Hanthawaddy kingdom

History

Chris Baker and Pasuk Phongpaichit read the founder's story as one about the closeness of trade and rule. In it Makadu comes from Martaban to trade at Sukhothai, rises to be governor of the palace, elopes with the king's daughter while the king is away at war, returns to Martaban and grows wealthy enough that its ruler plots against him, kills that ruler and takes the town, and then submits formally to Sukhothai. Rather than resenting the elopement the Sukhothai king welcomed the connection, sending regalia and a golden inscription that conferred the title chao fa ruea, prince of ships.

The kingdom also stood on a religious network. Over the 12th and 13th centuries the unification of the monkhood under the Mahavihara at Anuradhapura linked Sri Lanka to Buddhist communities at Arakan, Thaton, Pagan, Martaban, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Sukhothai, Chiang Mai and Ayutthaya. In 1361 Li Thai of Sukhothai brought a Lanka-trained monk from Martaban to head the Mango Grove monastery.

The energetic reign of King Razadarit (r. 1384–1421) cemented the kingdom's existence. Razadarit firmly unified the three Mon-speaking regions—Myaungmya, Donwun, and Martaban—and successfully fended off the northern Burmese-speaking Ava kingdom in the Forty Years' War (1385–1424), making the western kingdom of Rakhine a tributary from 1413 to 1421 in the process. The war ended in a stalemate but was a victory for Hanthawaddy as Ava finally gave up its dream of restoring the Pagan Empire. In the years following the war, Pegu occasionally aided Ava's southern vassal states of Prome and Taungoo in their rebellions but carefully avoided getting plunged into a full-scale war.

After the war, Hanthawaddy entered its golden age, whereas its rival Ava gradually declined. From the 1420s to the 1530s, Hanthawaddy was the most powerful and prosperous of all the post-Pagan kingdoms. Under a string of especially gifted monarchs – Binnya Ran I, Shin Sawbu, Dhammazedi and Binnya Ran II – it enjoyed a long golden age, profiting from foreign commerce. Its merchants traded with traders from across the Indian Ocean, filling the king's treasury with gold and silver, silk, and spices. The kingdom also became a famous centre of Theravada Buddhism. It established strong ties with Sri Lanka and encouraged reforms that spread throughout the country.

The powerful kingdom's end came abruptly. Since the late 15th century, Ava had tried to win the support of the Taungoo dynasty by entering into marriage alliances with King Mingyi Nyo, however from 1534 onwards, Ava came under constant raids by the Taungoo dynasty from Upper Burma. King Takayutpi could not marshal the kingdom's much greater resources and workforce against the much smaller Taungoo, led by King Tabinshwehti and his deputy general Bayinnaung. Taungoo captured Bago and the Irrawaddy Delta in 1538–39 and Mottama in 1541. The surrendered Pegu officials were offered amnesty and a pardon by Bayinnaung; they accepted and were placed in their old positions.

Hanthawaddy briefly revived in 1550 after Tabinshwehti was assassinated. But the "kingdom" did not extend much outside the city of Bago. Bayinnaung quickly defeated the rebellion in March 1552. Though Taungoo kings would rule all of Lower Burma well into the mid-18th century, the golden age of Hanthawaddy was fondly remembered by the Mon people of Lower Burma. In 1740, they rose up against a weak Taungoo Dynasty on its last legs and founded the restored Hanthawaddy kingdom.