Perhaps one of the least distinctive temples at the Koh Ker complex, which hosts well over fifty structures, is an anomaly because the now-ruinous Prasat Bak has given us one of its most remarkable sculptures, a substantial statue of the half-elephant half-man deity known as Ganesha, weighing in at just under 4 tons, and more than eight-feet in height. Constructed in the second quarter of the tenth century under the reign of King Jayavarman IV, the rectangular building of laterite stone, faces northeast and is hardly noticeable amongst the trees on the main access road to the complex. The front doorway had a sandstone frame while the other walls were devoid of false doors, as you can find at other single sanctuary temples. Just one wall remains standing, a second wall fell recently and the site is a series of scattered laterite blocks with a few broken colonettes lying half-submerged in the soil. As for the statue of Ganesha, here’s a story I posted recently on its return to Cambodia. The elephant-headed god Ganesha is one of the priceless Khmer artifacts that were on display at the Peace Palace in March, having recently been returned to Cambodia by USA authorities. Weighing in at just under 4 tons, and more than eight-feet-tall, this gigantic statue of the half-man half-elephant deity was sculpted in the early part of the 10th century and installed in the small laterite temple of Prasat Bak, in the complex of Koh Ker, under the watchful eye of King Jayavarman IV. And that’s where it stood for 1,000 years until looters severed the statue from its immense pedestal in the early 1990s and it disappeared into the dead of night. Fast forward to December 2004 when a substantial statue of a remarkably-similar Ganesha arrived at the Museum of Indian Art in Berlin and was given prominent display at the museum’s entrance. It was supposedly on loan from ‘an American private collection’ - actually it was from Douglas Latchford’s personal collection - and had earlier that year been included in a book, Adoration and Glory, authored by Latchford and Emma Bunker. The cover story was that even though the two statues looked almost identical, the Berlin version wore different types of necklaces, the right arm was intact, it wore a tiara and carved nipples were absent…both the figures were likely products of the same workshop it was surmised. It was also noticeable that the Berlin figure was missing both hands and the top of the trunk appeared to have been restored. As questions became more vociferous, the Ganesha was removed from display in December 2006. It was a sham. Fortunately, at the start of the 1930s, during an excavation and clearance of the Koh Ker complex, Henri Parmentier found the Ganesha statue in fragments, littering the entrance to an already very ruined Prasat Bak. He had it reassembled and put back in place inside the small sanctuary. He also took pictures of the statue in-situ in 1934. It depicted the popular Hindu god, exuding calm and comfort in a sitting position, with a human body including a pot-belly and an elephant head. He can usually be found at entrances to shrines and dwellings, with offerings made to him before beginning a new enterprise. He is the son of the god Shiva and his spouse, Parvati. As the remover of obstacles and protector of knowledge, the Indian epic, the Mahabharata, was scribed by him and when his pen failed, he broke off his tusk to finish the job. Usually you will find that part of his tusk in his right hand and maybe some sweets in the other hand. Why an elephant head? During a fit of rage his father cut off his head and to relieve his wife’s grief, he replaced the head with that of the first living creature he could find, an elephant. The Prasat Bak version was heavily decorated with body jewelry, a pleated sampot and holding both a broken tusk and a rice cake. The image and decorated pedestal were finely carved from one monumental block of sandstone. Clearly, the cover story of two identical statues was a fantasy. Latchford was the owner of the sculpture (having most likely arranged for its removal from Prasat Bak in the 1990s) and in or around April 2006, he sold it to American tech billionaire James H Clark, one of many artifacts that the collector purchased from Latchford, for a substantial sum. He was told it was one of a kind after its twin had disappeared and may’ve even been destroyed by the Khmer Rouge, one of the regular excuses churned out by Latchford to obfuscate the truth from buyers and the authorities. After Latchford’s death in 2020, the real truth came to light, Clark voluntarily handed over the Ganesha to Homeland Security in the United States and finally, the elephant-headed god has overcome all the obstacles in his path, true to his name, and has finally returned back to the kingdom. You can see it for yourself, temporarily housed at the front door of the National Museum in Phnom Penh.