The chapel royal of the Ayutthaya kings, inside the palace walls and never a monastery: three Ceylonese bell chedis over the ashes of three kings, and the empty hall where a sixteen-metre gilded Buddha once stood.
วัดพระศรีสรรเพชญ์ · Wat Phra Si Sanphet
| Official name | วัดพระศรีสรรเพชญ์ — Wat Phra Si Sanphet |
|---|---|
| Where | Pratu Chai, Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya, Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya |
| Royal temple class | Not established from an official register. |
| Monastic order | Not recorded in any register we could read. |
| Ancient monument | Carried in the national monument register; gazette announcement unread The Fine Arts Department's park history records that in B.E. 2519 an area of 1,810 rai inside the island was declared an archaeological zone by Royal Gazette announcement, and gives the date as 27 July B.E. 2519; ONEP gives 17 August B.E. 2519 for the same act. Neither the announcement nor any earlier one naming this temple individually was read, because ratchakitcha.soc.go.th refused every request. No register id for the temple was found. |
| World Heritage | Historic City of Ayutthaya (576) |
| Coordinates | 14.355909, 100.558348 Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre, arts database entry for the principal chedis — an academic database, not a register coordinate |
Thai temple histories mix two different kinds of statement, and this guide keeps them apart. What a register, a gazette entry, an inscription or a dated royal act shows is one thing. What the chronicles and the temple itself hold is another, and it is worth telling as what it is.
Two things about this temple are unusually well attested and one is not. That it stood inside the palace and had no resident community is stated outright by the Tourism Authority. That the image was stripped of its gold in 1767 and its remains taken to Bangkok is stated by the Fine Arts Department. Which of the three chedis belongs to which king is contested between two Thai state bodies, and this page prints the disagreement rather than settling it.
Wat Phra Si Sanphet is not a monastery and never was one, and that single fact explains its shape. King Ramathibodi I built the first royal residence on this ground. When King Borommatrailokkanat moved the palace north to the Lopburi river in B.E. 1991 he gave the vacated ground to the Buddha rather than to a community of monks: it became the palace's own Buddhist precinct, the place where kings performed state and religious ceremony — including the drinking of the Water of Allegiance — and where their ashes were put. The Tourism Authority of Thailand states the consequence in six words of Thai: จึงเป็นวัดที่ไม่มีพระสงฆ์จำพรรษา, so it is a temple with no monks in residence. Bangkok would later copy the arrangement exactly at Wat Phra Kaew.
The three chedis in a row are the ashes of three kings. King Ramathibodi II raised the first two in B.E. 2035, one for his father Trailokkanat and one for his elder brother Borommarachathirat III; the third, to the west, was raised by his son Borommarachathirat IV for Ramathibodi II himself. That is the Fine Arts Department's and the Tourism Authority's account, and it is worth knowing that the Anthropology Centre's arts database does not fully endorse it — it records that opinion differs on which chedi holds whom, and dates the group only to one of two reigns. The chedis are Ceylonese bells on a shared platform with small mondops set between them, and the Tourism Authority attributes those mondops to around the reign of Prasat Thong as a supposition rather than a fact.
The temple takes its name from an image that is no longer here. In B.E. 2042 a great vihara was built, and in B.E. 2043 a standing Buddha sixteen metres high was cast and covered with gold weighing 286 chang — about 171 kilogrammes — and named Phra Si Sanphetdayan. When the city fell in B.E. 2310 the Burmese burned the image to strip the gold, leaving the bronze core. King Rama I had what was left brought down to Bangkok and sealed inside a chedi built for it at Wat Phra Chetuphon, which he named Chedi Si Sanphetdayan. The image is therefore in two places at once: its ashes in Bangkok and its absence here, in a hall reduced to its pillars.
What you walk on has been rebuilt more than once. The Tourism Authority records traces of a restoration around the reign of King Borommakot, and states that the chedis were restored to the condition you see now during the premiership of Field Marshal Plaek Phibunsongkhram. Around the compound stand rows of subsidiary chedis raised for members of the royal family; the department notes that Phraya Boran Ratchathanin's excavations found ash urns inside several of them. Behind the three great chedis is a mondop with four porches, dated by the department to the late Ayutthaya period around the reign of King Narai, which once held a seated, a reclining, a standing and a walking Buddha. Only the seated one survives, in the east porch.
Three Ceylonese bell chedis in a line on a raised platform, with mondops built between them. The Anthropology Centre describes the composition from the ground up: plinth tiers, garland mouldings, the lotus at the mouth of the bell, the bell itself, the harmika and the spire.
The site of the royal vihara, now columns and a pedestal, where the sixteen-metre Phra Si Sanphetdayan stood under 286 chang of gold until 1767.
The four-porch mondop behind the chedis, which the Fine Arts Department dates to the late Ayutthaya period around the reign of King Narai. It held four images in the four postures and one, the seated image in the east porch, is still there.
Rows of subsidiary chedis raised for members of the royal family, several of which were found to contain ash urns when Phraya Boran Ratchathanin excavated them.
The old royal palace ground immediately north, which is the same ticket and the same monument: the temple has no boundary of its own because it was always inside the palace.
This is a working place of worship for millions of people rather than an attraction, and it is treated as one at the gate. Where a figure below is blank, no source we are prepared to cite states it.
| Hours | Tickets are sold 08:30–17:00 and the site stays open until 18:00, per the Tourism Authority of Thailand's Thai-language listing. Note the half-hour later start than the Tourism Authority gives for Wat Mahathat, Wat Ratchaburana and Wat Chaiwatthanaram. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Thai nationals: 10 baht. Foreign visitors: 80 baht. |
| Dress | Not established from an official source. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | North of the Wihan Phra Mongkhon Bophit, inside the old royal palace precinct on the island; the palace ruins are on the same ticket. Enquiries go to the Third Regional Office of Archaeology and National Museums on 0 3524 2501 or 0 3524 2448. |
Every temple reference repeats claims nobody has checked. These are the ones we went looking for and could not stand up, listed so you know exactly where this page stops.
Because it was never a monastery. It stood inside the royal palace as the king's own Buddhist precinct, built for state and religious ceremony and for the enshrining of royal ashes, and the Tourism Authority of Thailand states outright that it is therefore a temple with no monks in residence. Bangkok repeated the arrangement when Rama I built Wat Phra Kaew inside the Grand Palace, which is why that temple has no resident community either.
It was destroyed for its metal. The standing image, sixteen metres high and covered with 286 chang of gold — about 171 kilogrammes — was cast in B.E. 2043 and named Phra Si Sanphetdayan. When Ayutthaya fell in B.E. 2310 the Burmese burned it to strip the gold off, leaving only the bronze core. The Fine Arts Department records that King Rama I had the remains brought to Bangkok and sealed inside a chedi he named Chedi Si Sanphetdayan at Wat Phra Chetuphon, better known as Wat Pho.
The Fine Arts Department and the Tourism Authority both say the eastern chedi holds King Borommatrailokkanat, the middle one King Borommarachathirat III, and the western one King Ramathibodi II, who built the first two in B.E. 2035 for his father and brother before his own son built the third for him. The Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre records that scholars do not agree on which chedi holds which king, so the attribution is less settled than it looks on a signboard.
It is the same visit. The temple has no boundary of its own because it was built inside the palace, and the palace ruins immediately north are covered by the same ticket. There is not a great deal standing — foundations, platforms and a few walls — but the layout is legible, and walking it is the only way to understand why the temple sits where it does and why it never had monks.
Before you go, read the guide to Buddhism and temple etiquette in Thailand — dress, footwear, where photography is not welcome and how to behave around monks. The rest of Phra Nakhon Si Ayutthaya’s temples are covered here too.
Every temple here sits in a place worth reading about on its own terms. The nationwide temple guide covers the other provinces to the same documentary standard as this page, and says on each one what the record establishes and what it does not.
If you are thinking about more than a visit: work out which Thai visa route fits your situation, and see what is available to rent and buy in residences across Thailand.
Every fact on this page is drawn from the sources above. Where they disagree, this page says so rather than choosing silently. Registrations, fees, hours and access change; confirm anything you are relying on with the authority concerned. BAANLYY LLC is a Nevada company and a listing portal, does not represent any temple, and offers no legal or religious advice.