Wat Phra Thong, visit Phuket, read the history of Luang Pho Phra Phut. Really amazing half a Buddha image emerges from the ground. its located in Thalang District a short distance from the city. The old temple there is an ancient Buddha statue a half body emerges from the ground. There is also a story that when King Bodawpaya came to attack Thalang, he tried to dig up the Buddha statue but was unsuccessful.
Luang Pho Phra Thong (Phra Phut) is a golden Buddha statue that has only half emerged from the ground. According to legends told by elderly Thais and Chinese people who have lived in Thailand for a long time, Phuket people like to call it Phra Phut because when it was first discovered, the Buddha statue only emerged one cubit above the ground, at the top of the head (Gatu Mala).
According to legend. 2,000 years ago three beautiful Buddha statues were built in Shanghai, China to worship the three city lords. When Shanghai was defeated by Tibet. The Tibetans took one of the three Buddha statues on a boat through a monsoon. Hope to return to their homeland. A great storm carried the ship to the coast of Phang Nga. The ship sank. The changes that occurred in the earths crust around the area where the ship sank caused the current Phuket Island. A canal flowed through the area near the Buddha statues. When heavy rains and floods caused the ground level to drop. The golden Buddha statue crown emerged from the ground.
After the rain stopped, a boy tied a buffalo to it before returning to his house, where it died the next morning. The boys father left the house hoping to bring the buffalo back, but found that the buffalo had also died. Later, he dreamed that the cause of death was his son tying the buffalo to the topknot of the Buddha statue. He therefore invited the villagers to clean the mud from the topknot of the Buddha statue. They were all surprised. They reported this to the Lord of Thalang, who ordered the Buddha image to be dug up.
The excavation of the Buddha statue continued, but no matter how hard they dug, it was not successful. The more they dug, the more dangerous it became for all the workers. Some became ill, some died. When the Lord of Thalang found out, he ordered that only a building be built to protect it from the sun and wind. The villagers had to mix lime with sand to cover the Buddhas crown to prevent theft.
When Thalang was defeated by the Burmese, the Burmese discovered that the Buddha statue was made of gold. The Burmese soldiers therefore chipped away at the lime and dug around the Buddha image. However, the more they dug, the more ants came up with it. If these ants bit the Burmese soldiers, they would fall ill and die in the hundreds. The Burmese soldiers were only able to dig up as the Buddhas neck.
Luang Pho Singh, a monk who lived by the river near Luang Pho Phra Phut, warned that even though the Buddha statue only protruded from the ground up to its neck, it was still at risk of being stolen by thieves, so a half-body Buddha statue was built to cover the real Buddha statue.
King Rama VI named the temple Wat Phra Thong. The people of Phuket have been calling the temple by the royal name ever since.
