Material and structural transformations and the basis for selecting conservation interventions for Khmer pagodas in Southwestern Vietnam

Abstract

Khmer pagodas in Southwestern Vietnam remain in religious use while buildings and materials are repaired or replaced. This study reanalyses 20 purposively selected cases from an existing 100-pagoda survey to compare documented building histories with recorded technological and material assessments. The shared dataset contains 58 criteria, including six in group G, with five rating columns per case. The recorded G mean remains 3.72/5, with case means of 2.87–4.50. Among the four cases coded for high ensemble intervention, three have specified accounts of reinforced-concrete rebuilding (G = 3.50), post-fire reconstruction (4.07) and new construction (2.97). Hàng Còng, the fourth (3.37), has only a register mention of repainting with unresolved scope. These scores do not identify a common intervention category. The original form does not establish a consistent direction for G3 and G6. Omitting them raises the sample mean to 4.00, but lowers it in three cases; this is a sensitivity scenario rather than a corrected measure of fabric loss. Separate checks exclude university-affiliated and Kampong Speu-labelled columns, with remaining counts reported for every case. The additional contribution comprises complete case reporting, these sensitivity checks and a record of the component evidence needed for each conditional intervention option. The resulting distinctions concern documented histories and evidence requirements, not regional defect prevalence, structural safety or validated numerical thresholds.