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<< Our Photo Pages >> The Plain of Jars - Ancient Mine, Quarry or other Industry in Laos

Submitted by Andy B on Friday, 24 July 2020  Page Views: 12941

Multi-periodSite Name: The Plain of Jars Alternative Name: Ban Ang, Site No. 1
Country: Laos Type: Ancient Mine, Quarry or other Industry
Nearest Town: Phonsavan
Latitude: 19.333300N  Longitude: 103.366700E
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
4 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
2 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
1 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
2

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I have visited· I would like to visit

baz visited on 30th Nov 2022 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 4 Access: 3

ModernExplorers visited on 20th Aug 2008 - their rating: Cond: 3 Amb: 5 Access: 3 A fantastic site, one of my favourites. Fields and fields of jar shaped rocks, you can visit many of them on a tour from Phonsaven

DrewParsons Andy B have visited here

Average ratings for this site from all visit loggers: Condition: 3.5 Ambience: 4.5 Access: 3

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by Andy B : Site in Laos. Image credit: Chris Mitchell (Vote or comment on this photo)
The Plain of Jars is famous for its huge stone vessels, ranging in height from 1.5 to three metres tall, These remarkable stone receptacles can occur individually, or in groups running to several hundred. While the most-famous set was arranged on the plain (hence the name), most jars can be found perched on ridges and hills, with some still shrouded by forest. All the signs are that these vessels were associated with funerary activity, but the communities responsible for them remain mysterious.

The breeze is cool and redolent of mountain pine. The landscape verdant and vast, a series of rolling hills stretching all the way to the horizons. If it weren't for the paddy fields, a sea of sun-ripened sheaves of grain swaying gently in the wind, one could be forgiven for thinking one was on an upland meadow somewhere in New Zealand. Then one notices women wearing brightly coloured pa sin (tubular sarongs) and small herds of water buffalo grazing here and there and one remembers that one is actually in the Lao People's Democratic Republic.

Welcome to a particularly remote corner of this landlocked country, to the northeastern province of Xiang Khouang, where such bucolic scenes of plenty are commonplace. Located as it is at an elevation of around 1,000 metres above sea level, the weather here is never oppressively hot, the smiling locals never in too much of a hurry to stop and chat.

But tourists come here neither for the picture-postcard views nor for the idyllic temperatures. And most stay only for as long as it takes to get a good look at the ancient stone jars scattered in great numbers across this plateau. For we are - you've guessed correctly - on the Plain of Jars, famous for huge stone vessels, ranging in height from 1.5 to three metres, whose original purpose remains a mystery to this day.

According to one local legend these enormous receptacles were hollowed from blocks of stone in order to ferment an alcoholic concoction for consumption at the mass celebration of a great military victory thousands of years ago. Once upon a time (the story goes), there lived an evil king called Chao Angka who oppressed his subjects so terribly that they appealed to Khun Jeuang, a good-natured monarch who reigned to the north, to come and liberate them. In the great battle that ensued, Khun Jeuang's army defeated the forces of Chao Angka and then marked their success with an orgy of drinking. And it must have been some session indeed, since one of these vessels could probably hold enough liquor to get an entire village intoxicated!

Archaeologists have come up with a more sober theory - but no supporting evidence, alas - to the effect that the jars are actually coffins, perhaps as much as 2,000 years old. Which would make them one of the oldest archeological finds in Southeast Asia, artefacts that have survived the attention of looters, the ravages of time and the elements and countless American bombs.

Some seven kilometres from Phonsavan, the provincial capital, lies the principal jar site. Known as Ban Ang or sometimes simply as Site No. 1, it contains more than 300 of these gargantuan vessels. The other two main sites are only a few kilometres away.

During the so-called Secret War, waged from 1953 to 1975 by the US and its allies, some 580,000 bombing raids were flown over Laos, dropping in excess of two tons of high explosive for every man, woman and child resident in the country at that time. Cluster bombs, rockets, artillery shells and anti-aircraft rounds rained down on more than 87,000 square kilometres of this tiny country. Falling on bogs, waterlogged rice fields and forests, nearly a third of these failed to detonate, but this UXO (unexploded ordnance) continues to kill and maim hundreds of unwary people each year.

So roaming at will around the Plain of Jars is not recommended. Take a stroll around the streets of Phonsavan, though, and you'll see plenty of recycled bomb casings put to a variety of ingenious uses. More glaring evidence of the war can be seen in the town of Khoun, some 30km away, where the damage to the principal Buddha image and ubosot at Wat Phia remains unrepaired.

Forgotten for many decades amid the chaos and conflict which swept this remote corner of Laos, Xiang Khouang is today welcoming tourists back to view its unique mix of natural and man-made wonders.

Source: Bankok Post

IMPORTANT NOTE: Location not totally accurate

VERY VERY IMPORTANT NOTE: Possible Unexploded bombs in the area, take extreme caution!


Note: New research into the megalithic structures on the Plain of Jars in Laos. Radiocarbon dates and evidence some of these 30 tonne structures were brought from a quarry 8km away. More in the comments on our page.
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The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by Andy B : Site in Laos. Image credit: Chris Mitchell (Vote or comment on this photo)

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by ModernExplorers : Some of the jars had lids (Vote or comment on this photo)

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by ModernExplorers : Another set of jars (Vote or comment on this photo)

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by ModernExplorers : (Vote or comment on this photo)

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by ModernExplorers : Some of the Jars were huge

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by DrewParsons : Photos courtesy my pal Alan Addison (pictured here) who has just returned from a visit to the site and gave permission for them to be posted on Megalithic Portal. August 2016.

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by ModernExplorers : There were carvings on some of the jars, this was the clearest I could find

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by ModernExplorers : There were different areas with Jars, here you can see one close up and more in the distance

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by DrewParsons : Photos courtesy my pal Alan Addison who has just returned from a visit to the site and gave permission for them to be posted on Megalithic Portal. August 2016

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by DrewParsons : Photos courtesy my pal Alan Addison who has just returned from a visit to the site and gave permission for them to be posted on Megalithic Portal. August 2016.

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by DrewParsons

The Plain of Jars
The Plain of Jars submitted by DrewParsons

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"The Plain of Jars" | Login/Create an Account | 8 News and Comments
  
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Re: The Plain of Jars - Researching a newly inscribed World Heritage Site by Andy B on Friday, 24 July 2020
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Numerous sets of massive stone jars have been discovered in Laos. The most-famous site is at Ban Hai Hin, where the jar placements include this set (Group 2), which was arranged in a crescent shape around a cave.

Clusters of massive stone jars in Laos have inspired considerable curiosity. Little is known about the people who fashioned them, while even the date they were created has not been conclusively resolved. Louise Shewan, Dougald O’Reilly, and Thonglith Luangkhoth explain what research is revealing about these mysterious megaliths.

The breathtaking, mountainous, and forested landscape of northern Laos conceals one of South-east Asia’s most mysterious and least understood archaeological cultures, known primarily for the massive stone jars they left behind. The megalithic jar sites of Laos comprise 1m- to 3m-tall carved stone jars scattered across the landscape, appearing alone or in clusters of up to several hundred. To date, it has been thought they are related to the funerary rituals of an elusive, powerful, and expansive group that existed during the Iron Age (c.500 BC-AD 500) – a dynamic period with evidence for increasing social and political complexity. The sites were brought to the attention of Western scholars by visitors and surveyors from as early as the late 1800s

In 2016, an international Lao–Australian team conducted excavation and survey at Ban Hai Hin (Site 1), creating a detailed inventory of the stone jars, burial-marker boulders, and sandstone discs. Each megalith was accurately geolocated, while their appearance and state of preservation were carefully registered to aid ongoing conservation measures.

Radiocarbon dating of charcoal samples produced dates spanning 8200 BC to AD 1200, with the majority suggesting that activity around the Group 2 jars occurred between the 9th and 13th centuries AD, making it considerably more recent than the Iron Age dates previously reported for the site. However, only one of these dates (AD 1163-1125) was produced by material retrieved from beneath a jar, so further evidence is needed to confirm their exact date of placement, as the burial activity is not necessarily contemporary with when the jars were installed.

Another vexing issue is how such massive megaliths, some weighing in excess of 30 tonnes, were transported from their quarry across the rolling landscape. A soon-to-be-published geochronological study of jars from Site 1 has confirmed that they probably came from a quarry at Phukeng, some 8km away. This raises several, as-yet unanswered questions related to the method of megalith movement. Possibilities include the completed vessels being hauled from the quarry using a rolling pulley system or perhaps drawn by elephants or buffalo, but whatever the solution, or solutions, manoeuvring the megaliths was clearly a significant logistical and organisational undertaking.

Read More at Current World Archaeology
https://www.world-archaeology.com/features/plain-of-jars/

[ Reply to This ]

Re: The Plain of Jars by Anonymous on Sunday, 05 April 2015
mast/axis / pole/beam and rod/ribs for a tripod strapped set of woven and turned fibre (cloth and rope) are sufficient to set up a rock spinning atop another in the wind reliably by themselves, within a decade they would have worn perfectly round holes in the ones they are hoisted and kept swiveling upon ... if an old volcanic cone such as this vid
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfgrjLNKL5g
shows the 20th minute had any minerals - http://www.remineralize.org - worth growing with, they would not hesisate to do some hauling .. in both chunky and fine form ... voila .. solved
[ Reply to This ]

Re: The Plain of Jars by coldrum on Sunday, 23 October 2011
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Understanding the mysterious Plain of Jars

Often referred to as a south-east Asian version of Stonehenge, the Plain of Jars is one of the most enigmatic sights on Earth. Shrouded in both mystery and myth, this place has fascinated archaeologists and scientists ever since its discovery in the 1930s.



Thousands of giant stone jars are scattered around the Xieng Khouang plain in Laos and form one of the most bizarre archaeological collections, appearing in clusters and ranging from a single jar to several hundred, on the lower foothills surrounding the central plain and upland valleys.

Excavation by Lao and Japanese archaeologists in the intervening years has supported the conclusion that these were funeral megaliths, with the discovery of human remains, burial goods and ceramics found in association with the stone jars. The Plain of Jars is dated to the Iron Age (500 BCE to 500 CE) and is one of the most fascinating and important sites for studying Southeast Asian prehistory.
The most dangerous site in the world?

So far, archaeologist Julie Van Den Bergh – who works for UNESCO – has counted over 3,000 jars scattered across 90 sites in Xieng Khouang province and until further survey is possible there is no absolute count. Each jar is up to 3 metres tall and weighs several tons, often made of sandstone, but also of harder granite and limestone. She works with mine clearance teams set up by Manchester-based Mines Advisory Group (Mag) who launched a project to make the area safe, in one of the most dangerous archaeological sites in the world. The last remains of an ancient civilisation are often close to craters and unexploded US ordnance.


In this unusual collaboration, UNESCO archaeologists work alongside the clearance team and at one site they were able to recover 87 bags of artefacts, including pottery, bone fragments and charcoal.

We were very excited about finding charcoal as it can be dated and hopefully provide us with a more precise date for the Plain of Jars

Julie van den Bergh, said: “We were very excited about finding charcoal as it can be dated and hopefully provide us with a more precise date for the Plain of Jars.”

Because the jars have lip rims, it is presumed that all of them were originally covered with lids and although a few stone lids have been recorded it is more likely that the main material used was wood or ratan. Stone lids with animal representations have been noticed at few sites such as Ban Phake.
Making a difference

UNESCO are currently in phase IV of it’s programme for this fascinating site. A series of interpretative materials is being produced in consultation with the indigenous communities.



A final outcome for this part of the project will be the construction and outfitting of a visitor resource centre to provide general information and site interpretation.

It is hoped that this enigmatic site will become one that can be shared with visitors without losing it’s sense of mystery.



UNESCO website for the Plain of Jars and Safeguarding the Plain of Jars Project

Baldock, J and J. Van Den Bergh 2009. Geological Mysteries at the Plain of Jars begin to unravel. Geology Today. August 2009.

Karen J. Coates, 2005, Plain of Jars, Volume 58 Number 4, July/August 2005

Box, P. 2003, Safeguarding the Plain of Jars: Megaliths and Unexploded Ordinance in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic. ESRI, Journal of GIS in Archaeology, Volume 1-April 2003.
http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/09/2011/understanding-the-mysterious-plain-of-jars#ixzz1YUBj8GVP
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Re: The Asian Stonehenge: The Mysterious Plain of Jars by AngieLake on Thursday, 10 June 2010
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"An ancient mystery unfolds scattered across Laos’s Xieng Khouang plain. Known as the Plain of Jars, this bizarre archaeological collection of thousands of giant stone jars made from sandstone, granite and calcified coral is often referred to as an “Asian version of Stonehenge.”"

(Excerpt from brief 'Weird Asia News' article, with three good photographs and a ref to a visitor site, that popped up on my Google 'Stonehenge' search today. I am sure Andy will love this 'yet *another* comparison' to 'Stonehenge'!)
;-)

Link to article here:
http://www.weirdasianews.com/2010/06/09/asian-stonehenge-mysterious-plain-jars/

(NB: This is not a site for the faint-hearted visitor!):

"During the 1960s and 1970s, more bombs were dropped on Laos than any other country in the history of mankind. The stone jars bore their own battle scars from the different impacts in the form of cracks in their formations and giant craters formed between them."

"The Plain of Jars no doubt would receive more tourists if not for the fact that more than 30% of the bombshells dropped did not explode on contact and are still buried all around the area. It is estimated that as many as 250,000 hidden booby-traps still remain and it is reported that accidents happen almost weekly.

Perhaps one day we will unravel the fascinating enigma of the Plain of Jars.

Until then…watch your step!"
[ Reply to This ]
    Re: The Asian Stonehenge: The Mysterious Plain of Jars by Andy B on Thursday, 10 June 2010
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    > Asian version of Stonehenge

    Noooooooooooooooooooo :-)
    (sound of me metaphorically jumping off something)

    Good find though
    [ Reply to This ]

Iron Age discovery uncovers prehistoric burial customs in Laos by Andy B on Sunday, 14 February 2010
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The discovery of Iron Age human bone fragments in Laos has shed new light on the region's prehistoric burial customs, state media reports said Friday. A team of Lao and foreign archeologists foundthe fragments last week in a burial ground believed to be about 2,000 years old when South-East Asia was in the Iron Age, the Vientiane Times reported.

The discovery was made during a dig known as the Middle Mekong Archaeological Project, which is a joint effort between Laos' Department of Heritage and the University of Pennsylvania Museum in the United States.

"Last week, we unexpectedly found two skulls and a fragment of a third, a baby, along with some body bones," said Joyce White, associate curator at the University of Pennsylvania Museum. "It is quite a significant discovery of Lao archaeology."

Also among the items found was a burial pot containing human bones, which was the first such example of a secondary burial, or the custom of dismembering a corpse and removing all flesh so the bones could be placed in a container.

Although the practice was common in neighbouring Thailand and Vietnam, this was the first evidence of a secondary burial in what is now Laos.

The project is funded by the Henry Luce Foundation.

http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/305145,iron-age-discovery-uncovers-prehistoric-burial-customs-in-laos.html
[ Reply to This ]

Re: The Plain of Jars by Andy B on Wednesday, 03 February 2010
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I found some great photos of some of the jars here:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2370071/posts
http://travelhappy.info/laos/the-plain-of-jars-laos/
[ Reply to This ]

Re: The Plain of Jars by Runemage on Friday, 25 December 2009
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"Archaeologists have come up with a more sober theory - but no supporting evidence, alas - to the effect that the jars are actually coffins, perhaps as much as 2,000 years old. "

Not according to this...
"In the 1930s, French archeologist Madeline Colani documented the jars in a 600-page monograph, The Megaliths of Upper Laos, She discovered some jars contained bronze and iron tools, and bracelets, along with cowry shells and glass beads, while the rest appeared to have been looted, and concluded that they were funeral urns carved by a vanished Bronze Age people. This theory has been strengthened by the more recent discovery of underground burial chambers. "

http://plainofjars.net/caves.htm

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