There are more than 3,600 feet of [G 05 / bas-relief] carving on the walls of the Bayon, showing scenes from fiction and from real life, from the past and the present. The whole impression of the carvings is of great movement and of scenes packed with figures. These carvings are less beautiful works of art than some other Khmer bas-reliefs, but their very hurriedly executed form and over-crowded appearance adds to their sense of real movement and energy.
On the first level, scenes from contemporary Cambodian life, similar to the ones which Chou Ta-Kuan would describe in words nearly 200 years later, cover the walls. Real [P 029 / battles] between the Chams and the Khmers are shown in gruesome detail with severed limbs littering the scene. People are shown bartering and gossiping, cooking and playing. Many of the scenes of the lives of ordinary people carved in stone at the Bayon can be seen in real life in Cambodia today, proving that little has changed in the Cambodian countryside. A circus act of dwarfs and strong men, acrobats and tightrope walkers is shown in detail with an audience watching from a terrace, just as the royal court would have watched shows in the Royal Plaza from the Royal Terrace. [G 01 / Asparas], less delicately carved than at Angkor Wat, dance up the columns of the temple's galleries.
