Now this was perhaps the lady’s intention.  Nagas rarely emerged from their aquatic habitat except to meet humans.  In any case, she agreed to marry the human prince. Her father, who was ruler of all the land and all the waters, also agreed to the match. To provide the human immigrants with land to cultivate and live on, Shesha drank much of the lake’s water, so the lake shrank to its present size.  Vast stretches of land fell dry and soon were populated by people.

Successive generations of the kings of Cambodia all claimed descent from this original union of the immigrant prince and the Naga princess.  Indeed, every Cambodian king was believed to maintain the country’s prosperity by uniting mystically with the queen of the waters.  Without this regular intercourse, there would be no water on the earth and no rice for the people.  A tower was reserved in the palace precinct for the nightly meetings between the king and his divine consort, and a nine-headed serpent, the image of Shesha, became the emblem of Cambodia, the land of lakes and rivers.

Eight Brahmans from famine-ridden Klonka solicit the aid of King Vesandar, an incarnation of Puthisath, the Cambodian Buddha.

Further tales of Cambodia’s origin

By the early Middle Ages, Cambodia was a well-established kingdom (physically larger than the modern country) with an advanced culture and literature. Its written works profoundly influenced both Siamese and Laotian literatures.  The oldest known inscriptions date from the eighth century A.D., with some composed in Sanskrit (praising the kings as incarnations of the gods Vishnu or Shiva) and others in Old Cambodian. Two literary texts, written on palm leaves long after their composition, recount significant oral traditions.  They are the mythical cosmology Trai Phet (or Triveda in Sanskrit) and the epic Ream Kirti, the exploits of Rama (the ancient Indian hero who is also an incarnation of Vishnu). Libraries in Cambodian monasteries are also filled with Pali manuscripts dealing with the three major disciplines of Buddhist lore: abhidhamma (metaphysics), vinaya (doctrine), and sutta (rules of life).  Many of these texts have been translated into Khmer (Cambodian) with numerous commentaries added.

The authors of these Pali didactic texts frequently end with admonitions for the reader to curb his earthly desires and pray to seek refuge with the Lord Buddha as living protector of the world, with the Dhamma (eternal law) and Sangha (worldwide community of Buddhist devotees).