The great stupa of Fa Daet Song Yang, fifteen metres from base to finial, with Dvaravati brick, Ayutthaya repair and a 1957 village restoration stacked one on top of another.
ธาตุใหญ่ หรือพระธาตุยาคู · That Yai, or Phra That Ya Khu
| Official name | ธาตุใหญ่ หรือพระธาตุยาคู — That Yai, or Phra That Ya Khu |
|---|---|
| Where | Nong Paen, Kamalasai, Kalasin |
| 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 First listed at Royal Gazette vol. 54, p. 2287, 3 January B.E. 2480; land boundary of about 6 rai 2 ngan determined at vol. 99, part 155 (special issue), 21 October B.E. 2525; boundary amended at vol. 119, special part 117 ง, 29 November B.E. 2545 Registered with a determined land boundary. The 2525 instrument is unusually candid about why it exists: it recites the earlier registration of That Yai and states that no monument land boundary had been set at that time. Signed by the Director-General on 22 August B.E. 2525 and published on 21 October. The Fine Arts Department is recorded as sole custodian. |
| Coordinates | 16.319113, 103.520225 Fine Arts Department register, monument id 0003341, GPS-sourced point |
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.
No founding date is established and the register offers none. What it does offer is a construction sequence in three visible layers, which is more useful than a year would be.
Phra That Ya Khu stands at the north-eastern edge of the old walled town and it is the biggest thing at Fa Daet Song Yang by a wide margin. The Fine Arts Department's Unit 7 at Khon Kaen found it in the survey of B.E. 2510 to 2511, filed as monument 10 and later renumbered 101. The clearance took twenty-six days in February and March of B.E. 2511, and what came out of the ground is a stupa you can read like a section drawing.
The base is a 16-metre square, 1.15 metres high, with porches projecting 3.75 metres on all four sides and a second porch stepping out another 2.5 metres in front of each. Dvaravati stucco ornament still clings to the base wall between the eastern and northern porches, which is the single best-preserved detail on the monument. On top of the square base sits an octagonal drum, 5.5 metres to a side, built up in three receding tiers to a height of 1.5 metres. Above the octagon the brick changes: the department identifies it as Ayutthaya-period, so the stupa was already being repaired centuries before anyone registered it. Above that again, roughly five metres of the upper structure is a rebuild done by the villagers of Ban Sema in B.E. 2500. Total height from base to top is fifteen metres, and the original ground level sits a metre below the present surface.
Five subsidiary chedis stand around it, and two of them were only discovered when the ground was being levelled for the B.E. 2539 conservation project. Monument 104, eighty metres to the south, is the most interesting of the group: an 11.5-metre square base with image altars on three sides and a narrow 60-centimetre doorway on the north, and the stucco found adhering to its upper base course had been bricked over by a later repair. What came out of monument 104 is the sort of material that makes the site's reputation — stucco and terracotta heads of Buddha images, of deities, of bodhisattvas, animal heads, and ornamental work, all Dvaravati.
Eleven sandstone sema stones ring the stupa. They were turned up by ground levelling, lying flat with their tips pointing inwards towards the stupa, and the B.E. 2526 conservation work reset them in what the department's analysis judged to be their original positions, marking the eight cardinal and intermediate directions. Three of the eleven carry carving legible enough to identify the subject: the Mahosadha Jataka, the Bhuridatta Jataka and the Temiya Jataka. Every full moon of the sixth lunar month the stupa is bathed, and the bang fai rockets go up.
The Dvaravati stucco still in place on the base wall between the east and north porches — the oldest visible decoration on the monument.
Three distinct periods of brick in one elevation: Dvaravati below, Ayutthaya repair above the octagonal drum, and the B.E. 2500 village rebuild at the top.
Eleven sandstone sema stones reset in B.E. 2526 around the eight directions, three of them carrying identifiable Jataka scenes.
Five subsidiary chedis, including monument 104 with its three image altars and 60-centimetre north door, and monument 106, which is deliberately kept under sand.
The square-and-porch plan itself: a 16-metre base with double-stepped porches on four sides, which is the Dvaravati form the Ayutthaya and modern work above it was built to preserve.
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 | A functioning object of devotion inside an archaeological site. Cover shoulders and knees, and expect offerings at the base. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | At the north-eastern edge of the Fa Daet Song Yang walls, reached through Ban Sema south-west of Kamalasai. It is the one monument in the complex with a clear approach and parking. |
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.
The register says ya khu is a local word for a senior monk, a phra thera of high standing. The name is the villagers' name for the stupa, not an inscribed one.
Only the lower part. Above the octagonal drum the brick is Ayutthaya-period repair, and roughly the top five metres is a rebuild by the villagers of Ban Sema in B.E. 2500.
From the group around it, and monument 104 especially, stucco and terracotta heads of Buddha images, deities and bodhisattvas, animal heads and ornamental work, all identified as Dvaravati.
The stupa is bathed on the full moon of the sixth lunar month, with the bang fai rocket tradition, according to the department's own register entry.
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 Kalasin’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.