The Khmer king Jayavarman II is generally regarded as the founder of the kingdom of Angkor.

One knows only few things about the reign of this king, no inscription going back to this period not having still been found. What one could reconstitute of the achievements of the first king of the Khmer Empire of the Angkorienne period bases on the inscription of the Sdok Kok Thom, located today in Thailand, close to the border with Kampuchea, which carries the date of 1053.

This stele, capital in the Kampuchean epigraphy, states the chronology of the former sovereigns of Kampuchea, since the accession with the throne of Jayavarman II into 802 of our era, until Udayadityavarman II reigning in 1053. One finds in particular in the text of this stele, that before returning in Kampuchea, Jayavarman II spent some time, voluntarily or not besides, at the court of the kings Sailendra with Java before returning to the Kampuchea and being made proclaim king into 802.

It is Jayavarman II which at the 9th century, introduced the worship of the god-king ( devaraja ) into the Brahmanisme. From now on, the king is the representation of Shiva, the higher god of the trinity brahmanist: Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu. The sovereign must be adored like a divinity, with formal rites of which the observance, with regard to the temple of Sdok Kok Thom, was entrusted to the same family of Brahmans which will maintain them for centuries. This introduction is attested by a single information source, the stele of Sdok Kok Thom, posterior 250 years to the reign of Jayavarman II, and is confirmed by no other document. Shiva and the king-god shares the same religious symbol, the phallic Lingam.

It is generally allowed today that it is Jayavarman II which founded the first city known as Angkorienne de Hariharalaya, currently Roluos (temples of Bakong and Lolei) like capital of the Khmer empire, following the foundation of other former capitals. Concerning the stele of the temple of Sdok Kok Thom, following an erroneous interpretation, the " Central" mount; evoked in the inscription had been identified as being the temple of Bayon, which had been classified thus like shivaïte and among oldest, according to Etienne Aymonier (1906) and Etienne Lunet de Lajonquiere (1911). It is only in the years 1920-1930, with the studies of Louis Finot and Victor Gouloubew of the French School of the Far East, that the temple of Phnom Bakheng was identified with the Central Mount of the inscription. The king manufacturer of this temple of Phnom Bakheng then was identified as being Yasovarman Ier, (king from 889 to 910) and explicitly refers to Jayavarman II like founder of the first city of Angkor, Bayon being thereafter recognized like affected with the worship Buddhist and built or altered by Jayavarman VII at the end of XIIe century.

One also allots to Jayavarman II in particular the introduction of:

• choreographic Traditions Javanese, in particular of royal ballets intended to show the royal power. To offer his/her more beautiful daughter to the king was a sign of commonly allowed vassalage.
• the apotheosis of dignitaries and heroes, dead or even alive, and their assimilation with the god of their choice.