Overview
The walls enclose about 218,000 square metres and more than a hundred buildings, laid out in three courts. The outer court held the government offices of a kingdom that was run from inside a palace; the middle court holds the throne halls; and the inner court was the women’s quarters, a walled town of its own with its own market and its own guards, into which no man but the king could go. Rama I built it in wood salvaged and shipped downriver from Ayutthaya, the capital the Burmese had burned fifteen years before.
Description
Within its walls stands the royal chapel Wat Phra Kaew, which houses the Emerald Buddha, the palladium of the kingdom. The largest of the throne halls is the Chakri Maha Prasat of 1882, built under King Chulalongkorn and famous for joining a European classical body to Thai spired roofs.
History and legacy
Kings ceased to reside in the palace after 1925, but royal and state ceremonies are still held within its walls. Today it is regarded as Thailand’s foremost monument and ranks among Bangkok’s most visited sites.