Talks for a new museum featuring Phum Snay artefacts

A Japanese archaeologist is in talks with the Cambodian government to set up a museum for the display of the artefacts unearthed at the pre-Angkoran site of Phum Snay. The excavation has already uncovered over 47 burials so far including the famous so-called “warrior women“.

Museum planned for ancient artefacts stored in Siem Reap
Phnom Penh Post, 07 May 2009

Japanese archaeologist Miyatsuka Yoshito is returning to Siem Reap this month with the aim of creating a museum for the artefacts he unearthed at Phum Snay, in Banteay Meanchey.

Despite being heavily looted when it was first discovered in 1999 by road workers, the Phum Snay excavation site has proffered numerous skeletons and pots that are estimated to be over 2,000 years old. Yoshito is leading a research team on a five-year excavation of the site, which began in 2007, and is supported by the Japanese government.

The team has uncovered 47 burials since 2007 and the artefacts they have exhumed so far are stored in plastic tubs sitting on the floor of dig manager Sophia’s Siem Reap office. But Yoshito wants to give the artefacts a more dignified home behind glass displays in a museum.