Five brick towers on a single laterite platform, ringed by four L-shaped ponds edged with five-headed stone nagas — the most complete surviving plan of its kind in Thailand, eight kilometres below Phanom Rung.
ปราสาทเมืองต่ำ · Prasat Mueang Tam
| Official name | ปราสาทเมืองต่ำ — Prasat Mueang Tam |
|---|---|
| Where | Chorakhe Mak, Prakhon Chai, Buriram |
| Royal temple class | Not established from an official register. |
| Monastic order | Not recorded in any register we could read. |
| Ancient monument | Registered national ancient monument ราชกิจจานุเบกษา เล่มที่ ๕๒ ตอนที่ ๗๕, ๘ มีนาคม ๒๔๗๘ (registration), and ราชกิจจานุเบกษา เล่ม ๑๑๕ ตอนพิเศษที่ ๘๓ ง, ๒๑ กันยายน ๒๕๔๑ determining the monument boundary at ๕๓๘ ไร่ ๒ งาน ๑ ตารางวา, jointly with บารายเมืองต่ำ Both citations are as published by the Fine Arts Department on its own virtual historical park site for this monument. There is a conflict worth naming: the department's page gives the 2478 registration as ตอนที่ ๗๕, while the index line of the 2541 boundary announcement in the Royal Gazette's own document service refers back to the earlier registration as ตอนที่ ๒๕. That announcement PDF could not be opened by this run, so the discrepancy is recorded rather than resolved, and the department's own figure is the one printed. |
Chorakhe Mak, Prakhon Chai, Buriram
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.
The stylistic dating and the UNESCO dossier's eleventh century agree with each other but neither rests on a dated inscription naming a founder, and this page does not convert them into a founding year.
Prasat Mueang Tam sits at Ban Khok Mueang in Tambon Chorakhe Mak, Prakhon Chai district, on flat ground about eight kilometres south-east of Phanom Rung. The relationship between the two is the point of the place. Phanom Rung is the sanctuary on the volcano; Mueang Tam is the sanctuary on the plain, and the Thai name says so.
The plan is what people come for and it is the best-preserved arrangement of its kind in the country. Five brick towers stand on one laterite platform, set in two rows on a north-south axis, three in the front row and two behind, with the central tower of the front row larger than the others. Around that platform run four L-shaped ponds, one at each corner, their edges carved as five-headed nagas so that the water is held inside the coils of the serpent. An outer wall with gopuras encloses the whole. The ONEP cultural-environment register records the sanctuary as a Hindu foundation in the Khmer tradition and describes the sandstone carving, including a lintel with Indra.
Outside the monument to the north lies the Mueang Tam baray, an enormous reservoir. Thailand's UNESCO submission gives it as 510 by 1,090 metres and reads the whole arrangement of sanctuary, ponds and reservoir as a representation of Mount Kailash and its waters. The baray is not an afterthought in the administrative record either: when the Fine Arts Department determined the monument's boundary in 2541 it did so for the sanctuary and the baray together, at 538 ไร่ 2 งาน 1 ตารางวา between them.
Four inscriptions were recovered at the sanctuary in November B.E. 2533 (1990) and are catalogued by the Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre as the Prasat Mueang Tam inscriptions. They are short — the centre notes they carry few words — and they are the sanctuary's only contemporary documentary material.
Mueang Tam is administered by the Fine Arts Department together with Phanom Rung, shares its combined ticket, and was covered by the same closure and the same reopening announcement of 9 August 2568 (2025). It is one of the three components of the Ensemble of Phanom Rung, Muang Tam and Plai Bat Sanctuaries that Thailand submitted to the UNESCO Tentative List on 11 April 2019. That is a nomination and not an inscription.
Five brick towers on one laterite platform, in two rows on a north-south axis — three in front, two behind, the central front tower the largest.
Four L-shaped ponds, one at each corner of the inner enclosure, their stone edges carved as five-headed nagas.
Sandstone lintels and pediments on the towers, including one carrying Indra, as recorded by the ONEP cultural-environment register.
The outer enclosing wall and its gateways, and beyond them to the north the Mueang Tam baray — given in Thailand's UNESCO submission as 510 by 1,090 metres.
The contrast with Phanom Rung eight kilometres away, which is the real reason to see both on one day: the same building tradition solving a hilltop and a floodplain.
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 07:00–18:00, as published by the Fine Arts Department on its virtual historical park site for this monument. |
|---|---|
| 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 | Ban Khok Mueang, Tambon Chorakhe Mak, Prakhon Chai district, about 8 km south-east of Phanom Rung and reached from it by road. |
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 the only coordinate a state register publishes for Prasat Mueang Tam is the coordinate of Buriram city, about forty kilometres away and in a different district. The ONEP cultural-environment register gives the monument's address correctly and then gives a latitude and longitude that belong to the provincial capital. Rather than print a pin that would send a reader to the wrong place, or quietly fall back to the district centre, this guide leaves the field empty and says why. The district and subdistrict above are on the record and are correct.
Height, and what the builders did about it. Phanom Rung is on the rim of an extinct volcano two hundred metres above the plain and is approached by a long processional way and a terraced stair. Mueang Tam is eight kilometres away on flat ground and is built around water instead — five towers on one platform, four L-shaped ponds at the corners edged with stone nagas, and an enormous reservoir outside the walls. The Thai name means the lower sanctuary and the pairing is deliberate. They share a ticket and a park administration.
No founding instrument for it was read for this page, so there is no founding date here. The ONEP cultural-environment register dates the complex on stylistic grounds to about the 16th to 17th Buddhist centuries, and Thailand's UNESCO Tentative List submission describes it as an eleventh-century CE construction — the same window in two calendars. Four short inscriptions were recovered at the site in November B.E. 2533 and are catalogued by the Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre; their content was not read here.
In the administrative record, yes. When the Fine Arts Department determined this monument's protected boundary in the Royal Gazette of 21 September B.E. 2541, it did so for the sanctuary and the Mueang Tam baray together, at 538 ไร่ 2 งาน 1 ตารางวา for the pair. Thailand's UNESCO submission gives the reservoir as 510 by 1,090 metres and reads it as part of the same design.
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 Buriram’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.