The Southeast Asian Kingdom of Cambodia, with a population of nearly 17 million, is located on the Gulf of Thailand and shares borders with Thailand, Vietnam and Laos. Cambodia is best known for its landmark Angkor Wat temple complex near present-day Siem Reap. It is the largest temple complex in the world and attracts millions of tourists from all over the world every year. Once dedicated to the Hindu gods, Khmer culture became increasingly influenced by Buddhism. To this day, Buddhism remains the predominant religion in Cambodia. Angkor was the centre of the Khmer Empire from the 9th century onward, and over the centuries grew into a megacity through advanced irrigation systems. Overgrown by jungle, Angkor was rediscovered as recently as 1860, and it was only a few years ago that researchers discovered even more huge remains of settlements through aerial laser scans, which again overturned previous estimates of Angkor's size. Researchers are nowadays speaking of up to 900,000 inhabitants at Angkor's peak - for comparison, Paris was considered the largest city in Europe in the 13th century with 100,000 inhabitants!
