A Khmer sanctuary in southern Ubon Ratchathani: three brick towers standing in a north-south line on one shared laterite platform, facing east inside a rectangular laterite wall with a single gate. It was built for Shaivite worship, not for Buddhism, and the state registered it in 1936 without drawing a boundary until 1981.
ปราสาทบ้านเบ็ญ (ปราสาทหนองเบ็ญ) · Prasat Ban Ben (Prasat Nong Ben)
| Official name | ปราสาทบ้านเบ็ญ (ปราสาทหนองเบ็ญ) — Prasat Ban Ben (Prasat Nong Ben) |
|---|---|
| Where | Som Sa-at, Det Udom, Ubon Ratchathani |
| 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. 53, part 34, p. 1534, item 21 of the Ubon Ratchathani block, 27 September B.E. 2479; land boundary at vol. 98, part 104, p. 2025, 30 June B.E. 2524 Two instruments, both read by eye from the department's mirror in this run. The 1936 national ancient-monuments list, made under section 6 of the Act B.E. 2477, carries the sanctuary as item 21 of the Ubon Ratchathani block on page 1534, under the name ปราสาทหนองเบ็ญ, อำเภอเดชอุดม ตำบลสมสอาด. The boundary came forty-five years later: ประกาศกรมศิลปากร เรื่อง กำหนดเขตที่ดินโบราณสถาน, section 7 of the Act B.E. 2504, announced 27 April B.E. 2524 by เดโช สวนานนท์ and published at เล่ม ๙๘ ตอนที่ ๑๐๔ หน้า ๒๐๒๕, fixing ๕ ไร่ ๑ งาน ๙ ตารางวา at ตำบลสมสะอาด อำเภอเดชอุดม. That order's recital is the most useful sentence read in this run: it cites the 1936 instrument as เล่ม ๕๓ ตอนที่ ๓๔ วันที่ ๒๗ กันยายน ๒๔๗๙ and states that the registration หากแต่มิได้กำหนดเขตที่ดินโบราณสถาน — did not fix a land boundary. That is the third independent confirmation in this guide of the 1936 part number, which the register itself does not carry. The department's own history text miscites the same instrument as เล่ม 34, mistaking the part for the volume. |
| Coordinates | 14.787725, 104.929485 Fine Arts Department register, monument 0002090 |
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 is established and none is claimed. The department's own two datings — the sixteenth Buddhist century, and the late fifteenth to early sixteenth — differ by about half a century and both are stylistic readings from the finds rather than dates from any inscription. Nothing here was read that could narrow them.
Prasat Ban Ben stands in open country in southern Ubon Ratchathani, about eight hundred metres west of the village that gives it its name, and the name itself is the smallest and most human fact about it. The Fine Arts Department records that ben is the villagers' word for a creeper that grows by the pond near the settlement. The plant named the village; the village named the sanctuary. Both names are still in the register, which files it as ปราสาทบ้านเบ็ญ with ปราสาทหนองเบ็ญ — the Nong Ben form, after the pond — as an alternative.
What it is, is not a temple in the Thai sense and not Buddhist. The department's own record calls it a Hindu sanctuary in the Lopburi style, built to carry out the rites of the Hindu or Brahmanical religion in the Shaivite tradition, the worship of Shiva. That reading rests on objects rather than on a text: a stone panel carved with the nine planetary deities, a lintel of Indra on the three-headed Erawan, and — decisively — the pedestal in which a shivalinga stood. Along with those came potsherds, glazed and unglazed, in an ordinary local clay body, and other pieces of the building itself.
This is the ordinary case for a Khmer monument in Thailand, which is worth saying because the last province in this guide was the exception. In Nakhon Ratchasima, Prasat Hin Phimai was built for Mahayana Buddhism and never was Hindu. Here the safe assumption holds: a Shaivite foundation, with nothing in the department's record to suggest it was ever put to Buddhist use.
The plan is the thing to look at. Three brick towers stand in a line running north to south, each on its own base cut back on the twenty-indented plan in white sandstone, and all three of those bases sit on a single shared platform of laterite. They face east. The middle tower is the largest and it is the one that carried the Indra lintel; the two flanking it, north and south, are smaller and close to each other in size.
Around them runs a rectangular laterite wall, and there is exactly one gate. The gopura stands on the eastern front, on the axis of the central tower, joined to it by a laterite-paved walk. From the gopura the wings run out north and south and then turn back west, closing the rectangle. Beyond the gate to the east is the laterite base of a cruciform building; the department's reading is that its walls were open and its upper structure and roof were of timber, which is why only the base survives.
The modern history is a single dated campaign. In the budget year B.E. 2533 the Archaeology Division of the Fine Arts Department, working through its Sixth Fine Arts Unit at Phimai, excavated the sanctuary, shored it and strengthened it structurally, under the Isan Khiao programme — the Green Isan development scheme. The department's own account of the result is modest and technical: the architecture and the surrounding layout can now be read clearly, the ground is tidy, and the loose members of the gopura and the wall have been sorted into groups and laid out west of the wall so that they can be put back if any of them prove sound enough to reuse.
One correction belongs on this page because the state made it against itself. The department's history text says the sanctuary was registered in ราชกิจจานุเบกษา เล่ม 34 on 27 September B.E. 2479. Thirty-four is the part number, not the volume. The volume is 53 and the page is 1534, and the department's own boundary order of 1981 recites the citation correctly. Both documents were opened for this page and the correct citation is the one used here. BAANLYY does not represent this site and nothing here is legal or religious advice.
Three brick towers in a north-south line, each on its own base of white sandstone cut back on the twenty-indented plan, all three standing on one shared laterite platform, facing east.
The central tower, larger than the other two, which originally carried the lintel of Indra riding the three-headed Erawan.
The two flanking towers, north and south of it, smaller and close to each other in size.
The gopura on the east front, on the axis of the central tower, reached along a laterite-paved walk — and the fact that there is only one, on one side.
The rectangular laterite kamphaeng kaeo running from the gopura's wings north and south and then west, enclosing all three towers.
Outside the wall to the east, the laterite base of a cruciform building whose walls the department reads as having been open, with a timber superstructure and roof now gone.
West of the wall, the loose stones: gopura and wall members sorted into groups after the B.E. 2533 excavation and laid out for possible reuse.
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 unenclosed archaeological site rather than a working place of worship, so no ordination-hall dress rule applies. The brickwork is shored and stabilised rather than rebuilt, and it is not for climbing. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | Tambon Som Sa-at, Amphoe Det Udom, on the Nam Yuen–Det Udom road per the Fine Arts Department register, about 800 metres west of Ban Ben. No official telephone number or site office was found in this run. |
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 Fine Arts Department's own record calls it a Hindu sanctuary built for Shaivite rites — the worship of Shiva — and rests that on what was excavated: a stone panel of the nine planetary deities, a lintel of Indra on the three-headed Erawan, and the pedestal in which a shivalinga stood. It is a prasat, not a wat, and no monastery has ever stood on it. This is the ordinary case for a Khmer monument in Thailand, and the opposite of Prasat Hin Phimai in Nakhon Ratchasima, which was built for Mahayana Buddhism.
Not established, and the Fine Arts Department gives two answers in one record: about the sixteenth Buddhist century in one sentence, and the late fifteenth to early sixteenth Buddhist century in another. Both are readings from the style of the building and the objects found in it. No inscription dates the site and none is recorded there.
On 27 September B.E. 2479, as item 21 of the Ubon Ratchathani block in the national ancient-monuments list at Royal Gazette vol. 53, page 1534, under the name ปราสาทหนองเบ็ญ. That registration drew no boundary. A boundary of 5 rai 1 ngan 9 square wa was fixed forty-five years later, by an order announced on 27 April B.E. 2524 and published at vol. 98, part 104, page 2025 — and that later order says so in its own opening words. Both instruments were read from the scans for this page.
Because the Fine Arts Department's own history text for this monument says so, and it is a slip. Thirty-four is the part number of the 1936 instrument, not its volume; the volume is 53 and the page is 1534. The department's own 1981 boundary order recites it correctly as เล่ม ๕๓ ตอนที่ ๓๔ วันที่ ๒๗ กันยายน ๒๔๗๙. This page uses the correct citation and says where the error comes from.
It is a plant. The Fine Arts Department records that ben is the local name for a kind of creeper that grows at the edge of the pond near the village, that the plant gave its name to the village, and that the village gave its name to the sanctuary about eight hundred metres to the west. The alternative form of the name, Prasat Nong Ben, is after the pond rather than the settlement.
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 Ubon Ratchathani’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.