcher in Cambodian archaeology and history.
Four of his major books — Cambodian Dancers, Ancient & Modern; In the Shadow of Angkor, Unknown Temples of Ancient Cambodia; Return to Clay, A Romance of Cambodia and Road of the Strong, A Romance of Cambodia – have been translated into English and published by DatAsia Press.
Read here about the Rue Groslier (Groslier Street) in Phnom Penh (access to National Museum).
