A ruined Khmer shrine on a settlement mound at Kaset Wisai where people were burying their dead three thousand years before it was built.
กู่เมืองบัว · Ku Mueang Bua
| Official name | กู่เมืองบัว — Ku Mueang Bua |
|---|---|
| Where | Mueang Bua, Kaset Wisai, Roi Et |
| 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 Royal Gazette vol. 114, special part 80 ง, p. 4, 12 September B.E. 2540 (1997), about 9 rai 91.43 square wa Quoted in that form by the Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre's archaeological database. The same date, 12 September B.E. 2540, carries the registration of Wat Traiphum Khanachan elsewhere in Roi Et, so this appears to be one provincial announcement covering several monuments rather than a single-site order. |
| Coordinates | 15.603786, 103.595098 Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre, archaeological sites database entry 477 (พิกัด DD 15.603786 N, 103.595098 E), checked against the registered address at Mu 6, Ban Mueang Bua, Tambon Mueang Bua, Amphoe Kaset Wisai. |
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 year exists for this monument. The mound it stands on was occupied long before the sanctuary was raised, and the two chronologies are kept apart on this page: the settlement runs from prehistory, the building is Khmer work of the 17th to 18th Buddhist centuries.
Ku Mueang Bua stands on a low mound the village calls Don Ku, rising five or six metres above the plain at Ban Mueang Bua in Kaset Wisai. What survives of the sanctuary is one structure of laterite and sandstone, its garbhagriha built solid, with sections of the southern wall still standing and a scatter of carved architectural stone around it. Among the carvings is a relief of Indra riding the elephant Airavata — the same subject that survives at Ku Kasing, twenty-odd kilometres away across the same plain.
The dating is typological and both state bodies give the same answer. The Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre's archaeological database and the Fine Arts Department's regional article put the building in the 17th to 18th Buddhist centuries on the evidence of its architecture and its sculpture together, and the department names male and female stone figures from the site as pointing to Shaivite Hinduism. No inscription and no founding date have come from here.
The mound is the more remarkable half of the site, and it belongs to a different discipline. The archaeological site at Ban Mueang Bua, which the Sirindhorn centre records separately, is a settlement occupied from prehistory into the early historic period, with burials spanning roughly three thousand years in three distinct traditions. Villagers came across it in B.E. 2539, the Fine Arts Department excavated across B.E. 2540 to 2542, and Sukanya Baonuad worked there again in B.E. 2545; pottery, human bone, tools and ornaments came out of it. The dates the centre attaches to the settlement run from about four thousand years ago to about seven hundred.
So the honest description of Ku Mueang Bua is two things at once. A Khmer shrine of the 17th to 18th Buddhist centuries, and beneath it a burial ground that was already ancient when that shrine was raised. That sequence — prehistoric settlement, then Khmer sanctuary, then a modern Thai-Lao village on the same rise — is the pattern of the Thung Kula Ronghai plain as a whole, and Ban Mueang Bua is the place in Roi Et where the state record actually documents all three layers rather than assuming them.
One surviving sanctuary of laterite and sandstone with a solid-built garbhagriha, and sections of the southern enclosure wall still standing.
A relief of Indra riding the elephant Airavata — the same subject that survives at Ku Kasing on the same plain, which makes the two worth seeing in one trip.
Loose carved architectural stone scattered around the ruin, including worked pieces the Fine Arts Department describes as carrying designs.
The mound itself, about 200 by 250 metres and five to six metres above the surrounding fields — the shape of the settlement, and the reason the sanctuary is where it is.
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 every day, per the Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre's record for the site. No state source consulted publishes opening or closing times. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Thai nationals: free. Foreign visitors: 0 baht. |
| Dress | Not established from an official source. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | Mu 6, Ban Mueang Bua, Tambon Mueang Bua, Kaset Wisai district, on the Thung Kula Ronghai plain. It is a ruin on a village mound rather than a managed site, and reaching it needs a vehicle. |
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.
One sanctuary of laterite and sandstone, parts of the southern wall, carved stone fragments around the ruin, and a relief of Indra on the elephant Airavata. This is a ruin rather than a standing monument — if you want a Khmer building in Roi Et with its roof on, go to Prang Ku at Thawat Buri instead.
Older than the shrine by a long way. The Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre records the settlement at Ban Mueang Bua as running from prehistory into the early historic period, with burials in three distinct traditions spanning roughly three thousand years and dates reaching back about four thousand years.
12 September B.E. 2540 (1997), at Royal Gazette vol. 114, special part 80 ง, p. 4, covering about 9 rai 91.43 square wa.
No. The Sirindhorn Anthropology Centre's record states the site may be visited every day at no charge, and no state source gives a separate rate for foreign visitors.
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 Roi Et’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.