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Authors: Thant Myint-U
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Ceylon and encouraged fundamentalist reforms that later spread throughout the country.
But Bayinnaung, the generals’ favorite, didn’t come from Pegu. He came instead from a poorer kingdom to the north called Toungoo, nestled in the dark teak and bamboo forests along the foothills of the Shan Plateau. Whereas the people of Pegu spoke Mon, the people of Toungoo spoke Burmese. And they were envious of Pegu’s wealth and its easy access to the sea and were ready to make war and gain what they could of the outlandish luxuries hidden behind the city’s heavy walls. Tabinshweti was the king of Toungoo, and Bayinnaung was the king’s most trusted captain and loyal friend. Together they would bring fire and sword not only to Pegu but to every corner of Burma. And when Tabinshweti died his mysterious death, Bayinnaung went on to even greater victories and became to his people the universal monarch of legend. 5
*
The empire building of Tabinshweti and Bayinnaung took place in the context of much grander empire building elsewhere. The Ottomans were then at the very peak of their vitality, reaching the gates of Vienna under Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent in the spring of 1532. Farther east, Ismail had recently become the shah of Persia and had launched the series of campaigns that would establish the formidable and elegant Shiite Safavid Empire. And closer to home, in 1526, the Central Asian warlord Babur, scion of the house of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane, had defeated the sultan of Delhi and set up Mughal domination over almost the entire Indian subcontinent. The world of imperial Islam now marched close to Burma, separated now only by the tidal swamps and malarial marshes of eastern Bengal. But perhaps most important for Burma were developments in the near north.
More than the Ottomans, the Safavids, and even the Mughals, itwas Ming China that could best claim superpower status. With 150 million people, a huge military machine, and a colossal exam-based bureaucracy, there was simply nothing like it in the world, as it dwarfed neighboring Burma in population and economic size. The Ming dynasty had been founded by the tough peasant leader Zhu Yuanzhang, and he and his heirs presided over a long era of scientific progress, economic growth, and political stability. Military power was converted into an aggressive foreign policy, and the new Chinese army, the first anywhere to be equipped with firearms and cannons, was the deadliest ever seen, crushing domestic dissent and carving out huge expanses of the inner Asian steppe. 6
The Ming also traveled overseas. A Muslim eunuch of Mongol descent named Zheng He, born in a border town not far from Burma, was one of China’s most distinguished admirals. Captured and castrated as a boy for service in the Forbidden City, he later studied at the Imperial Central University and proved himself both in battle and in the intrigues of the royal court. In 1405, Zheng He, who some say inspired the story of Sinbad the Sailor in The Thousand and One Nights, led a fleet around the Indian Ocean that inspires awe even today. More than thirty thousand men sailed in three hundred ships on the first expedition alone (compared with a mere three ships under Christopher Columbus), and these ships were the biggest wooden vessels ever, journeying as far from China as Egypt and the Red Sea and down the African coastline to Mozambique and perhaps beyond. Over the next quarter century there were seven expeditions in all, bolstering China’s political prestige while increasing the Middle Kingdom’s knowledge of the world. Many of these ships were laden with porcelain, lacquer, silk, and other desired goods, and these were freely distributed as a demonstration of Sino superiority. After one voyage Zheng returned to Peking with a giraffe and other exotics for the imperial menagerie, and after another with envoys from no less than thirty countries, including a king of Ceylon, who came to render homage to the
But Bayinnaung, the generals’ favorite, didn’t come from Pegu. He came instead from a poorer kingdom to the north called Toungoo, nestled in the dark teak and bamboo forests along the foothills of the Shan Plateau. Whereas the people of Pegu spoke Mon, the people of Toungoo spoke Burmese. And they were envious of Pegu’s wealth and its easy access to the sea and were ready to make war and gain what they could of the outlandish luxuries hidden behind the city’s heavy walls. Tabinshweti was the king of Toungoo, and Bayinnaung was the king’s most trusted captain and loyal friend. Together they would bring fire and sword not only to Pegu but to every corner of Burma. And when Tabinshweti died his mysterious death, Bayinnaung went on to even greater victories and became to his people the universal monarch of legend. 5
*
The empire building of Tabinshweti and Bayinnaung took place in the context of much grander empire building elsewhere. The Ottomans were then at the very peak of their vitality, reaching the gates of Vienna under Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent in the spring of 1532. Farther east, Ismail had recently become the shah of Persia and had launched the series of campaigns that would establish the formidable and elegant Shiite Safavid Empire. And closer to home, in 1526, the Central Asian warlord Babur, scion of the house of Genghis Khan and Tamerlane, had defeated the sultan of Delhi and set up Mughal domination over almost the entire Indian subcontinent. The world of imperial Islam now marched close to Burma, separated now only by the tidal swamps and malarial marshes of eastern Bengal. But perhaps most important for Burma were developments in the near north.
More than the Ottomans, the Safavids, and even the Mughals, itwas Ming China that could best claim superpower status. With 150 million people, a huge military machine, and a colossal exam-based bureaucracy, there was simply nothing like it in the world, as it dwarfed neighboring Burma in population and economic size. The Ming dynasty had been founded by the tough peasant leader Zhu Yuanzhang, and he and his heirs presided over a long era of scientific progress, economic growth, and political stability. Military power was converted into an aggressive foreign policy, and the new Chinese army, the first anywhere to be equipped with firearms and cannons, was the deadliest ever seen, crushing domestic dissent and carving out huge expanses of the inner Asian steppe. 6
The Ming also traveled overseas. A Muslim eunuch of Mongol descent named Zheng He, born in a border town not far from Burma, was one of China’s most distinguished admirals. Captured and castrated as a boy for service in the Forbidden City, he later studied at the Imperial Central University and proved himself both in battle and in the intrigues of the royal court. In 1405, Zheng He, who some say inspired the story of Sinbad the Sailor in The Thousand and One Nights, led a fleet around the Indian Ocean that inspires awe even today. More than thirty thousand men sailed in three hundred ships on the first expedition alone (compared with a mere three ships under Christopher Columbus), and these ships were the biggest wooden vessels ever, journeying as far from China as Egypt and the Red Sea and down the African coastline to Mozambique and perhaps beyond. Over the next quarter century there were seven expeditions in all, bolstering China’s political prestige while increasing the Middle Kingdom’s knowledge of the world. Many of these ships were laden with porcelain, lacquer, silk, and other desired goods, and these were freely distributed as a demonstration of Sino superiority. After one voyage Zheng returned to Peking with a giraffe and other exotics for the imperial menagerie, and after another with envoys from no less than thirty countries, including a king of Ceylon, who came to render homage to the
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