Burmese Empire Research Articles

The Myowun's Nap: An Incident in 1852 and the Fall of the Burmese Empire

The Myowun's Nap: An Incident in 1852 and the Fall of the Burmese Empire

Beyond Collapse: Archaeological Perspectives on Resilience, Revitalization, and Transformation in Complex Societies. Ronald K. Faulseit, ed. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2016, 552 pp. $70.00, paper. ISBN 978-0-8093-3399-8.

<i>Beyond Collapse: Archaeological Perspectives on Resilience, Revitalization, and Transformation in Complex Societies</i>. Ronald K. Faulseit, ed. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 2016, 552 pp. $70.00, paper. ISBN 978-0-8093-3399-8.

Dancing or Stricken Peacock? Than Shwe, Suu Kyi and the Politics of Institutional Change in Myanmar

In a country where signs, symbols and astrology have played key roles in its political and cultural evolution, the peacock as the emblem of an independent state has had a chequered history in Myanmar (Burma). Frequently juxtaposed to the Sheldrake, emblem of the Southern Mon kingdom centred on Pegu until incorporation into the larger Burmese empire in the mid-18th century, the country peacock could not withstand the advances of the rampant British lion during the 19th century. It is now a protected bird accorded sanctuary, and placed on a pedestal with reverence almost equal to that of the sacred ‘White Elephant’ found recently in the jungles of Arakan. Such indigenous institutions are playing a critical role as the transitional state of Myanmar seeks to transform its political and socio-economic fabric after 26 years of socialist policies (1962-1988). In analyzing the politics of institutional change in contemporary Myanmar, we are forced to take account of Muthiah Alagappa’s observation that transitional states are not necessarily in linear evolution to Western models of democratic governance, for this expected trajectory ‘has not been borne out in practice’ whilst ‘politics in developing countries has its own dynamics.’ Alagappa’s views resonate also in the writings of Robert Taylor who notes the complexity and problematic task of grafting multi-party democratic systems onto societies like Myanmar with weak traditions of civil society, low levels of economic development and patronclientalist politico-social structures. The following paper focuses on some of the key political and socio-economic issues at the heart of achieving evolutionary institutional change in Myanmar (Burma).

Lord Amherst and Pegu: The Annexation Issue, 1824–1826

When, on 5 March 1824, British India formally declared war on the Burmese Empire, the Governor-General, Lord Amherst, strongly believed that this was to be a short defensive war with strictly limited ends. If all went well, the territorial results of such a war would be almost invisible, with little, if any, land passing under direct British control. In theory, the Burmese Empire, apart from the loss of some very recent conquests, would emerge almost unmarked, physically, from the contest. Not for Amherst were the grand plans for conquest or hegemony that moved a Wellesley or a Hastings. The end of the war, nearly two years later, not surprisingly, saw the Burmese lose most of their outlying possessions, and the British Empire correspondingly expanded. In view of the nature of the conflict in that two years, and the pressures built up during it, what is surprising is that the Burmese did not lose Pegu, that part of the Burmese Empire with which the British had had most contact, and had assessed as the richest province.

A Description of the Burmese Empire, Compiled Chiefly from Burmese Documents

A Description of the Burmese Empire, Compiled Chiefly from Burmese Documents

A Description of the Burmese Empire. By Father Sangermano. New York: Augustus M. Kelley, (1833) 1969. xxxix, 308 pp. Illustrations, Notes, Appendices, Index. $10.00. - History of Burma Including Burma Proper, Pegu, Taungu, Tenasserim, and Arakan: From the Earliest Time to the End of the First War with British India. By SirArthur P. Phayre. New York: Augustus M. Kelley, (1883)

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A Description of the Burmese Empire. By Father Sangermano. New York: Augustus M. Kelley, (1833) 1969. xxxix, 308 pp. Illustrations, Notes, Appendices, Index. $10.00.History of Burma Including Burma Proper, Pegu, Taungu, Tenasserim, and Arakan: From the Earliest Time to the End of the First War with British India. By Sir Arthur P. Phayre. New York: Augustus M. Kelley, (1883) 1969.

A Description of the Burmese Empire. By Father Sangermano. New York: Augustus M. Kelley, (1833) 1969. xxxix, 308 pp. Illustrations, Notes, Appendices, Index. $10.00.History of Burma Including Burma Proper, Pegu, Taungu, Tenasserim, and Arakan: From the Earliest Time to the End of the First War with British India. By Sir Arthur P. Phayre. New York: Augustus M. Kelley, (1883) 1969.

Americans and the First Anglo-Burmese War

Under Alaungpaya (1752-1760) and his successors in the last dynasty of Burmese kings, the Burmese Empire expanded from Tenasserim to Assam. The Burmese became convinced that their arms and strategy were invincible. Merchant adventurers during this period and before gave exaggerated accounts of the power and wealth of Burma. This period of expansion was concurrent with the rise of British power in India. Thus British India, along its eastern frontiers, had as a neighbor a state powerful and ambitious, glorying in its recent conquest of Siam and its defeat of the Chinese invasion of 1769. By 1824 a series of acts of aggression by the Burmese along the Chittagong frontier between India and Burma resulted in a declaration of war between the two powers. This war was the first of three Anglo-Burmese wars in which Burmese independence was extinguished. At the outbreak of the war there were seven American citizens living in the territory of the Burmese king. A Mr. and Mrs. Wade and a Mr. and Mrs. Hough were in Rangoon, Doctor Jonathan Price and Mr. and Mrs. Adoniram Judson were in Ava. At this time there were probably more Americans than British-born subjects in Burma. All the Americans were in the employ of the American Baptist mission board. Though small in number, the character of the service performed by these Americans, acting as interpreters and peacemakers between the Burmese and the English, is of such importance that it would seem to justify a description of their activities. When the British transports sailed up the Rangoon River May 1o, 1834, after a rendezvous in Port Cornwallis in the

II. Notices of Books - Description of the Burmese Empire. By Father Sanger-mano, Roman Catholic Missionary. Printed at Rome, 1833; republished at Rangoon, and sold by Messrs. Trübner &amp; Co.

II. Notices of Books - Description of the Burmese Empire. By Father Sanger-mano, Roman Catholic Missionary. Printed at Rome, 1833; republished at Rangoon, and sold by Messrs. Trübner &amp; Co. - Volume 25 Issue 4

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DR. THORELL deserves our best thanks for having begun a faunistic work on the spiders of Burmah; still greater would have been our gratitude had his minute and exhaustive descriptions been accompanied by figures of the numerous new species recorded. One of the greatest hindrances in the study of exotic araneology is the paucity of such works. The present, however, is not the first contributed, by Dr. Thorell's labours, for the supply of works on the spider-fauna of exotic regions: witness his extensive work, “Studi sui Ragni Malesi e Papuani,” in three volumes, 1877-81, describing and recording over five hundred species of the spiders of that richest of all known exotic regions, the Malay Archipelago. Up to the time of the publication of the present volume, but few Burman spiders were known, the earliest being an Epeirid, described by the late Dr. Stoliczka in 1869. This was followed, in 1878, by two others recorded by Mr. T. Workman, of Belfast; eight more were recorded in 1881 in Dr. Thorell's work above mentioned (on the spiders of the Malay Archipelago); and finally, twenty-two more by M. Eugène Simon in 1884. The total number of species of Burmese Araneidea now known is 163, by far the larger portion being new to science. Dr. Thorell records 145 species, of which go are new to science, and 130 new to Burmah. These figures doubtless give a very meagre idea of the spiders of such a rich zoological district as the Burmese Empire. Not to mention its situation in the tropics, Burmah has much in common with the productions of China, Siam, India, and the Malay Archipelago. We may therefore safely hazard a conjecture that the figures given by Dr. Thorell can scarcely represent a twentieth part of the spiders of Burmah. It is to be hoped that since the—still comparatively few—species as yet known have been collated in the present work, an impetus will be given to natural history collectors to add to our knowledge. For the want of figures in Dr. Thorell's work there is some compensation in the concise diagnoses which head each lengthened description. Excepting the introduction, which is in Italian, the work is written in Latin. It is exceedingly well got up, forming a handsome volume of over 400 pages, and is dedicated to the Rev. O. P. Cambridge, General A. W. M. Van Hasselt, and Dr. Ludwig Koch. The greater part of the Burmese spiders described by Dr. Thorell were collected by Signer Leonardo Fea, mostly in Upper (or North) Burmah; and of the rest some were collected in its southern and some in its central districts. Viaggio di L. Fea in Birmania e regioni vicini. II. “Primo saggio sui Ragni Birmani.” Del Prof. T. Thorell. (Genova: Tipographia del R. Istituto Sordo-Muti, 1887.)

VI. Geographical Notice of the Frontiers of the Burmese and Chinese Empires, with the Copy of a Chinese Map

The great interest which now attaches to the geography of the Burmese empire and to its relations with the Chinese, seems to call for as much information as can by any means be procured on these subjects from different quarters. In the Chinese library of the East-India Company at Canton is a MS. map, chiefly compiled from the labours of the missionaries; and as its extreme accuracy can be vouched for with respect to those parts of the empire through which Lord Amherst's embassy passed, it is entitled to a degree of credit, which is not hastily to be awarded to Chinese maps in general. An exact copy has been taken from this map of the western part of Yun-nan province. Our latest geographical knowledge of the Burmese country is contained in a map recently published at Calcutta, with the permission of the Bengal government; and as that portion which relates to the Chinese frontier was likely to have been obtained from Burmese sources, it may be worth while to compare it with the Chinese map. As far as relates to the names of places, the Chinese character is the only sure guide within their own territory. Little accuracy can be expected from, or stress laid on, the names written by one set of strangers, the English, and obtained by them through the mouths, or the writing, of another set of strangers, the Burmese. Notwithstanding this difficulty, however, it will perhaps be found that a considerable degree of correspondence exists between the two maps.