Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 03.djvu/785

BURMA. Century, thoroughly imbued with Buddhism. It has been their great teacher and civilizer, stimulating the growth of a folk-lore and a national literature. It has prevented caste, and has covered the settled part of the country with temples, shrines, and monasteries, the latter being well organized. Theoretically, every boy in the country, while at the temple school, becomes a monk, though he is not bound by vows to remain. Tolerant and free from fanaticism, as well as from blood feuds, the Burmans show the blessings of the gentle teachings of the purer Buddhism. In sacred edifices the country is very rich: the tope, dagoba, or shrine is a solid mass of brickwork, shaped like a bell and crowned by an umbrella-like open ironwork. The temples contain many images of the Enlightened One, or Gautama, the Buddha of history; and the people never tire of plastering these images over with gold-leaf. The temples bristle on the sides and top with pointed projections which are usually gilded. The most famous temple in the country is in Pagan, a city founded 100. It flourished about 1000, and later fell into decay, its ruins covering nearly eight square miles. A tremendous expense was incurred in temple-building. At every shrine great bells are hung by metal clasps of rich design. At Mingum, near Mandalay, the bell, cast in 1790, weighs 88 tons. It is 17 feet in diameter, and the metal is 18 inches thick. The monastery buildings have roofs of several diminishing stages, elaborately adorned, but the special feature of Burman architecture is the pointed arch, used not only for doors and windows, but also in the vaulted coverings of passages. The ancient temples of Pagan consisted almost entirely of brick corridors, one within the other, with vaulted tent roofs, of masonry springing from the outer or lower wall to the inner or higher. Among the non-Buddhist tribes, spirit, nature, or demon worship prevails in more or less degrading form.

The early history of Burma is mythical and obscure. As is the case with many other peoples, the legendary accounts, preserved in old chronicles of the country, seem to point to an early immigration of the dominant race. It is supposed that the ancestors of the modern Burmese came from the Indian Highlands, on the northwest, at a period from 2000 to 2500 years ago; entered the valley of the Irrawaddy, the great river highway along which the whole history of Burma has been enacted; conquered the Mongoloid peoples then inhabiting the country, and gradually built up a new State. Tagoung, on the Upper Irrawaddy, the ruins of which still remain, is reputed to have been founded about 800. In the Eleventh Century Pagan, in Central Burmah, was the seat of power; its kings consolidated the country, and conquered the land of Pegu on the south. The power of Pagan declined through the decadence of its rulers, and received a fatal blow from the assault of the Mongols, in the time of Kublai Khan. The Fourteenth Century saw the rise of the power of the rulers of Ava, the new centre of the kingdom, and the beginning of the long rivalry between Ava, the northern kingdom, and Pegu, in the south. The chronicles of the Kings of Ava claim for them descent from early Buddhist rulers in India, even going back to

Gautama himself. The power of Ava reached its zenith in the Fifteenth Century, when the history of the country becomes clearer through the accounts of Portuguese and other European traders, who entered the country and described its conditions. The supremacy passed temporarily from the Burmans to a line of kings from the Shan tribes on the Siamese border; but in 1580 the southern Kingdom of Pegu became dominant over all Burma. The Peguan supremacy continued until 1752, but during the last century of this period there was a steady decline of the Burmese power. The French and English, meanwhile, secured a foothold in the Irrawaddy delta. In 1752 Alaunghpra, or Alompra, the energetic warrior-chief of a village of Ava, headed a rising, overthrew the dominion of Pegu, and reorganized the Burmese Empire. He founded Rangoon (1755), the commercial centre of Burma. Troubles began in his reign with the English East India Company, which had established a factory in Burmese territory. Alompra died in 1760, during an invasion of Siam. The dynasty which he founded degenerated rapidly through intermarriage among its members. With one exception, Mindohn Min (1852-78), the successsors of Alompra were bloodthirsty and tyrannical.

In 1795, in consequence of the violation of British territory by a Burmese force in pursuit of certain rebels, troubles arose, which were, however, quieted for a time. Difficulties over trading privileges followed, and frontier disputes occurred, culminating, in 1824, in a collision between armed forces of the East India Government and of Burma, on the Assam frontier. War was declared, and British forces at once invaded Burma. The common error of British campaigns, that of despising an unknown foe, led to failures at the beginning, but ultimately the Burmese were pressed so hard that a treaty was made at Yandabo, February 24, 1826, by which Burma renounced its claim on Assam and ceded to the British Government Arakan and the coast of Tenasserim, including Martaban, east of the Salwin River. Their defeat was a great blow to the national pride of the Burmese. King Tharawaddy, who obtained the throne in 1837 by the deposition of his brother, declared the treaty of Yandabo void, and treated English envoys with studied contempt until, in 1840, relations between the British and Burmese Governments ceased altogether. The extreme development in Tharawaddy and his son, Pagan Men, of the homicidal mania, which was the curse of the line of Alompra, led to a revolt which, in 1853, seated the brother of Pagan Men, Mindohn Min, on the throne. At the same time the intolerable treatment of English citizens had brought on the second war between Great Britain and Burma. In the spring of 1852 a British force captured Martaban and Rangoon, and the Peguans took the part of the British against the Burmese. In January, 1853, Pegu was proclaimed a part of the British Empire, which thus obtained control of the Burmese coast and of the mouths of Burma's three navigable rivers. Mindohn Min proved to be a wise and just ruler. Diplomatic relations were resumed in 1867 between Burma and Great Britain, and a commercial treaty was made. Two years before, a superstition had caused the abandonment of