Qualla: That Sikhottabong

That Sikhottabong: Introduction

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nomad Tales from Australia, CC BY-SA 2.0. Three stupas stand within a hundred kilometres of one another along the middle Mekong, and all three make the same enormous claim: that somewhere inside the brickwork lies a physical piece of the Buddha. One is That Inhang at Savannakhet. One is Wat Phra That Phanom, on the Thai bank. The third rises from a riverside terrace just south of Thakhek in Laos, whitewashed and gilded, its spire tapering into a shape that Lao builders describe as a banana flower. It is called That Sikhottabong, and it is named for a kingdom that most people have never heard of.

Read more: That Sikhottabong on Qualla

Image: Nomad Tales from Australia | CC BY-SA 2.0

That Sikhottabong: Sri Gotapura

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dragfyre, CC BY-SA 3.0. Long before Lan Xang, before Vientiane meant anything, this stretch of the Mekong held a cluster of loosely connected city-states — Fa Daet in what is now Kalasin, Muang Sua at Luang Prabang, Chantaburi where Vientiane stands today, and near present-day Thakhek a place called Sri...

Read more: That Sikhottabong on Qualla

Image: Dragfyre | CC BY-SA 3.0

That Sikhottabong: Built for a King

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Torbenbrinker, CC BY-SA 3.0. The founding story is a royal one, told the way such stories usually are. King Nanthasene raised the stupa for King Soummitham, and the relics of the Buddha are said to have been consecrated within it. Whether the archaeology supports the legend is a question the legend has never...

Read more: That Sikhottabong on Qualla

Image: Torbenbrinker | CC BY-SA 3.0

That Sikhottabong: Setthathirath's Century

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Tango7174, CC BY-SA 4.0. The building you see now is not the original. That Sikhottabong was refurbished in the sixteenth century under King Setthathirath, who ruled Lan Xang from 1548 to 1571 and left more monuments behind him than almost any Lao monarch since. He moved the capital from Luang Prabang to...

Read more: That Sikhottabong on Qualla

Image: Tango7174 | CC BY-SA 4.0

That Sikhottabong: The Banana Flower

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Torbenbrinker, CC BY-SA 3.0. The stupa rises to 29 metres on a square, tiered base, and the detail that visitors remember is the finial — the pinnacle narrows and swells into a form deliberately modelled on the bud of a banana flower, a motif drawn from the plant that grows in every village yard in Laos. Whi...

Read more: That Sikhottabong on Qualla

Image: Torbenbrinker | CC BY-SA 3.0

That Sikhottabong: The Third Month

Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Torbenbrinker, CC BY-SA 3.0. The great festival at That Sikhottabong falls in the third month of the lunar calendar, when pilgrims arrive to circle the stupa, offer candles and alms, and stay for the fair that grows up around any Lao temple festival worth attending. Nothing about the stupa's permanence shoul...

Read more: That Sikhottabong on Qualla

Image: Torbenbrinker | CC BY-SA 3.0