The Phra Bang is a small standing figure of the Buddha, about 83 centimetres tall, both hands raised in the gesture of dispelling fear, cast in a precious alloy of gold, silver and bronze. Lao tradition traces it to Sri Lanka and holds that it reached the Lao kingdom through the Khmer court, given to King Fa Ngum, founder of Lan Xang, in the fourteenth century; art historians reading its style tend to date the image itself somewhat later, but its symbolic history is what matters.
As the palladium of the kingdom, the image was believed to guarantee the legitimacy and prosperity of whoever held it, and the royal capital took its name from the relic, Luang Prabang meaning the great, or royal, Phra Bang. To possess the image was to possess the mandate to rule the Lao, which is why its fate was so closely bound to that of the monarchy, and why rival powers coveted it. The Haw Pha Bang exists to give this national relic a home worthy of that role.