Myanmar is a country of many ethnic groups, and in its history, the Bagan Dynasty was one of the relatively powerful and socially prosperous dynasties. During Anurudha's reign, he established the first unified feudal dynasty in Burmese history. The "History of Song" said: "Today's Bagan is a big country, and it cannot be regarded as a vassal country. "So, how did the mighty Bagan dynasty go from prosperity to demise?
Let's start with the prosperity of the Bagan dynasty. "Rome was not built in a day", and a combination of geography, history and economy contributed to the establishment of the Bagan dynasty. The Bagan dynasty developed from many small countries such as Bagan. In 850 AD, the Burmese founded the city of Bagan in central Burma, and established their regime centered on the city of Bagan.
Geographically, Bagan is located in the middle of Myanmar, the middle reaches of the Irrawaddy River, Myanmar's mother river. The Bagan area is home to Myanmar's largest ethnic group, the Burman. The northern part of Bagan was the Shan, which at that time was under feudal tusi rule; In the south, it is inhabited by the Mon people of Myanmar, who belong to the oldest ethnic group in Myanmar and have close contacts with the Khmers in the southeast peninsula; In the western coastal areas, the economically developed Rakhine ethnic group is relatively developed. Because of its strategic location, Bagan occupies a pivotal position in Myanmar. It is not only conducive to the unity of the Burmese people, but also conducive to the ties between the major ethnic groups in the east, west, south and north of Myanmar.
Let's look at the historical origins. During the Tang Dynasty of the mainland, the area around Bagan was called the Pyu Kingdom, and during the rule of the Vigama Dynasty from the 7th to the 9th centuries AD, the Pyu Kingdom was very powerful, with eighteen vassal states, 298 tribes and nine towns. And their culture is also very prosperous, and they are good at stone carving and openwork, which has reached a very high level. Pi Guo also loves music, and their orchestra has performed in Chang'an several times. Tang dynasty literati and poets also wrote many poems to record their deep impression of Pyu Guole. For example, the poet Bai Juyi wrote in "Pyu Guo Le": "The jade snail blows the spine, and the copper drum hits the tattoo." The beads dazzle and the stars shake, and the flowers and dragons move. ”
Although the Pyu Kingdom was a thing of the past when the Bagan Dynasty was founded, the Pyu people left a valuable cultural heritage to the Burmese people, which laid a good foundation for the flourishing of Bagan culture. The grand pagoda temples in Bagan are the result of the exquisite architectural craftsmanship handed down by the art craftsmen of the Pyu Kingdom.
Then look at the economic fundamentals. Agriculture belonged to the economic lifeblood of ancient Myanmar. The Bagan region was flat and fertile, and at that time it was known as the "Land of Oze", which was very suitable for the development of agriculture. Judging from the inscriptions of the Bagan period, 61 kinds of crops such as rice, rice, sorghum, beans, winter melons, eggplant, pepper, grapes, sugar cane, betel nut and other crops were planted in the area near Bagan, and agricultural production had reached a considerable level of development. Historically, the Burmese ancestors have undergone several great migrations, and finally settled in 650 AD in the area of Qianqi, 30 kilometers south of Mandalay, which is a famous rice-producing region in Myanmar.
However, the principle of central Myanmar is that drought is often plagued. With the accession of Anuruda (reigned 1044-1078), he successively dug seven irrigation canals and rebuilt old water conservancy facilities of various sizes, forming an irrigation network system consisting of irrigation canals, reservoirs, ponds, etc. The construction of a variety of water conservancy facilities greatly improved Bagan's agricultural production, provided them with a large amount of food, laid the foundation for building a strong army, and provided a strong guarantee for Anuruda to launch a war to unify Burma.
In the third century AD, Buddhism was introduced to southern Burma. By the fifth century AD, Mahayana Buddhism had been introduced to Bagan. Beginning with the Bagan dynasty, Theravada Buddhism slowly became the dominant religion in Burma. Anurudha unified Burma by waging religious wars and also strongly promoted Buddhism as the state religion of Burma. According to inscriptions and archaeological data, Buddhism reached its peak during the Bagan Dynasty, and thousands of famous stupas still exist in Bagan today.
During the more than two hundred years of the Bagan Dynasty, more than 4,000 temples were built in the area around the capital alone of about 50 square kilometers. The prosperity of Buddhism also promoted the prosperity of Bagan's construction and carving industries to a certain extent. During the Bagan period, there were a large number of lacquerists, stonemasons, potters, and carpenters specializing in the construction of stupas and temples, and a monastic economy unique to Myanmar emerged. Therefore, the temple economy initially promoted the development of industry and commerce in Bagan and economic exchanges with various regions.
Let's talk about the decline and fall of the Bagan dynasty. From the twelfth century onwards, the Bagan dynasty began to weaken and was eventually replaced by the Shan. The reason for the decline of the Bagan dynasty is divided into internal causes and external causes.
The external cause is the invasion of foreign races. At the end of the Bagan Dynasty, the strength of some surrounding ethnic groups such as the Mon, Shan and Rakhine gradually increased, and their development power was also growing, and the contradictions with the Bagan Dynasty were also increasing. Moreover, during the Yuan Dynasty on the mainland, Kublai Khan sent emissaries to the state of Bagan several times to recruit surrender, but to no avail. In 1287, Yuan soldiers attacked the state of Bagan from the Yunnan region, which later became a vassal state of the Yuan Dynasty. It is recorded in the "Records of the Yuan Dynasty's Conquest of Burma": Yunnan Province invited this autumn to discuss, and was ordered to "not listen," so the king of Yunnan and the kings marched. To Bagan, more than 7,000 mourners, the beginning of peace, the years of tribute. Subsequently, there was a split in Bagan, with the Mon establishing the Bago Kingdom in the south and the Shan establishing the Ava Kingdom in eastern Burma.
The internal reason is that the stupa was built in Bagan, which caused labor and loss of money. Because of the prosperity of Buddhism, the kings of Bagan began to build pagodas, which gradually caused the economy of Bagan to decline. During the Bagan period, land was administered directly by the king and partly was given to nobles and temples, which made the land of the temples exceed the king's land.
The development and spread of Buddhism did unify the religion of the Bagan dynasty; But at the same time, its drawbacks are also revealed. On the one hand, a large number of people choose to cut their hair and become monks, monastic land is not taxed by the state, and monastic land also occupies a large amount of state land and labor. The royal family in Bagan also did not hesitate to spend a lot of money to recruit a large number of peasants to serve to build pagodas, causing the barrenness of farmland and serious damage to the country's economic foundation. As the folk song of Myanmar at that time says: "The pagoda is built, the dust is nationalized." In addition, the peasants of Bagan were required to pay rent to the local princes every year and offer various tributes (jewelry, cotton, cotton cloth, etc.), which caused the peasants to be oppressed and revolted against the tyranny of the royal family.
And the royal life was very poor and extravagant, and the inscription of the last king of the Bagan dynasty, Emperor Narotikhop, reads: "Emperor Narotikhop... For the supreme commander of 36 million victorious soldiers, 300 statues of Natsu Curry, wanting to reach Nirvana, love to build this pagoda, with 51 statues of gold and silver built-in, the families of Princess Cangluo, ministers, and concubines, and at the beginning of the moon in February 636 of the Buddhist calendar, the statue of Dharma Buddha on the pure silver bridge was offered to all the statues, the image was one foot high, from the palace to the tower, and the floor was paved with mats, first with bamboo mats, then with straw mats, covered with white cloth, 28 feet long, and banners were erected all over the road, one for each foot. "Because the working people bear heavy taxes and miscellaneous taxes, and the kingdom of Bagan has built construction and pagodas, the social contradictions in Bagan have gradually intensified, and the national strength has become weaker and weaker.
In short, in the later period, the Bagan Dynasty abandoned production due to the ruler's overhaul of stupas, coupled with the continuous intensification of class contradictions and ethnic contradictions, and finally perished under the invasion of foreign races.
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