The third-class royal monastery at the centre of Chonburi city, holding a mural cycle the Fine Arts Department thinks important enough to publish a study of, and a record whose two halves sit three and a half centuries apart.
วัดใหญ่อินทาราม · Wat Yai Intharam
| Official name | วัดใหญ่อินทาราม — Wat Yai Intharam |
|---|---|
| Where | Bang Pla Soi, Mueang Chonburi, Chonburi |
| Royal temple class | Third class royal temple, Saman (ชั้นตรี ชนิดสามัญ) Chonburi Provincial Office of the National Office of Buddhism, which states ได้รับพระมหากรุณาโปรดเกล้าฯ ให้ยกเป็นพระอารามหลวงชั้นตรี ชนิดสามัญ |
| Monastic order | Not recorded in any register we could read. |
| Ancient monument | Not established. |
Bang Pla Soi, Mueang Chonburi, Chonburi
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 gap between the two halves of this record is about three hundred and fifty years and it is not reconcilable from anything read here. The same state body publishes both: an administrative establishment in B.E. 2325 and a narrative of an Ayutthaya royal foundation roughly six centuries ago. Both can be true of one site — a Rattanakosin re-establishment of an older place is ordinary in Thailand — but no source consulted actually says so, and no page on this site should collapse them into a single founding year in either direction.
Wat Yai Intharam stands at 858 Chet Chamnong Road in Tambon Bang Pla Soi, in the middle of Chonburi city. Local usage calls it simply Wat Yai, the big temple, and that name has stuck so firmly that the official Wat Intharam has been absorbed into it. It is a third-class royal monastery of ordinary type, a grade the Chonburi provincial office of the National Office of Buddhism states in its own words, and it is the principal temple of the provincial town.
Its history, as the state publishes it, comes in two incompatible halves. The administrative record is straightforward: established as a temple in B.E. 2325 and granted its visungkhamsima in B.E. 2335, which places its formal existence in the first decade of the Rattanakosin period. The narrative the same office publishes is entirely different. It holds the temple to be around six hundred years old, founded by Somdet Phra Nakharinthrathirat, the sixth king of Ayutthaya, who is said to have travelled to Chonburi by barge, been struck by the wooded shore and the sound of the sea at night as a setting for monastic practice, and named the monastery after his own former name, Phra Nakhon In.
This guide does not choose between them, and the reason is worth stating plainly: a Rattanakosin re-establishment of an older site is one of the commonest things in Thai monastic history, and it would explain both records at once — but no source read here actually says that happened. Writing a single founding year for this temple, in either direction, would be inventing the sentence that reconciles them. The two records are printed side by side instead.
The temple also holds the story of an image. Luang Pho Choei is a bronze crowned Buddha in the Ayutthaya manner which did not begin here. It belonged to Wat Samoraköt, a temple the provincial office describes as founded in the same era as this one, which lost its monks and its patrons, fell derelict, and left the image sitting in the open as the vihara over it decayed. The name Luang Pho Choei — roughly, the indifferent one — was given by villagers for the way it sat through sun and rain without complaint, and when they could bear it no longer they moved it here.
Luang Pho Choei, a bronze crowned Buddha image in the Ayutthaya manner, brought here from the derelict Wat Samoraköt and the object of the strongest local devotion in the temple.
The ordination hall and its wall paintings, which the Fine Arts Department considers significant enough to have published a dedicated study of them in its Chonburi National Library article series.
The compound itself at 858 Chet Chamnong Road, in the centre of Chonburi city rather than on its edge, which is why this is the working parish temple of the provincial town as well as a royal monastery.
The two names side by side — วัดอินทาราม on the record and วัดใหญ่ in every local mouth — which is the shortest way to see how the temple is actually regarded in the town.
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 | Not established from an official source. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Not established from an official source. |
| Dress | An active royal monastery in the middle of the provincial town: shoulders and knees covered, shoes off in the ordination hall and the vihara. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | 858 Chet Chamnong Road, Tambon Bang Pla Soi, Mueang Chonburi district, in the centre of Chonburi city. |
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.
A third-class royal monastery of ordinary type — พระอารามหลวงชั้นตรี ชนิดสามัญ — in the words of the Chonburi provincial office of the National Office of Buddhism. It is the principal temple of Chonburi city.
The state publishes two answers and this page prints both. The administrative record gives establishment in B.E. 2325 and the grant of ordination ground in B.E. 2335, which is early Rattanakosin. The same office narrative holds the temple to be around six hundred years old and founded by an Ayutthaya king. Nothing read here reconciles the two, and no single founding year is given.
Not a person but an image: a bronze crowned Buddha in the Ayutthaya manner. It came from Wat Samoraköt, a temple of the same era that fell derelict, and it sat in the open through sun and rain after its vihara decayed. Villagers gave it the name for that, and eventually moved it here.
This page cannot tell you reliably. The Fine Arts Department has published a study of them, but that article could not be opened by the research behind this page, and no official source consulted gives access arrangements or hours. Ask at the temple office.
Because local usage overtook the record. The provincial office explains that villagers called it Wat Yai — the big temple — until the name stuck, and the two were eventually joined into the present Wat Yai Intharam.
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 Chonburi’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.