A riverside monastery at Nakhon Chai Si that is not a royal temple and does not need to be: its three-floor museum of two abbots' possessions, manuscripts and ceramics is one of the best temple collections in the central plain.
วัดกลางบางแก้ว · Wat Klang Bang Kaeo
| Official name | วัดกลางบางแก้ว — Wat Klang Bang Kaeo |
|---|---|
| Where | Nakhon Chai Si, Nakhon Chai Si, Nakhon Pathom |
| Royal temple class | Not established from an official register. |
| Monastic order | Maha Nikaya (มหานิกาย), per the Sangha Region 14 temple register |
| Ancient monument | Not established. |
Nakhon Chai Si, Nakhon Chai Si, Nakhon Pathom
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 the honest position is: a monastery whose founding is nowhere recorded, whose fabric two sets of specialists read as Ayutthaya, and whose documented history effectively begins in the 1880s with an abbot whose dates are known to the day. Note also that no ancient-monument registration could be established here — the Fine Arts Department's own site search returns nothing for this temple's name, and no gazette citation for any structure in it was found anywhere.
Wat Klang Bang Kaeo stands on the Tha Chin at Nakhon Chai Si, and the first thing to say about it is what it is not. It is not a royal monastery: the Sangha's register carries it as a วัดราษฎร์, an ordinary temple, and that is worth stating plainly, because a page that quietly avoided the question would leave a reader assuming otherwise. Its older name was Wat Khongkharam, and people in the district simply call it Wat Klang, the middle temple.
Its age is presumed rather than known. The register's history calls it an ancient monastery said to date from the Ayutthaya period or the late U Thong era, and marks the claim as presumption; the tourism authority says archaeologists suppose the ordination hall, wihan and old principal image to be Ayutthaya work. No founding date exists in any register consulted — the field is simply empty — and no ancient-monument registration could be established for any structure here, the Fine Arts Department's own site search returning nothing at all for the name.
What is documented is a succession of remarkable abbots, and it is documented to the day. Luang Pu Bun Khandhachoti was born on 3 July B.E. 2391, ordained at this temple on 21 June B.E. 2412, became abbot in B.E. 2429, was given the title Phra Khru Phutthawithinayok on 30 December B.E. 2462 along with the chairmanship of the Sangha committee for three provinces, and died on 30 March B.E. 2478. His pupil Luang Pu Perm Punyavasano, born 28 January B.E. 2429, became abbot on 5 February B.E. 2481, was raised to the rank of Phra Rachakhana under the name Phra Phutthawithinayok on 5 December B.E. 2503, retired as emeritus in B.E. 2520 and died on 6 January B.E. 2526 in his ninety-seventh year. Both are venerated well beyond this district, and the museum is named for the title they shared.
The museum is the reason to come and it is genuinely unusual: three floors, built between B.E. 2533 and B.E. 2537, holding not treasure but the working possessions of a monastic household. On the ground floor, the two abbots' belongings, Thai herbal medicines and the tools for preparing them, astrological calendars in Luang Pu Bun's own hand, palm-leaf manuscripts in Khom script, samut khoi folding books, illustrated Phra Malai and Buddha-life manuscripts, chronicles and treatises on medicine and astrology. On the first floor, benjarong and blue-and-white ware, cut glass, brass and lacquer, and a mother-of-pearl preaching throne of Luang Pu Bun's that the tourism authority records as given by Prince Athitthaya Thipha-apha, Regent during the reign of King Ananda Mahidol. On the top floor, silver-clad images, a carved and gilded busabok throne, and Luang Pu Bun's old kuti reassembled as it stood, with a wax figure of him inside it.
The rest of the compound repays a slow walk. The Tripitaka hall stands in a purpose-dug moat with gilded and painted door panels that include Chinese guardian figures; the mondop has four porches, terracotta cladding and a Buddha footprint inside; and by the river is a small octagonal teak bandstand built in B.E. 2464, in Luang Pu Bun's time, which the Sangha register says is the only structure of its kind and construction in the province. All three were restored in the last twenty years, in B.E. 2553, 2556 and 2559 respectively.
The Phra Phutthawithinayok museum on three floors: manuscripts in Khom script and samut khoi folding books, hand-written astrological calendars, herbal medicine tools, benjarong and blue-and-white ceramics, cut glass, brass and lacquer, silver-clad Buddha images, and Luang Pu Bun's own kuti reassembled with a wax figure of him inside it.
The mother-of-pearl preaching throne of Luang Pu Bun on the museum's first floor, which the Tourism Authority of Thailand records as a gift from Prince Athitthaya Thipha-apha, Regent in the reign of King Ananda Mahidol.
The Tripitaka hall standing in a dug moat, a timber structure with a gabled roof and gilded, painted and carved door panels that include Chinese guardian figures, restored in B.E. 2553.
The mondop with its four porches and terracotta cladding, enshrining a replica of the Buddha's footprint over a now-inaccessible passage beneath the base, restored in B.E. 2529 and again in B.E. 2556.
The octagonal teak bandstand by the river, built in B.E. 2464 in Luang Pu Bun's time as a place for meditation and funeral chanting, restored in B.E. 2559, and described in the Sangha register as the only structure of its kind in the province.
The ordination hall with its red sandstone principal image and its murals, and the boundary stones that both the register and the tourism authority cite as part of the evidence for the temple's age.
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 | For the museum only: Thursday to Sunday and public holidays, 09.00–16.00, according to the Nakhon Pathom Provincial Administrative Organisation and the Tourism Authority of Thailand, which agree word for word. No official source consulted publishes opening hours for the temple grounds themselves, and these should not be read as the temple's hours. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Thai nationals: 20 baht. No foreign rate is published. |
| Dress | Not established from an official source. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | 113 Mu 2, Tambon Nakhon Chai Si, Nakhon Chai Si, Nakhon Pathom 73120, on the Tha Chin river beside Nakhon Chai Si market. The temple's own site gives three road approaches — by Borommaratchachonnani and Phutthamonthon Sai 7 on the inner Nakhon Chai Si road, by Phetkasem Road turning into Nakhon Chai Si market, or by Phutthamonthon Sai 4 past Mahidol University at Salaya — and by rail to Nakhon Chai Si station, or by boat along the Tha Chin to the temple's own landing. |
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.
No. The Sangha Region 14 information centre's register carries it as a วัดราษฎร์, an ordinary commoner monastery, and this guide says so plainly because it is a real fact rather than an absence. Its interest lies elsewhere: in an abbot lineage documented to the day from the 1880s, and in a three-floor museum that holds one of the better temple collections in the central plain.
Not established. The Sangha register's founding-date field is empty, and both the register's history and the Tourism Authority of Thailand's page describe the Ayutthaya or late U Thong attribution as a presumption, using the Thai word for it. The evidence offered is the fabric of the ordination hall and wihan, the old principal image and the boundary stones, read by specialists — which is a reasonable basis for an opinion and not a founding date.
Three floors of a monastic household's working life rather than a treasury. The ground floor holds the two abbots' possessions, Thai herbal medicines and their tools, astrological calendars in Luang Pu Bun's hand, and manuscripts in Khom script on palm leaf and in folding samut khoi books. The first floor holds ceramics, cut glass, brass, lacquer and a mother-of-pearl preaching throne. The top floor holds silver-clad images and Luang Pu Bun's reassembled kuti with a wax figure of him in it.
Thursday to Sunday and on public holidays, from 09.00 to 16.00, at 20 baht for adults and 10 baht for school and university students, according to the Nakhon Pathom Provincial Administrative Organisation and the Tourism Authority of Thailand, which give identical wording. Groups must write to the abbot in advance. No separate foreign rate is published, and no official source gives opening hours for the temple grounds themselves as distinct from the museum.
Phra Khru Phutthawithinayok, born on 3 July B.E. 2391, ordained at this temple on 21 June B.E. 2412 and abbot here from B.E. 2429 until his death on 30 March B.E. 2478. On 30 December B.E. 2462 he was given his royally-conferred title together with the chairmanship of the Sangha committee for Nakhon Pathom, Samut Sakhon and Suphanburi. A large devotional tradition attaches to him and to the amulets associated with his name; this guide records that the tradition exists and makes no claim about 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 Nakhon Pathom’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.