ancient Khmer legend of controlling water

There's a old saying " if you control the water you control the resources"
In Cambodia, there is a legend about the ancient Khmer civilization using magic to control the water.

So i did some research and here what i find.

Ancient Khmer empire, had over 1000 man-made canals, ponds, and moats. remember this was before the invention water pumping system.
www.sciencedaily.com...

The team discovered more than 1000 man-made ponds and at least 74 more temple sites in the Angkor region, revealing ruins covering an area of 1000 square kilometres.

Here's a satellite view of the ancient Khmer capital call Angkor Thom. You can almost clearly see all the ancient canal, moat and pond made by the Khmer


Here's is a closer view of some of it

www.nasa.gov...

It's not flowing uphill.
Just because it reverses direction, that does not imply that it defies the laws of gravity.

My guess without too much research is that the river is particularly flat and is forced to flow to the lowest level of water which is sometimes the ocean when there is lots of water and the other way when there isn't enough water to push it to sea.

reply to post by pirhanna



then how you explain the river rise parallel to the growth of the rice field so it wont over flooded the food supply , how do you explain it flowing northwest toward the capital if it randomly nature phenomenon it should flow random different direction every years and it only happened on the dry season when the capital need water the most.
To me this is a sign of controlling, too many coincidence

you mention it probably force to go the lowest level but then how do you explain during the wet season the river change it direction again and flow it normal direction southward into the ocean?

Originally posted by PoorGrammar

how do you explain it flowing northwest toward the capital if it randomly nature phenomenon it should flow random different direction every years and it only happened on the dry season when the capital need water the most.

Because the resivoirs around the capitol would be at lower levels during the dry season,
making them look "downhill" from the river.

Originally posted by PoorGrammar

then how you explain the river rise parallel to the growth of the rice field so it wont over flooded the food supply ,

The rate of water flow can becontroled by the size of opening.
I too would adjust the rate so it wouldn't drown the crops.


David Grouchy

isnt this how the great khmer empire city of angkor, which was bigger than new york city, infrastructure fell?

maybe thats the next target in america, the water supply

Umm , the mekong does not reverse its flow at all . An adjacent flood plain lake, the tonle sap, fills when the mekong is in flood stage, and outflows during the dry season. It's very much like the now drained Great tulare lake in central California' s san joaquin valley. During the flood season the kings and san joaquin rivers would over flow their channels and fill adjacent wetlands(sloughs) and flow into a huge shallow depression in the center of the valley. Then it would flow back out as river levels dropped.

The Tonlé Sap is unusual for two reasons: its flow changes direction twice a year, and the portion that forms the lake expands and shrinks dramaticallywith the seasons. From November to May, Cambodia's dry season, the Tonlé Sap drains into the Mekong River at Phnom Penh. However, when the year's heavy rains begin in June, the Tonlé Sap backs up to form an enormous lake

The source

en.m.wikipedia.org...