Pyu city-states

The Pyu city states (Burmese:

)
were a group of city-states that existed from c. 2nd century BCE to c. mid-11th century in present-day Upper
Burma (Myanmar). The city-states were founded as
part of the southward migration by the Tibeto-Burmanspeaking Pyu people, the earliest inhabitants of Burma
of whom records are extant.[2] The thousand-year period,
often referred to as the Pyu millennium, linked the Bronze
Age to the beginning of the classical states period when
the Pagan Kingdom emerged in the late 9th century.

1 Background

The city-statesve major walled cities and several

smaller towns have been excavatedwere all located in
the three main irrigated regions of Upper Burma: the
Mu River Valley, the Kyaukse plains and Minbu region,
around the conuence of the Irrawaddy and Chindwin
Rivers. Part of an overland trade route between China
and India, the Pyu realm gradually expanded south.
Halin, founded in the 1st century AD at the northern edge
of Upper Burma, was the largest and most important city
until around the 7th or 8th century when it was superseded by Sri Ksetra (near modern Pyay) at the southern
edge. Twice as large as Halin, Sri Ksetra was the largest
and most inuential Pyu center.[2]

About 1500 BCE, people in the region were turning copper into bronze, growing rice, and domesticating chickens
and pigs; they were among the rst people in the world to
do so. By 500 BCE, iron-working settlements emerged
in an area south of present-day Mandalay. Bronzedecorated cons and burial sites lled with earthenware
remains have been excavated.[5] Archaeological evidence
at Samon River Valley south of Mandalay suggests ricegrowing settlements that traded with China between 500
BCE and 200 CE.[6]

Based on limited archaeological evidence, it is inferred

that the earliest cultures existed in Burma as early as
11,000 BCE, mainly in the central dry zone close to the
Irrawaddy. The Anyathian, Burmas Stone Age, existed
around the same time as the lower and middle Paleolithic
eras in Europe. Three caves located near Taunggyi at the
foothills of the Shan Hills have yielded Neolithic artifacts
dated 10-6000 BCE.[4]

Circa 2nd century BCE, the Tibeto-Burman-speaking

Pyu people began to enter the Irrawaddy River Valley
from present-day Yunnan using the Tapain and Shweli
Rivers. The original home of the Pyu is reconstructed
to be Qinghai Lake, which is located in the present-day
provinces of Qinghai and Gansu.[7] The Pyu, the earliest inhabitants of Burma of whom records are extant,
went on to found settlements throughout the plains region centered around the conuence of the Irrawaddy
and Chindwin Rivers that has been inhabited since the
Paleolithic.[2][8] The Pyu realm was longer than wide,
stretching from Sri Ksetra in the south to Halin in the
north, Binnaka and Maingmaw to the east and probably
Ayadawkye to the west. The Tang dynasty's records report 18 Pyu states, nine of which were walled cities, covering 298 districts.[9]

The Pyu culture was heavily inuenced by trade with India, importing Buddhism as well as other cultural, architectural and political concepts, which would have an enduring inuence on the Culture of Burma and political
organization.[3] The Pyu calendar, based on the Buddhist
calendar, later became the Burmese calendar. Latest
scholarship, though yet not settled, suggests that the Pyu
script, based on the Indian Brahmi script, may have been
the source of the Mon script used to write the Burmese
language.
The millennium-old civilization came crashing down in
the 9th century when the city-states were destroyed by
repeated invasions from the Kingdom of Nanzhao. The
Bamar people, who came from Nanzhao, set up a garrison town at Bagan at the conuence of the Irrawaddy
and Chindwin Rivers. Pyu settlements remained in Upper Burma for the next three centuries but the Pyu gradually were absorbed into the expanding Pagan Kingdom.
The Pyu language still existed until the late 12th century.
By the 13th century, the Pyu had assumed the Burman
ethnicity. The histories and legends of the Pyu were also
incorporated to those of the Bamar.[3]

Archaeological surveys have actually so far unearthed 12

walled cities, including ve large walled cities, and several smaller non-fortied settlements, located at or near
the three most important irrigated regions of precolonial
Burma: the Mu River Valley in the north, the Kyaukse
plains in center, and the Minbu region in the south and
west of the former two.[10] The city-states were contemporaries of the Kingdom of Funan (Cambodia) and (perhaps) Champa (southern Vietnam), Dvaravati (Thailand),
Tambralinga and Takuapa near the Kra Isthmus, and
Srivijaya (southeast Sumatra). All these statelets foreshadowed the rise of the classical kingdoms of Southeast Asia in the second millennium CE.[11]
1

2 CITY-STATES

City-states

carried out in 1979have unearthed many artifacts, including jewelry, silver coins, and funerary urns. Many of
the artifacts such as the coins and funerary urns are virtually identical to those found Beikthano and Binnaka.[10]

Pyu realm circa 800 CE, before the advent of the Mranma

Of the 12 walled cities excavated thus far, ve are the remains of largest Pyu states: Beikthano, Maingmaw, Binnaka, Halin and Sri Ksetra.

2.1

Beikthano

[ben]) situated in the

Beikthano (Burmese:
irrigated Minbu region (near present-day Taungdwingyi)
with direct land access to the well-watered Kyaukse plains
to its northeast, is the oldest urban site so far discovered
and scientically excavated site. Its remainsthe structures, pottery, artifacts, and human skeletonsdate from
200 BCE to 100 CE. Named after Hindu god Vishnu, the
city may be the rst capital of a culturally and perhaps
even politically uniform state in the history of Burma. It
was a large fortied settlement, measuring approximately
300 hectares inside the rectangular (3 km by 1 km) walls.
The walls and fortications along it measured six meters
thick, and are radiocarbon dated to a period between 180
BCE and 610 CE. Like most subsequent cities, the main
entrance of the walls led to the palace, which faced east.
Stupas and monastic buildings have also been excavated
within the city walls.[10][12]

2.2

Maingmaw

Maingmaw (
[m m ]; also Mong Mao), located the Kyause region, was circular in shape, and has
tentatively been dated to the rst millennium BCE. At 2.5
km in diameter and 222 hectares, Maingmaw is one of
the largest ancient cities on the entire Kyaukse plains. It
has two inner enclosure walls, the outer of which is square
while the inner one is circular. The plan of a circle within
a square suggest a zodiac sign which represents a view of
the heavens from the perspective of the sun, the manner
in which 19th century Mandalay was also conceptualized.
At almost dead center, a 19th-century temple called Nandawya Paya, which was probably built upon the ruins of
an ancient one. The city is bisected by a canal, thought
to be contemporary to the city, though no scientic dating has conrmed it. Excavationsthe rst of which was

Pyu city-states circa 8th century; Pagan shown for comparison

only, not contemporary to the Pyu cities.

2.3 Binnaka
[bnka]) too was located in the
Binnaka (
Kyaukse region, and virtually identical to its neighbor
Maingmaw in numerous ways. Its brick structures shared
the same oor plan as those found at Beikthano and other
Pyu sites. Excavations have recovered pre-Buddhist artifacts, gold necklaces, precious stone images of elephants,
turtles and lions, distinctive Pyu pottery, terracotta tablets

2.5

Sri Ksetra

with writing that strongly resembled the Pyu script, and

various kinds of acid-etched onyx beads along with others
made of amber and jade. Also excavated are distinctive
silver coins identical to those found at Beikthano and Binnaka, stone molds for casting silver and gold ornamental
owers, a gold armlet in association with a silver bowl that
has Pyu writing on it, and funerary urns virtually identical
to those found Beikthano and Binnaka.[10]

3
Chinese records state that the city was destroyed by the
Nanzhao warriors in 832 CE, with 3000 of its inhabitants
taken away. However, radiocarbon dating reveals human
activity to about 870 CE, nearly four decades after the
reported sack of the city.[14]

2.5 Sri Ksetra

Both Maingmaw and Binnaka may have been contempoMain article: Sri Ksetra Kingdom
rary of Beikthano. The chronicles, which do not mention
Sri Ksetra or Thaye Khittaya (
Beikthano at all, do mention the two, though not specifically as Pyu cities. The chronicles state that the ruler
of Binnaka was responsible for the fall of Tagaung, the
city identied by the chronicles as the original home of
Burmese speakers.[13] Binnaka was inhabited until about
the 19th century, according to a Konbaung era palm-leaf
sittan (record) discovered there.[10]

2.4

[j

Halin

Halin or Halingyi (
[hld]), located in
the Mu valley, one of the largest irrigated regions of precolonial Burma, is the northernmost Pyu city so far discovered. The earliest artifacts of Halincitys wooden
gatesare radiocarbon dated to 70 CE. The city was rectangular but with curved corners, and brick-walled. Excavated walls are approximately 3.2 km long on the northsouth axis and 1.6 km on the east-west. At 664 hectares,
the city was nearly twice the size of Beikthano. It has four
main gates at the cardinal points, and a total of 12 gates,
based on the zodiac. A river or canal ran through the city.
Traces of a moat exist on all sides except the south, where
it was probably not needed, as land was dammed there to
create reservoirs.
This design of the city inuenced the city planning of
later Burmese cities and the Siamese city of Sukhothai.
For example, the number of gates and conguration was
also found in subsequent major Burmese capitals such as
the 11th century Pagan and 19th century Mandalay. The
citys conguration was also found at other contemporary
cities such as Maingmaw and Beikthano in the Pyu realm
and Danyawaddy and Wethali in Arakan as well as later
cities such as Sukhothai, which emerged over a millennium later. Structural remains of temples at Halin show
that the design of citys temples inuenced the 11th to
13th century temples at Pagan. Excavated artifacts point
to Halins Pyu script to be the earliest writing in the Pyu
realm (and in Burma). It was based on an earlier version
of the Brahmi script (Mauryan and Guptan). Inscriptions
at Sri Ksetra show a later version of the same script.[14]

Bawbawgyi Pagoda at Sri Ksetra, prototype of Pagan-era pagodas

ktj]; lit., Field of Fortune[15] or Field of

Glory[12] ), located 8 km southeast of Prome (Pyay) at
present-day Hmawza village,[16] was the last and southernmost Pyu capital. The city was founded between the
5th and 7th centuries, and likely overtook Halin as the
premier Pyu city by the 7th or 8th century, and retained
that status until the Mranma arrived in the 9th century.
The city was home to at least two dynasties, and maybe
three. The rst dynasty, called the Vikrama Dynasty, is
believed to have launched the Pyu calendar, which later
became the Burmese calendar, on 22 March 638.[2] The
on 25
Known for the production of salt, a highly prized com- second dynasty was founded by King Duttabaung
[17]
March
739
(11th
waxing
of
Tagu
101
ME).
modity in the rst millennium, Halin was superseded by
Sri Ksetra as the premier Pyu city-state circa 7th century. Sri Ksetra is the largest Pyu site discovered thus far.
By the Chinese accounts, Halin remained an important (Only Beikthano and Sri Ksetra have been extensively exPyu center until the 9th century when the Pyu realm came cavated. Other important Pyu cities as Maingmaw and
under repeated attacks from the Nanzhao Kingdom. The Binnaka could yield more artifacts with more extensive

3 ECONOMY

excavations.) It occupied a larger area than that of the 3 Economy

11th century Pagan or 19th century Mandalay. Circular
in design, Sri Ksetra was more than 13 km in circumfer3.1 Agriculture
ence and three to four km across, or about 1400 hectares
of occupied area. The citys brick walls were 4.5 meters
The economy of the Pyu city states was based on agrihigh, and had 12 gates with huge devas (deities) guarding
culture and trade. All important Pyu settlements were lothe entrances and a pagoda at each of the four corners.[17]
cated in the three main irrigated regions of Upper Burma,
It also has curving gateways, such as those found at Halin centered around the conuence of the Irrawaddy and
and Beikthano. In the center of the city was what most Chindwin rivers: Halin in the Mu valley, Maingmaw and
scholars think represented the rectangular palace site, Binnaka in the Kyaukse plains, nally Beikthano and Sri
518 meters by 343 meters, symbolizing both a mandala Ksetra at or near the Minbu district.[14] (The irrigation
and a zata (horoscope), like in Maingmaw.[17] Only the projects of the Pyu were later picked up by the Burmans.
southern half of the city was taken up by the palace, King Anawrahta of Pagan would build irrigation projects
monasteries and houses; the entire northern half consisted in these three regions in the 1050s to turn them into the
of rice elds. Together with the moats and walls, this ar- main rice granaries of Upper Burma. They would give
rangement ensured that the city could withstand a long Upper Burma an enduring economic base from which to
siege by enemies.[18]
dominate the Irrawaddy valley and its periphery in the fol[21]
Sri Ksetra was an important entrept between China and lowing centuries.[22] ) The Pyu grew rice, perhaps of the
India. It was located on the Irrawaddy, not far from Japonica variety.
the sea as the Irrawaddy delta had not yet been formed.
Ships from the Indian ocean could come up to Prome to
trade with the Pyu realm and China.[15] Trade with India
brought deep cultural contacts. Sri Ksetra has yielded the
most extensive remains of Theravada Buddhism. Religious art suggests several distinct occupations with earlier
inuences stemming from Southeast India and later inuences from Southwest India while 9th century inuences
include those from the Nanzhao Kingdom.[17] Much of
the Chinese account of the Pyu states was through Sri
Ksetra. Chinese pilgrims Xuanzang in 648 and Yijing in
675 mentioned Sri Ksetra in their accounts of Buddhist
kingdoms of Southeast Asia. The Tang histories mention
the arrival at the court of an embassy from the Pyu capital
in 801.[19]

2.6

Smaller settlements

See also: Tagaung Kingdom

3.2 Trade
The Pyu realm was an important trading center between
China and India in the rst millennium CE. Two main
trading routes passed through the Pyu states. As early
as 128 BCE, an overland trade route between China and
India existed across the northern Burma. An embassy
from the Roman Empire to China passed through this
route in 97 CE and again in 120 CE.[23] But the majority of the trade was conducted by sea through the southern Pyu states, which at the time were located not far
from the sea as much of the Irrawaddy delta had not yet
been formed, and as far south as upper Tenasserim coast
towns such as Winga, Hsindat-Myindat, Sanpannagon
and Mudon where Pyu artifacts have been found. (It is
insucient to conclude however that the Pyu had administrative and military control over these upper Tenasserim
coastal towns.)[24] The ports connected the overland trade
route to China via present-day Yunnan.
The trading area of the Pyu states spanned across the
present-day Southeast Asia, South Asia and China. Artifacts from the 2nd century northwest India to Java and the
Philippines have been found at Beikthano.[24] Likewise,
Pyu artifacts have been found along the coasts of Arakan,
Lower Burma, and as far east as c Eo (in present-day
southern Vietnam).[25] The Pyu also conducted trade and
diplomatic relations with China. In 800 and 801802,
Sri Ksetra sent a formal embassy, along with 35 musicians to the Tang court. According to the Chinese, the
Pyu used gold and silver coinage. But only silver coins
have survived.[26]

Many Pyu settlements have been found across Upper

Burma. They include Wati (an urban area west of Maingmaw), Ayadawkye Ywa in the Mu valley, west of Halin
and south of a recently discovered Bronze Age site called
Nyaunggan, and several others in Myinmu township,
which controls the mouth of the Mu river.[17] A small
but politically signicant Pyu site is Tagaung (
[d]) in northern Burma (about 200-km north of
Mandalay) where Pyu artifacts including funerary urns
have been excavated. The signicance is due to the fact
that the Burmese chronicles identify Tagaung as the home 3.3 Currency
of the rst Burmese kingdom.[20] Aside from Beikthano
and Sri Ksetra, most Pyu sites have not seen extensive or A notable feature of the Pyu states is the minting and use
of silver coinage. Originated in the Pegu area, these coins
any excavation.[17]

4.2

Language and script

date from the 5th century and were the model for most
rst millennium coinage in mainland Southeast Asia. The
earliest type of these coins is not inscribed and depicts a
conch on one side and a Srivatsa on the other. Many of
the coins had a small hole along the perimeter, and may
have also been used as amulets. Remarkably, after the use
of coins ceased at the end of Pyu period in the late 9th
century, coins did not reappear in the Burmese kingdoms
until the 19th century.[27]

4
4.1

Culture
Religion

5
By the 4th century, most of the Pyu had become predominantly Buddhist, though archaeological nds prove that
their pre-Buddhist practices remained rmly entrenched
in the following centuries. According to the excavated
texts, as well as the Chinese records, the predominant religion of the Pyu was Theravada Buddhism. The Theravada school prevalent in the Pyu realm was probably
derived from the Andhra region in southeast India, associated with the famous Theravada Buddhist scholar,
Buddhagosa.[28][29] It was the predominant Theravada
school in Burma until the late 12th century when Shin
Uttarajiva led the realignment with Ceylons Mahavihara
school.[30]
The archaeological nds also indicate a widespread presence of Tantric Buddhism, Mahayana Buddhism and
Hinduism. Avalokitevara (Lokanatha) (called Lawkanat
in Burmese;
[l ka na]), Tara, Manusi Buddhas, Vairavaa, and Hayagriva, all prominent in Mahayana Buddhism, were very much part of Pyu (and later
the Pagan) iconography scene. Various Hindu Brahman
iconography ranging from the Hindu trinity, Brahma,
Vishnu and Shiva, to Garuda and Lakshmi have been
found, especially in Lower Burma.[28]
Non-Theravada practices such as ceremonial cattle sacrice and alcohol consumption were main stays of the
Pyu life. Likewise, the greater prominence of nuns and
female students than in the later eras may point to preBuddhist notions of female autonomy.[31] In melding of
their pre-Buddhist practices to Buddhist ones, they placed
the remains of their cremated dead in pottery and stone
urns and buried them in or near isolated stupas, a practice
consistent with early Buddhist practices of interring the
remains of holy personages in stupas.[32]

Avalokitevara holding a lotus ower. Bihar, 9th century, CE.

The Pyu followed a mix of religious traditions.

The culture of Pyu city states was heavily inuenced by

India. Indian culture was most visible in the southern Pyu
realm through which most trade with India was conducted
by sea. The names of southernmost cities were in Pali
or Sanskrit derived like Sri Ksetra (Thaye Khittaya) and
Vishnu (Beikthano). The kings at Sri Ksetra titled themselves as Varmans and Varma. It was not just a southern phenomenon. To varying degrees, northern Pyu cities
and towns also became under the sway of Indian culture.
The Burmese chronicles claim that the founding kings of
Tagaung were descended from no less than the Sakya clan
of the Buddha himself.[28][29]

Though their religious beliefs was a syncretic mix of

many backgrounds, probably like in the early Pagan period, the outlook of the Pyu reportedly was largely peaceful. Tang Chinese records describe the Pyu as a humane
and peaceful people to whom war was virtually unknown
and who wore silk cotton instead of actually silk so that
they would not have to kill silk worms, and that many
Pyu boys entered the monastic life at seven to the age
of 20.[2][33] To be sure, this peaceful description by the
Chinese was a snapshot of the Pyu realm, and may not
represent the life in the city-states in general.

4.2 Language and script

Main articles: Pyu language (Burma) and Pyu script
The Pyu language was a Tibeto-Burman language, related to Old Burmese. But it apparently co-existed with
Sanskrit and Pali as the court language. The Chinese
records state that the 35 musicians that accompanied the
Pyu embassy to the Tang court in 800802 played music
and sang in the Fan (Sanskrit) language. Many of the important inscriptions were written in Sanskrit and/or Pali,
alongside the Pyu script. The Pyu sites have yielded a

5 ARCHITECTURE
building dams, canals and weirs found in pre-colonial Upper Burma trace their origins to the Pyu era and the Pagan
era. (Burmans likely introduced new water management
methods, especially the canal building techniques which
became the prevailing method of irrigation in the Pagan
era.)[22]

5.2 City planning

The Pyu city plans, consisted of square/rectangles and
circles, were a mix of indigenous and Indian designs. It is
believed that circular patterns inside the cities were Pyu
while the rectangle or square shape of the outer walls and
the use of 12 gates were Indian in origin. According to
historian Cooler, the adoption of Indian concepts of city
planning incorporated a belief in the ecacy of the world
axis that connects the centermost point in a properly constructed Mandala city with the city of the Gods above
(Tavatimsa heaven) in order to assure prosperity throughout the kingdom below.[27] Pyu-era city practices were
the forefathers of the latter-day Burmese city and palace
designs down to the 19th century Mandalay.[37]
The Myazedi inscription c. 11121113 in Pyu

5.3 Temple design

wide variety of Indian scripts from King Ashoka's edicts

written in north Indian Brahmi and Tamil Brahmi, both
dated to the 3rd and 2nd centuries BCE, to the Gupta
script and Kannada script dated to the 4th to 6th centuries
CE.[34][35]

4.3

Calendar

In addition to religion, the Pyu also imported science and

astronomical expertise from India. The Chinese records
also report that the Pyu knew how to make astronomical calculations.[2] The Pyu calendar was based on the
Buddhist calendar. There were two eras in use. The rst
was the Sakra Era, which was adopted in the Pyu realm
in 80 CE, just two years after the new era had come into
use in India. A second calendar was adopted at Sri Ksetra in 638, superseding the Sakra Era. The calendar, the
rst day of which was 22 March 638, later became the
Burmese calendar, and is still in use in present-day Myanmar. (The existence of two Pyu calendars has been cause
for dispute among scholars trying interpret the dates on
the nds.)[36]

Architecture

Shwezigon Pagoda (built in the 11th century) at Pagan, based on

earlier Pyu design

From the 4th century onward, the Pyu built many Buddhist stupas and other religious buildings. The styles,
ground plans, even the brick size and construction techniques of these buildings point to the Andhra region,
particularly Amaravati and Nagarjunakonda in presentday southeastern India. Some evidence of Ceylonese
contact is seen by the presence of Anuradhapura style
moonstones discovered at Beikthano and Halin. By
perhaps the 7th century, tall cylindrical stupas such as
the Bawbawgyi, Payagyi and Payama had emerged at Sri
Ksetra.[37]

The Pyu architecture greatly inuenced later Burmese

Buddhist temple designs. For example, temples at Sri
Ksetra such as the Bebe and Lemyethna were proto5.1 Irrigation structures
types for the later hollow (gu) temples of Pagan. The
The Pyu-era architectural practices greatly inuenced oor plan of the 13th century Somingyi Monastery at
later Pagan and Burmese architecture. The techniques of Pagan was largely identical to that of a 4th-century

7
monastery at Beikthano. The solid stupas of Sri Ksetra were in turn prototypes for Pagans such as the
Shwezigon, Shwehsandaw, and Mingalazedi, and ultimately, the Shwedagon in modern Yangon.[37]

swift horsemen from the north, the (Mranma) (Burmans) of the Nanzhao Kingdom entered the upper Irrawaddy valley through a series of raids. According to the
Tang Dynasty chronicles, the Nanzhao began their raids
of Upper Burma starting as early as 754[43] or 760.[2]
Nanzhao raids intensied in the 9th century, with the
Nanzhao raiding in 800-802, and again in 808-809. Fi6 Demography
nally, according to the Chinese, in 832, the Nanzhao warriors overran the Pyu country, and took away 3000 Pyu
The city-states were mainly populated by the Tibeto- prisoners from Halin. (In 835, the Chinese records say
Burman-speaking Pyu people, who like their cousins Bur- the Nanzhao also raided a state, generally identied by
mans are believed to have migrated from present-day some but not universally accepted to be a Pyu state.)
north central China, reconstructed as modern Qinghai
To be sure, the Pyu and their culture did not disappear
and Gansu provinces via Yunnan.[7][38][39] Extensive exjust because 3000 of them were taken away. The size of
ternal trade attracted sizable communities of Indians and
the Pyu realm and its many walled cities throughout the
the Mon, especially in the south. In the north, trickles of
land indicates a population many times over. Indeed, no
Burmans may have entered the Pyu realm from Yunnan
rm indications at Sri Ksetra or at any other Pyu site exist
as early as the 7th century. (Modern scholarship however
to suggest a violent overthrow. It is more likely that these
holds that Burmans did not arrive in large numbers unraids signicantly weakened the Pyu states, enabling the
til the mid-to-late 9th century, and perhaps as late as the
Burmans to move into Pyu territories.[27] At any rate,
10th century, according to radiocarbon dating of Pagans
evidence shows that the actual pace of Burman migrawalls.)
tion into the Pyu realm was gradual. Radiocarbon dating
The size of population of the Pyu realm was probably a shows that human activity existed until c. 870 at Halin,
few hundred thousand, given that the 17th and 18th cen- the subject of the 832 Nanzhao raid.[44] The Burmese
tury Burma (about the size of present-day Myanmar) only chronicles claim the Burmans founded the fortied city
had about 2 million people.
of Pagan (Bagan) in 849 but the oldest radiocarbon dated
evidence at Pagan (old walls) points to 980 CE while the
main walls point to circa 1020 CE, just 24 years earlier
than the beginning of the reign of Anawrahta, the founder
7 Administration
of Pagan Empire.[45]
The Pyu settlements were ruled by independent chiefs.
The chiefs at larger city-states later styled themselves as
kings, and established courts largely modeled after the Indian (Hindu) concepts of monarchy. Not all Hindu concepts such as divine kingship were fully adopted due to
the presence of Theravada Buddhism. It is not clear if a
vassalage-overlord relationship existed between the larger
city-states and smaller towns. The Burmese chronicles
mention alliances between the states such as one between
Beikthano and Sri Ksetra. By and large, each Pyu citystate appeared to have controlled just the city itself.[40]
The large size of the Pyu cities (660 to 1400 hectares)
vis-a-vis Pagan (only 140 hectares) suggests that much
of the population resided within the walls, as corroborated by the Chinese records.[41] Archaeology in Pagan
produced Pyu artifacts across a number of the settlements in the enclosed complex dating to the rst millennium, until approximately 1100 C.E. when a shift to a
monument-rich state and diusion beyond walled boundaries is evident.[42]

At any rate, the Burmans had overtaken the leadership of

the Pyu realm by the late 10th century, and went on to
found the Pagan Empire in the middle of the 11th century, unifying the Irrawaddy valley and its periphery for
the rst time. Nonetheless, the Pyu had left an indelible
mark on Pagan whose Burman rulers would incorporate
the histories and legends of the Pyu as their own. The
Burman kings of Pagan claimed descent from the kings
of Sri Ksetra and Tagaung as far back as 850 BCE
a claim dismissed by most modern scholars.[27][46] Pyu
settlements remained in Upper Burma for the next three
centuries but the Pyu gradually were absorbed and assimilated into the expanding Pagan Empire. The Pyu language still existed until the late 12th century but by the
13th century, the Pyu had assumed the Burman ethnicity
and disappeared into history.[3]

9 Current status of the nds

Aside from Sri Ksetra and Beikthano, the rest of the Pyu
sites have not been extensively excavated. The care of the
sites falls under the purview of the Ministry of Culture's
8 Decline of Pyu city-states
Department of Archaeology. In November 2011, the Department reportedly was planning a museum at Sri KseIt was a long-lasting civilization that lasted nearly a mil- tra, and working with the UNESCO to gain recognition
lennium to the early 9th century until a new group of for Sri Ksetra, Beikthano and Halin as World Heritage

12

sites and the three old cities were recognised as World

Heritage sites in 2014.[16]

10

See also

REFERENCES

[28] Aung-Thwin 2005: 3134

[29] Htin Aung 1967: 1517
[30] Harvey 1925: 5556
[31] Lieberman 2003: 116117

Pagan Dynasty

[32] Stargardt 1990: 200

Mon city-states

[33] Htin Aung 1967: 12

History of Burma

[34] Aung-Thwin 2005: 3536

[35] Harvey 1925: 4

11

Notes

[36] Htin Aung 1967: 1819

[37] Aung-Thwin 2005: pp. 3031

[1] Aung-Thwin (2005), p. 24

[2] Hall 1960: 810
[3] Myint-U 2006: 5152
[4] Cooler 2002: Chapter I: Prehistoric and Animist Periods
[5] Myint-U 2006: 45
[6] Hudson 2005: 1
[7] Moore 2007: 236
[8] Aung-Thwin 2005: 16
[9] Aung-Thwin 2005: 327
[10] Aung-Thwin 2005: 1819
[11] Aung-Thwin 2005: 2526

[38] Harvey 1925: 3

[39] Hall 1960: 11
[40] Htin Aung 1967: 1516
[41] Aung-Thwin 2005: 40
[42] Hudson, B.; Nyein, L.; Maung, W. (2001). The origins
of Bagan: new dates and old inhabitants. Asian Perspectives 40 (1): 4874. doi:10.1353/asi.2001.0009.
[43] Harvey 1925: 1315
[44] Aung-Thwin 2005: 3637
[45] Aung-Thwin 2005: 38
[46] Hall 1960: 7

[12] Aung-Thwin 1996: 77

[13] Aung-Thwin 2005: 328
[14] Aung-Thwin 2005: 2123
[15] Htin Aung 1967: 8
[16] Thein, Myanmar Times
[17] Aung-Thwin 2005: 2426
[18] Htin Aung 1967: 1011
[19] Htin Aung 1967: 2021
[20] Htin Aung 1967: 7, 16
[21] Harvey 1925: 2425
[22] Aung-Thwin 2005: 2627
[23] Htin Aung 1967: 7
[24] Aung-Thwin 2005: 2930
[25] Aung-Thwin 2005: 18
[26] Htin Aung 1967: 13
[27] Cooler 2002: Chapter II The Pre-Pagan Period: The Urban Age of the Mon and the Pyu

12 References
Aung-Thwin, Michael (1996).
Kingdom of
Bagan. In Gillian Cribbs. Myanmar Land of the
Spirits. Guernsey: Co & Bear Productions. ISBN
0-9527665-0-7.
Aung-Thwin, Michael (2005). The mists of Rmaa: The Legend that was Lower Burma (illustrated ed.). Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press.
ISBN 9780824828868.
Charney, Michael W. (2006). Powerful Learning:
Buddhist Literati and the Throne in Burmas Last
Dynasty, 17521885. Ann Arbor: University of
Michigan.
Cooler, Richard M. (2002). The Art and Culture
of Burma. Northern Illinois University.
Hall, D.G.E. (1960). Burma (3rd ed.). Hutchinson
University Library. ISBN 978-1-4067-3503-1.
Harvey, G. E. (1925). History of Burma: From the
Earliest Times to 10 March 1824. London: Frank
Cass & Co. Ltd.

9
Htin Aung, Maung (1967). A History of Burma.
New York and London: Cambridge University
Press.
Hudson, Bob (March 2005), A Pyu Homeland in
the Samon Valley: a new theory of the origins of
Myanmars early urban system, Myanmar Historical Commission Golden Jubilee International Conference
Lieberman, Victor B. (2003). Strange Parallels:
Southeast Asia in Global Context, c. 8001830, volume 1, Integration on the Mainland. Cambridge
University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-80496-7.
Moore, Elizabeth H. (2007). Early Landscapes of
Myanmar. Bangkok: River Books. ISBN 9749863-31-3.
Myint-U, Thant (2006). The River of Lost Footsteps-Histories of Burma. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
ISBN 978-0-374-16342-6.
Stargardt, Janice (1990). The Ancient Pyu of
Burma: Early Pyu cities in a man-made landscape
(illustrated ed.). PACSEA. ISBN 9781873178003.
Thein, Cherry (2011-11-14). Pyu burial site discovered at Sri Ksetra. The Myanmar Times.
Coordinates:
95.8186E

222812N 954907E / 22.4700N

10

13

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