The Thonburi-bank temple where Taksin's sangha was reorganised and Rama I's own house still stands as a scripture library — and whose famous bell story historians have been picking apart for years.
วัดระฆังโฆสิตารามวรมหาวิหาร · Wat Rakhang Kositaram Woramahawihan
| Official name | วัดระฆังโฆสิตารามวรมหาวิหาร — Wat Rakhang Kositaram Woramahawihan |
|---|---|
| Where | Siriraj, Bangkok Noi, Bangkok |
| Royal temple class | Not established from an official register. |
| Monastic order | Not recorded in any register we could read. |
| Ancient monument | Not established. |
Siriraj, Bangkok Noi, Bangkok
The exact location has not been confirmed yet.
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.
So what is documented here is a temple already important enough in 1768 to host the choosing of a Supreme Patriarch, and a scripture library converted in 1788. How much older the temple is, and by whom it was first built, is not established, and this page does not pretend otherwise.
Wat Rakhang sits on the Thonburi bank almost opposite the Grand Palace, and its importance is a Thonburi-period importance rather than a Bangkok one. Under its older name, Wat Bang Wa Yai, it was where Taksin assembled monks in 1768 to rebuild an ecclesiastical hierarchy that the fall of Ayutthaya had destroyed, and where the first Supreme Patriarch of his reign was chosen. A university library account of his religious administration is explicit about the temple and the year. What that account does not do — and what no source we found does — is establish when or by whom the temple itself was first built.
The building most worth crossing the river for is the Ho Trai, the wooden scripture library, and its history is unusually well documented for this temple. The Fine Arts Department states that it began as the residence of the future Rama I, before his accession, and that he had it converted into a repository for Buddhist scripture in 1788. It is three connected traditional Thai timber halls — a front hall, a central hall and a rear sleeping hall — and it was moved in 2513, 1970, from its original position in the middle of a pond to where it now stands.
One thing to be careful about: 1788 is also the year of the first Rattanakosin recension of the Tripitaka, and the coincidence of dates has produced a persistent conflation. The council itself is documented as having convened at Wat Mahathat Yuwaratrangsarit, not here. The Ho Trai's 1788 date is the conversion of a house into a library, which is a different event in the same year.
Then there is the bell, which gives the temple its name and which is the part of the story that has not survived scrutiny well. The tradition is that an ancient bell of exceptional tone was found on the grounds, that Rama I took it for the chapel royal, and that he gave five bells back in exchange. Thai PBS quotes the temple's own assistant abbot dating the bell now at Wat Phra Kaew to roughly the third reign, and states plainly that there is no clear evidence of when it was made. A Matichon Weekly history column goes further and argues the whole discovery story is a legitimising narrative of the early first reign, noting that Wat Saket makes a competing claim to the same bell and that a poem by a son of Rama II describes it as newly cast. We record the exchange, the tradition and the dissent, and we do not settle it.
The Ho Trai, the three-hall wooden scripture library that was Rama I's house before it was a library. The murals inside are its point: the central hall carries Ramakien scenes and the rear hall a Traiphum cosmology, the Vessantara Jataka and celestial figures, attributed by the Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre to the master craftsman Phra Ajarn Nak on Prince Narisara Nuwattiwong's authority.
The conservation history is visible in the building. The Fine Arts Department records that the artist and conservator Fuea Haripitak documented the original line drawings before restoration and that the work was completed by 2525, 1982, and that the department's Archaeology Office allocated further preservation funding in the 2565 financial year.
The ordination hall and the bell tower, and the standing image of Somdet Phra Phutthachan To Phrommarangsi, whose association with this temple is the reason a great many Thai visitors come and the reason the surrounding lanes are full of amulet stalls.
The river itself. This is a cross-river temple and the approach by boat from the Grand Palace side is part of what it is; the compound faces the water rather than the road.
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 | Open daily, 08:00–17:00, per the Designated Areas for Sustainable Tourism Administration, which also records that the temple is currently open every day for visits and for worship. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Not established from an official source. |
| Dress | Not established from an official source. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | 250 Arun Amarin Road, Siriraj subdistrict, Bangkok Noi, on the Thonburi bank, per the Designated Areas for Sustainable Tourism Administration. The cross-river ferry from the Grand Palace side is the usual approach but we could not confirm the arrangement from a source we accept. |
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.
Tradition holds that an ancient bell of exceptional tone was found on the grounds in the first reign, that Rama I took it for the chapel royal at Wat Phra Kaew, and that he gave five bells back in exchange. The tradition is what the name rests on. Thai PBS quotes the temple's own assistant abbot dating the bell now at Wat Phra Kaew to roughly the third reign and states that there is no clear evidence of when it was made, and a Matichon Weekly column argues the discovery story is later myth-making. The exchange of five bells is the steadier part of the account.
It is the wooden scripture library, three connected traditional Thai timber halls, and the Fine Arts Department states that the building began as the residence of the future Rama I before his accession and that he had it converted into a scripture repository in 2331, 1788. It was moved in 1970 from the middle of a pond to its present position. The murals inside — Ramakien in the central hall, Traiphum cosmology and the Vessantara Jataka in the rear — are attributed to the master craftsman Phra Ajarn Nak.
No, and the confusion is understandable. The first Rattanakosin recension of the canon convened at Wat Mahathat Yuwaratrangsarit. What happened at Wat Rakhang in the same year, 1788, was the conversion of the future Rama I's former residence into a repository for scripture — a library, not a council. Two different events in one year, and the Fine Arts Department's account of the Ho Trai is clear about which one belongs to this temple.
Not established. A Ramkhamhaeng University library page and the temple's own telling both call it an ancient temple of the Ayutthaya period, but neither cites an inscription, a chronicle entry or an excavation, and no source we could read gives a founding year. What is documented is that by 1768 it was important enough for Taksin to gather monks there to choose a Supreme Patriarch, which makes it demonstrably older than Bangkok itself without fixing a date on it.
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 Bangkok’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.