An excavation pit in the grounds of a village temple at Ban Chiang, left open under a shelter with the skeletons and pots where they were found. The Fine Arts Department calls it the first open-air museum in Thailand, and it is the fourth of the five parts of the Ban Chiang National Museum.
วัดโพธิ์ศรีใน · Wat Pho Si Nai
| Official name | วัดโพธิ์ศรีใน — Wat Pho Si Nai |
|---|---|
| Where | Ban Chiang, Nong Han, Udon Thani |
| 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. 115, special part 4 ง, p. 1, 14 January B.E. 2541 ประกาศกรมศิลปากร เรื่อง ขึ้นทะเบียนและกำหนดเขตที่ดินโบราณสถาน, made under section 7 of the Act on Ancient Monuments B.E. 2504, announced ๑๑ กันยายน พ.ศ. ๒๕๔๐ by ภิรมย์ จีนะเจริญ as Deputy Director-General acting for the Director-General and published at เล่ม ๑๑๕ ตอนพิเศษ ๔ ง หน้า ๑ on ๑๔ มกราคม ๒๕๔๑. It is a two-item instrument for Udon Thani: item 1 is โบราณสถานอาคารราชินูทิศ in the provincial town at ๑๑ ไร่ ๒ งาน ๕๖ ตารางวา, and item 2 is โบราณสถานหลุมขุดค้นโบราณคดีวัดโพธิ์ศรีใน ตำบลบ้านเชียง อำเภอหนองหาน at ๒ ไร่ ๒ งาน ๑ ตารางวา. Read by eye from the scan. What is registered is the excavation pit, not the temple; the register's row is coded status 5 and its list of registered elements has one entry, หลุมขุดค้นทางโบราณคดี. |
| Coordinates | 17.408807, 103.243471 Fine Arts Department register, monument 0002477 |
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 department's own record disagrees with itself on the first date. The opening line of its history text reads กองโบราณคดีกรมศิลปากร (พ.ศ.2525) ได้ทำการขุดค้น — the Archaeology Division excavated in B.E. 2525 — and four lines later the same text says the first excavation was in B.E. 2515, which is also the year given in the department's own published page for this monument. Ten years apart, in one paragraph. Nothing read here resolves it and this page prints both.
Wat Pho Si Nai is an ordinary working temple in the village of Ban Chiang, in Amphoe Nong Han. What makes it a registered national monument is a rectangle of ground in its compound, about two and a half rai, where the earth was taken away and never put back.
The Fine Arts Department's Archaeology Division dug here, and rather than backfilling and carrying the finds to a museum it left the burials where they lay: human skeletons with the pottery, tools and metal objects that had been placed with them, in the soil layers that hold them. Between B.E. 2530 and 2531 the department built a roof over the whole thing and opened it. The Tourism Authority of Thailand, describing the five parts of the Ban Chiang National Museum, calls this fourth part พิพิธภัณฑ์กลางแจ้งแห่งแรกในประเทศไทย — the first open-air museum in Thailand.
The date of the first dig is the one thing the record is unreliable about, and the unreliability is the department's own. Its register entry opens by saying the division excavated here in B.E. 2525 and built the shelter in 2530–2531. Four lines later the same entry says the first excavation was in B.E. 2515, and adds that the King and Queen came to look at the work. The department's public page for the monument gives 2515. A visitor is unlikely to care; a reference that quietly picked one would be pretending to know.
What is not in doubt is the sequence after that: a second campaign in B.E. 2535 to open the pit up and dress it for display, repairs to the building and the grounds in B.E. 2540, registration with a delimited boundary on 14 January B.E. 2541, and care since then by the Ban Chiang National Museum a short walk away. The instrument that registered it also registered the Rachinuthi Building in the provincial town, which is a school building and not a temple, in the same two-item announcement.
The obvious question about a site at Ban Chiang is whether it is inside the World Heritage property, and the honest answer is that no source read for this page says. UNESCO inscribed the Ban Chiang Archaeological Site in 1992 under criterion (iii); the property is 30 hectares with a buffer zone of 760, and UNESCO's own description says the excavation site is protected by a secured shelter with a site museum nearby — which sounds exactly like this place and names nothing. ONEP publishes a coordinate for the property that sits about six hundred metres west of the Fine Arts Department's coordinate for this pit, and thirty hectares is a small circle. So the field is null, and a reader who wants the badge should look for the nomination map rather than take it from here.
One correction worth making while we are on the subject. The Tourism Authority's page for the Ban Chiang National Museum says the inscription was made in December B.E. 2535 ณ เมืองคาร์เทจ ประเทศตูนีเซีย — at Carthage, Tunisia. The 16th session of the World Heritage Committee, at which Ban Chiang was inscribed, was held at Santa Fe in the United States from 7 to 14 December 1992. Carthage hosted a session, but in 1979. BAANLYY does not represent this temple and nothing here is legal or religious advice.
The pit itself, open under its roof: human skeletons lying where they were excavated, with the pottery and metal objects buried alongside them, in the soil layers that contained them.
The stratigraphy — the point of leaving it open is that you can see the depths the burials sit at rather than a case of objects with a label.
The building over it, put up in B.E. 2530–2531, repaired in B.E. 2540, and described by the Tourism Authority as the first open-air museum in the country.
The rest of the Ban Chiang National Museum a short walk away: the Somdet Phra Sri Nakharinthra Boromratchachonnani service building, the Kanlayaniwatthana exhibition building with nine permanent sections, the Tai Phuan exhibition, and the Tai Phuan house that the King and Queen visited on 20 March B.E. 2515 and whose owner later gave it and its land to the Fine Arts Department.
The temple around the pit, which is a working village wat and not a display.
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 | Wednesday to Sunday, 09.00–16.00, as published by the Tourism Authority of Thailand for the Ban Chiang National Museum, of which this pit is the fourth part. Closed Monday and Tuesday. |
|---|---|
| Admission | Thai nationals: 30 baht. Foreign visitors: 200 baht. |
| Dress | The pit is inside a working temple compound. Shoulders and knees covered, and the burials are human remains rather than exhibits. |
| Photography | No source we found states a rule, so we print none. |
| Getting there | Thanon Sutthiphong, Ban Chiang, Amphoe Nong Han, Udon Thani 41320, per the Tourism Authority's address for the museum, which gives a telephone number of 0 4223 5040-1 and lists parking on site. |
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.
An excavation left open. Rather than lifting the finds and backfilling, the Fine Arts Department kept the burials in place — human skeletons with the pots, tools and metal objects buried with them, at the depths they were found — and built a roof over the trench. The Tourism Authority of Thailand, listing the five parts of the Ban Chiang National Museum, calls this fourth part the first open-air museum in Thailand.
It is in Ban Chiang, and no source read for this page says whether it is inside the inscribed property. UNESCO listed the Ban Chiang Archaeological Site in 1992 under criterion (iii), with a property of 30 hectares and a buffer zone of 760, and its description refers to an excavation site protected by a secured shelter with a site museum nearby without naming either. ONEP's published coordinate for the property is roughly six hundred metres from the Fine Arts Department's coordinate for this pit. Thirty hectares is a small area, so the honest answer is that this page does not know and will not claim it.
Either B.E. 2515 or B.E. 2525, and the disagreement is inside a single Fine Arts Department record. Its history text opens with 2525 and then says four lines later that the first excavation was in 2515, when the King and Queen came to see the work; the department's own public page for the monument gives 2515. The dates that are not disputed are the shelter of B.E. 2530–2531, the second campaign of 2535, the repairs of 2540 and the registration of 14 January 2541.
The Fine Arts Department dates the prehistoric material here to roughly 5,600 to 1,800 years before the present, and gives the same range on its own page for the monument. The department's broader survey excavations at Ban Chiang are dated to B.E. 2517–2518.
The Tourism Authority publishes Wednesday to Sunday, 09.00–16.00 for the Ban Chiang National Museum, with admission of 30 baht for Thai nationals and 200 baht for foreign visitors and a telephone number of 0 4223 5040-1. Those figures are for the museum, of which this pit is the fourth of five parts; no separate figure for the pit alone is published by any state source read here.
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 Udon Thani’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.