Wat Chet Yot

About

Wat Chet Yot, formally Wat Photharam Maha Wihan, stands northwest of Chiang Mai's old city. Its Thai name means 'seven-spired Temple', a direct reference to the seven slender chedi that crown its principal sanctuary. The wat holds particular significance as a place of pilgrimage for devotees born under the zodiacal sign of the Snake.

King Tilokarat commissioned the Temple in 1455 CE after sending monks to study the design of the Mahabodhi Temple at Bagan, itself a Burmese reflection of the original Mahabodhi at Bodh Gaya, where the Buddha is said to have attained enlightenment. The king planted a bodhi tree on the site that same year, and in 1476 raised a larger sanctuary for the celebration commemorating two thousand years of the Buddha Sasana.

The following year, the Temple hosted the eighth Buddhist World Council, convened to renew the Tripitaka. The central Maha Pho wihan, with its pyramid-like central spire surrounded by four smaller pyramidal spires and two bell-shaped chedis upon the side annexes, recalls its Indian model. Its exterior bears seventy stucco reliefs of devas, whose faces tradition holds were modelled on relatives of King Tilokarat.

A barrel-vaulted corridor leads through the central building to a Buddha image. Across the grounds, Lanna-style chedis hold the ashes of King Tilokarat, and a square mondop near the southern pond shelters a Buddha protected by the naga Mucalinda.

History

King Tilokarat founded the wat in 1455 after sending monks to study the Mahabodhi Temple at Bagan in Burma, itself built in the image of the original Mahabodhi at Bodh Gaya where the Buddha attained enlightenment. The Jinakalamali chronicle records that the king planted a bodhi tree on the site that same year and raised a larger sanctuary in 1476, most likely for the festival marking two thousand years of the Buddha Sasana, and the following year the wat hosted the eighth Buddhist World Council convened to renew the Tripitaka. The largest of the Lanna-style chedis scattered through the grounds today holds King Tilokarat's own cremated remains.

Significance

The central sanctuary's seven pyramidal spires, rising from a windowless brick hall and ringed by seventy weathered stucco reliefs of devas said to bear the faces of the king's own relatives, make the wat unlike any other Temple in Chiang Mai and a direct link to the Indian ground where the Buddha sat beneath the bodhi tree. Lanna tradition holds this wat as the pilgrimage Temple for devotees born in the year of the Snake, who come to pay respect at the chedi housing King Tilokarat's remains.

Architecture

Lanna Buddhist architecture modelled on the Mahabodhi Temple of Bodh Gaya via Bagan, Burma; a seven-spired brick sanctuary alongside later Lanna-style bell chedis