The name of Wat Chet Yot, also known as Wat Photharam Maha Wihan, means “seven-spired temple,” comes from the distinctive architectural form of its main sanctuary. The temple, located in Chiang Mai, is also regarded as a center of pilgrimage for those born in the year of the Snake.

The temple was commissioned in 1455 CE by King Tilokarat of the Lanna Kingdom. Before construction began, the king sent monks to Bagan in present-day Myanmar to study the design of the Mahabodhi Temple there, which itself was modeled after the Mahabodhi Temple in Bodh Gaya, India, the site traditionally associated with the Buddha’s enlightenment. Drawing from these influences, Wat Chet Yot was conceived as a Lanna interpretation of this important Indian Buddhist prototype.

According to the Jinakālamālī chronicle, King Tilokarat planted a bodhi tree at the site in 1455 CE. In 1476 CE, he established a large sanctuary within the monastery, likely in preparation for ceremonies marking 2,000 years of Buddhism. The following year, Wat Chet Yot became the venue of the 8th Buddhist World Council, during which the Tripitaka, or Pali Canon, was reviewed and renewed. This event firmly established the temple’s religious and historical importance in the region.

The central sanctuary, known as the Maha Pho Wihan or Maha Chedi, reflects clear Indian architectural influences. It is a rectangular, windowless structure with a flat roof crowned by seven spires. At the center rises a pyramid-like spire with a square base, set back slightly from the roof’s edge. This is surrounded by four smaller spires of similar form, while two bell-shaped chedis are positioned on the annexes at either end of the building. These seven spires, or chet yot in Thai, give the temple its commonly used name.

Inside the sanctuary is a barrel-vaulted corridor that leads to a Buddha statue at the far end. On either side of the statue, narrow staircases rise to the roof. In earlier times, a bodhi tree grew on top of the building, but it was removed in 1910 to prevent structural damage. Access to the roof is restricted, and only men are permitted to climb up to this part of the temple.

The exterior façades of the Maha Chedi are decorated with seventy stucco reliefs of Thewada, or Devas, divine beings in Buddhist cosmology. These figures are now partially weathered, but they remain one of the temple’s most distinctive features. Tradition holds that the faces of these reliefs were modeled after relatives of King Tilokarat, linking the monument symbolically to the royal family who sponsored its construction.