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115-622: The Toungoo Empire ( Burmese : တောင်ငူခေတ် , [tàʊɴŋù kʰɪʔ] , lit. "Toungoo Period"; also known as the Second Myanmar Empire in traditional historiography, or simply the Taungoo Dynasty ) was the dominant power in mainland Southeast Asia in the second half of the 16th century. At its peak, Toungoo "exercised suzerainty from Manipur to the Cambodian marches and from the borders of Arakan to Yunnan " and

230-565: A pitch-register language like Shanghainese . There are four contrastive tones in Burmese. In the following table, the tones are shown marked on the vowel /a/ as an example. For example, the following words are distinguished from each other only on the basis of tone: In syllables ending with /ɰ̃/ , the checked tone is excluded: In spoken Burmese, some linguists classify two real tones (there are four nominal tones transcribed in written Burmese), "high" (applied to words that terminate with

345-640: A tonal , pitch-register , and syllable-timed language , largely monosyllabic and agglutinative with a subject–object–verb word order. It is a member of the Lolo-Burmese grouping of the Sino-Tibetan language family . The Burmese alphabet is ultimately descended from a Brahmic script , either the Kadamba or Pallava alphabets. Burmese belongs to the Southern Burmish branch of

460-884: A Chiang Rai rebellion against Lan Na (Chiang Mai) in 1599. By 1601, Lan Na was divided into three spheres: Chiang Mai, Siam-backed Chiang Rai, Lan Xang-backed Nan. Chiang Mai defeated the Siam-backed rebellion in Chiang Rai in 1602 only to submit to Ayutthaya later that year. Chiang Mai retook Nan from Lan Xang in 1603. In the western mainland, Siam invaded Lower Burma in 1600, and went on to attack Toungoo only to be driven back by Toungoo's ally Arakan. The Portuguese garrison at Syriam switched allegiance from Arakan to Goa in 1603. Siamese vassal Martaban then entered into an alliance with Portuguese Syriam. Ava had seized cis-Salween Shan states by 1604. Siam planned to invade Ava's vassal southern Shan states in 1605 before cancelling it because of

575-580: A branch of the fallen house (known retrospectively as the Restored Toungoo Dynasty or Nyaungyan Dynasty) had succeeded in reconstituting a major portion of the First Toungoo Empire, except for Siam, Lan Xang and Manipur. The new dynasty did not overextend itself by trying to take over Siam or Lan Xang. This was a more “realistic and organic” polity that would last until the mid-18th century. The new dynasty proceeded to create

690-430: A key administrative reform, which turned out to be his most important and most enduring of his legacies. The king permitted the sawbwas to retain their feudal rights over their subjects. The office of the sawbwa remained hereditary. But the incumbent sawbwa could now be removed by the king for gross misconduct although the king's choice of successor was limited to members of the sawbwa's own family. The key innovation

805-614: A lawless place. Toungoo's first rebellion of 1317–18 failed but its nominal overlord Pinya had little control over it. Usurpers routinely seized office by assassinating the governor—in 1325, 1344 and 1347—without incurring any reprisals by Pinya. In 1358, Toungoo outright revolted. Pinya's successor Ava (Inwa) regained Toungoo in 1367 but gubernatorial assassinations continued: 1375, 1376 and 1383, at times with Ava's own permission. Only in 1399 could Ava impose tighter control. By then, Toungoo, along with Prome (Pyay), had received waves of Burmese-speaking migrants, driven out of Upper Burma by

920-550: A lesser extent, Burmese has also imported words from Sanskrit (religion), Hindi (food, administration, and shipping), and Chinese (games and food). Burmese has also imported a handful of words from other European languages such as Portuguese . Here is a sample of loan words found in Burmese: Since the end of British rule, the Burmese government has attempted to limit usage of Western loans (especially from English) by coining new words ( neologisms ). For instance, for

1035-638: A political and legal system whose basic features would continue under the Konbaung dynasty (1752–1885) well into the 19th century. The Toungoo Empire was “in theory and fact, a poly-ethnic political formation.” The Toungoo kings largely employed then prevailing Southeast Asian administrative model of solar polities in which the high king ruled the core while semi-independent tributaries, autonomous viceroys, and governors actually controlled day-to-day administration and manpower. The system did not work well even for mid-size kingdoms like Ava and Siam. Now, because of

1150-608: A result, the High King heavily depended on the vassal king to be both loyal and able. Ineffective vassal rulers, who did not command respect from their local sub-vassal rulers, such as those in Lan Xang and in Upper Burma after 1584, only brought constant trouble for the crown. On the other hand, able kings such as Maha Thammarachathirat (r. 1569–90) of Siam and Thado Minsaw of Ava (r. 1555–84) kept their kingdoms peaceful for

1265-461: A series of elaborate reclamation and irrigation projects to compensate for the Sittaung valley's modest agriculture. By the 1490s, Toungoo had grown, and a more confident Nyo began to test the limits of his authority. He built a new “palace”, replete with royal pretensions, in 1491. He then, without Ava's permission, raided Hanthawaddy territory, during the southern kingdom's succession crisis. It

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1380-594: A single campaign was about 70,000. A major weakness of the system was that the vast majority of the potential levy hailed from outside the capital region. In 1581, only 21% of residents within a 200-km radius of Pegu were ahmudans (whereas in 1650 in the Restored Toungoo period, over 40% of the ahmudans were within 200 km of the capital Ava). It meant that the High King of the First Toungoo period needed to rely far more on his vassal rulers to raise

1495-473: A small but strong regional power. History shows that the former vassal was about to "overawe the metropole". The period between 1526 and 1533 saw power change hands in all of the major states of Burma. Three of the states were succeeded by weak rulers: Taka Yut Pi (r. 1526–39) at Hanthawaddy; Bayin Htwe (r. 1527–32) and Narapati (r. 1532–39) at Prome; and Thohanbwa (r. 1533–42) at Ava (Confederation). Two of

1610-466: A stop or check, high-rising pitch) and "ordinary" (unchecked and non-glottal words, with falling or lower pitch), with those tones encompassing a variety of pitches. The "ordinary" tone consists of a range of pitches. Linguist L. F. Taylor concluded that "conversational rhythm and euphonic intonation possess importance" not found in related tonal languages and that "its tonal system is now in an advanced state of decay." The syllable structure of Burmese

1725-552: A stroke, over two centuries of Shan raids into Upper Burma, and "extended lowland control much farther than Pagan had dreamed possible:" Pegu now “exercised suzerainty from Manipur to the Cambodian marches and from the borders of Arakan to Yunnan.” Bayinnaung's authority would be vigorously contested in the following decade. His forces never quite vanquished the Lan Xang resistance in the Laotian hills and jungles, and in 1568, Siam,

1840-555: A western mainland polity "to conquer the central mainland rather than vice versa". Even at the peak of its might, the Toungoo military had the most difficult time controlling remote hill states. They never solved the sheer logistical issues of transporting and feeding large numbers of troops for sustained periods of time. Bayinnaung's persistence in sending troops year after year cost an untold number of lives, which at one point caused his senior advisers to murmur loudly. The conqueror king

1955-399: Is C(G)V((V)C), which is to say the onset consists of a consonant optionally followed by a glide , and the rime consists of a monophthong alone, a monophthong with a consonant, or a diphthong with a consonant. The only consonants that can stand in the coda are /ʔ/ and /ɰ̃/ . Some representative words are: Pinya Pinya ( Burmese : ပင်းယ ), or Vijayapura , was the capital of

2070-442: Is pronounced [mõ̀ũndã́ĩ] . The vowels of Burmese are: The monophthongs /e/ , /o/ , /ə/ , /ɛ/ and /ɔ/ occur only in open syllables (those without a syllable coda ); the diphthongs /ei/ , /ou/ , /ai/ and /au/ occur only in closed syllables (those with a syllable coda). /ə/ only occurs in a minor syllable , and is the only vowel that is permitted in a minor syllable (see below). The close vowels /i/ and /u/ and

2185-759: Is remarkably uniform among Burmese speakers, particularly those living in the Irrawaddy valley, all of whom use variants of Standard Burmese. The standard dialect of Burmese (the Mandalay - Yangon dialect continuum ) comes from the Irrawaddy River valley. Regional differences between speakers from Upper Burma (e.g., Mandalay dialect), called anya tha ( အညာသား ) and speakers from Lower Burma (e.g., Yangon dialect), called auk tha ( အောက်သား ), largely occur in vocabulary choice, not in pronunciation. Minor lexical and pronunciation differences exist throughout

2300-584: Is the value of the four native final nasals: ⟨မ်⟩ /m/ , ⟨န်⟩ /n/ , ⟨ဉ်⟩ /ɲ/ , ⟨င်⟩ /ŋ/ , as well as the retroflex ⟨ဏ⟩ /ɳ/ (used in Pali loans) and nasalisation mark anusvara demonstrated here above ka (က → ကံ) which most often stands in for a homorganic nasal word medially as in တံခါး tankhá 'door', and တံတား tantá 'bridge', or else replaces final -m ⟨မ်⟩ in both Pali and native vocabulary, especially after

2415-638: Is the word "moon", which can be လ la̰ (native Tibeto-Burman), စန္ဒာ/စန်း [sàndà]/[sã́] (derivatives of Pali canda 'moon'), or သော်တာ [t̪ɔ̀ dà] (Sanskrit). The consonants of Burmese are as follows: According to Jenny & San San Hnin Tun (2016 :15), contrary to their use of symbols θ and ð, consonants of သ are dental stops ( /t̪, d̪/ ), rather than fricatives ( /θ, ð/ ) or affricates. These phonemes, alongside /sʰ/ , are prone to merger with /t, d, s/ . An alveolar /ɹ/ can occur as an alternate of /j/ in some loanwords. The final nasal /ɰ̃/

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2530-491: The [ ɹ ] sound, which has become [ j ] in standard Burmese. Moreover, Arakanese features a variety of vowel differences, including the merger of the ဧ [e] and ဣ [i] vowels. Hence, a word like "blood" သွေး is pronounced [θw é ] in standard Burmese and [θw í ] in Arakanese. The Burmese language's early forms include Old Burmese and Middle Burmese . Old Burmese dates from

2645-588: The /l/ medial, which is otherwise only found in Old Burmese inscriptions. They also often reduce the intensity of the glottal stop . Beik has 250,000 speakers while Tavoyan has 400,000. The grammatical constructs of Burmese dialects in Southern Myanmar show greater Mon influence than Standard Burmese. The most pronounced feature of the Arakanese language of Rakhine State is its retention of

2760-455: The Bago Yoma range and southern Shan Hills . The narrow valley at the southern edge of the dry zone was not easily accessible from Central or Upper Burma; the best access to the region was from the south, via the Sittaung. Its hard-to-reach location would shape much of its early history. In the 14th century, the settlement grew to be the principal city of the frontier region, which remained

2875-527: The Burmese alphabet began employing cursive-style circular letters typically used in palm-leaf manuscripts , as opposed to the traditional square block-form letters used in earlier periods. The orthographic conventions used in written Burmese today can largely be traced back to Middle Burmese. Modern Burmese emerged in the mid-18th century. By this time, male literacy in Burma stood at nearly 50%, which enabled

2990-618: The English language in the colonial educational system, especially in higher education. In the 1930s, the Burmese language saw a linguistic revival, precipitated by the establishment of an independent University of Rangoon in 1920 and the inception of a Burmese language major at the university by Pe Maung Tin , modeled on Anglo Saxon language studies at the University of Oxford. Student protests in December of that year, triggered by

3105-723: The Mon people , who until recently formed the majority in Lower Burma . Most Mon loanwords are so well assimilated that they are not distinguished as loanwords, as Burmese and Mon were used interchangeably for several centuries in pre-colonial Burma. Mon loans are often related to flora, fauna, administration, textiles, foods, boats, crafts, architecture, and music. As a natural consequence of British rule in Burma , English has been another major source of vocabulary, especially with regard to technology, measurements, and modern institutions. English loanwords tend to take one of three forms: To

3220-534: The Myanma Salonpaung Thatpon Kyan ( မြန်မာ စာလုံးပေါင်း သတ်ပုံ ကျမ်း ), was compiled in 1978 by the commission. Burmese is a diglossic language with two distinguishable registers (or diglossic varieties ): The literary form of Burmese retains archaic and conservative grammatical structures and modifiers (including affixes and pronouns) no longer used in the colloquial form. Literary Burmese, which has not changed significantly since

3335-654: The Pagan Empire by 1550. His more celebrated successor Bayinnaung then greatly expanded the empire, conquering much of mainland Southeast Asia by 1565. He spent the next decade keeping the empire intact, putting down rebellions in Siam , Lan Xang and the northernmost Shan states . From 1576 onwards, he declared a large sphere of influence in westerly lands—trans-Manipur states, Arakan and Ceylon . The empire, held together by patron-client relationships , declined soon after his death in 1581. His successor Nanda never gained

3450-614: The Pyu language . These indirect borrowings can be traced back to orthographic idiosyncrasies in these loanwords, such as the Burmese word "to worship", which is spelt ပူဇော် ( pūjo ) instead of ပူဇာ ( pūjā ), as would be expected by the original Pali orthography. The transition to Middle Burmese occurred in the 16th century. The transition to Middle Burmese included phonological changes (e.g. mergers of sound pairs that were distinct in Old Burmese) as well as accompanying changes in

3565-566: The Sino-Tibetan languages , of which Burmese is the most widely spoken of the non- Sinitic languages. Burmese was the fifth of the Sino-Tibetan languages to develop a writing system, after Classical Chinese , Pyu , Old Tibetan and Tangut . The majority of Burmese speakers, who live throughout the Irrawaddy River Valley, use a number of largely similar dialects, while a minority speak non-standard dialects found in

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3680-543: The Toungoo armed forces , the upstart kingdom seized up to Pagan (Bagan) from the Confederation by 1545. The campaigns against Arakan (1545–47) and Siam (1547–49) , however, fell short. In both campaigns, Toungoo forces won all major open battles but could not overcome the heavily fortified defences of Mrauk-U and Ayutthaya . Despite the setbacks, Tabinshwehti had founded the most powerful polity in Burma since

3795-457: The eleventh ruler of Toungoo to be assassinated in office. The assassin was none other than his nephew Mingyi Nyo (r. 1510–30). It would be yet another rebellion except that Nyo won Minkhaung's acquiescence by offering his full support to the embattled king. Nyo turned out to be an able leader. He quickly brought law and order to the region, which attracted refugees from other parts of Central and Upper Burma. Using increased manpower, he sponsored

3910-413: The 11th to the 16th century ( Pagan to Ava dynasties); Middle Burmese from the 16th to the 18th century ( Toungoo to early Konbaung dynasties); modern Burmese from the mid-18th century to the present. Word order , grammatical structure, and vocabulary have remained markedly stable well into Modern Burmese, with the exception of lexical content (e.g., function words ). The earliest attested form of

4025-457: The 13th century, is the register of Burmese taught in schools. In most cases, the corresponding affixes in the literary and spoken forms are totally unrelated to each other. Examples of this phenomenon include the following lexical terms: Historically the literary register was preferred for written Burmese on the grounds that "the spoken style lacks gravity, authority, dignity". In the mid-1960s, some Burmese writers spearheaded efforts to abandon

4140-537: The 16th-century Burmese legalism was "quite different from those of its neighbors in East and South Asia", and some aspects "are reminiscent of Western European approaches to law and kingship." Bayinnaung promoted the new law throughout the empire so far as it was compatible with customs and practices of local society. The adoption of Burmese customary law and the Burmese calendar in Siam began in his reign. He also standardised

4255-410: The 19th century, in addition to concomitant economic and political instability in Upper Burma (e.g., increased tax burdens from the Burmese crown, British rice production incentives, etc.) also accelerated the migration of Burmese speakers from Upper Burma into Lower Burma. British rule in Burma eroded the strategic and economic importance of the Burmese language; Burmese was effectively subordinated to

4370-821: The Ava rebellion in 1584, the king never did establish firm control over Upper Burma and the surrounding Shan states. He could not get the most populous region in Burma to contribute much to his war effort in Siam. (His best troop levels were never more than a third of his father's.) He should have focused on reestablishing his authority in Upper Burma, and let Siam go—but he could not see it. He feared that acknowledging Ayutthaya's independence would invite yet more Tai rebellions, some perhaps closer to home. Nanda launched five major punitive campaigns against Siam between 1584 and 1593, all of which failed disastrously. With each Siamese victory, other vassals grew more inclined to throw off allegiance and more reluctant to contribute military forces. By

4485-526: The British in the lead-up to the independence of Burma in 1948. The 1948 Constitution of Burma prescribed Burmese as the official language of the newly independent nation. The Burma Translation Society and Rangoon University's Department of Translation and Publication were established in 1947 and 1948, respectively, with the joint goal of modernizing the Burmese language in order to replace English across all disciplines. Anti-colonial sentiment throughout

4600-557: The Buddhist clergy (monks) from the laity ( householders ), especially when speaking to or about bhikkhus (monks). The following are examples of varying vocabulary used for Buddhist clergy and for laity: Burmese primarily has a monosyllabic received Sino-Tibetan vocabulary. Nonetheless, many words, especially loanwords from Indo-European languages like English, are polysyllabic, and others, from Mon, an Austroasiatic language, are sesquisyllabic . Burmese loanwords are overwhelmingly in

4715-688: The Burmese language into Lower Burma also coincided with the emergence of Modern Burmese. As late as the mid-1700s, Mon , an Austroasiatic language, was the principal language of Lower Burma, employed by the Mon people who inhabited the region. Lower Burma's shift from Mon to Burmese was accelerated by the Burmese-speaking Konbaung Dynasty 's victory over the Mon-speaking Restored Hanthawaddy Kingdom in 1757. By 1830, an estimated 90% of

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4830-469: The Burmese language is called Old Burmese , dating to the 11th and 12th century stone inscriptions of Pagan . The earliest evidence of the Burmese alphabet is dated to 1035, while a casting made in the 18th century of an old stone inscription points to 984. Owing to the linguistic prestige of Old Pyu in the Pagan Kingdom era, Old Burmese borrowed a substantial corpus of vocabulary from Pali via

4945-680: The First Toungoo's formula of greater military experience, modern firearms and (comparatively greater) manpower to partially restore the empire in the following two decades. Likewise, Siam's military service system, phrai luang , was reorganised, modelled after the ahmudan system in the 1570s—indeed to fulfill Bayinnaung's demands for conscripts. Likewise, the First Toungoo dynasty's military strategy and tactics were likely adopted by Siam's new generation of leadership, Naresuan and Ekathotsarot , who grew up in Pegu, and were most probably exposed to Toungoo military strategy. By 1600, Siam had not only regained

5060-527: The High King they were loyal to: Bayinnaung. The downside was that the able rulers were also the most likely to revolt when the High King was not Bayinnaung; and they did. A rank below the vassal kingdoms were the princely states, ruled by sawbwas (chiefs, princes). Except for Manipur , they were all Shan states that ringed the upper Irrawaddy valley (i.e. the Kingdom of Ava) from the Kalay State in

5175-658: The Irrawaddy River valley toward peripheral areas of the country. These varieties include the Yaw , Palaw, Myeik (Merguese), Tavoyan and Intha dialects . Despite substantial vocabulary and pronunciation differences, there is mutual intelligibility among most Burmese dialects. Below is a summary of lexical similarity between major Burmese dialects: Dialects in Tanintharyi Region , including Palaw, Merguese, and Tavoyan, are especially conservative in comparison to Standard Burmese. The Tavoyan and Intha dialects have preserved

5290-552: The Irrawaddy River valley. For instance, for the term ဆွမ်း , "food offering [to a monk]", Lower Burmese speakers use [sʰʊ́ɰ̃] instead of [sʰwáɰ̃] , which is the pronunciation used in Upper Burma. The standard dialect is represented by the Yangon dialect because of the modern city's media influence and economic clout. In the past, the Mandalay dialect represented standard Burmese. The most noticeable feature of

5405-518: The Mandalay dialect is its use of the first person pronoun ကျွန်တော် , kya.nau [tɕənɔ̀] by both men and women, whereas in Yangon, the said pronoun is used only by male speakers while ကျွန်မ , kya.ma. [tɕəma̰] is used by female speakers. Moreover, with regard to kinship terminology , Upper Burmese speakers differentiate the maternal and paternal sides of a family, whereas Lower Burmese speakers do not. The Mon language has also influenced subtle grammatical differences between

5520-479: The OB vowel *u e.g. ငံ ngam 'salty', သုံး thóum ('three; use'), and ဆုံး sóum 'end'. It does not, however, apply to ⟨ည်⟩ which is never realised as a nasal, but rather as an open front vowel [iː] [eː] or [ɛː] . The final nasal is usually realised as nasalisation of the vowel. It may also allophonically appear as a homorganic nasal before stops. For example, in /mòʊɰ̃dáɪɰ̃/ ('storm'), which

5635-452: The Pegu court—e.g., Saw Lagun Ein , Smim Payu , Binnya Dala , Binnya Law, Daw Binnya, Binnya Kyan Htaw—were most probably ethnic Mons . The word used by European visitors to describe a court official was semini, Italian translation of smim , Mon for lord. Surrounding the core region were the tributary kingdoms. The vassal rulers were still styled as kings, and were allowed to retain full royal regalia. They were required to send tributes to

5750-451: The Shan high lands (1 million) and Lower Burma (0.5 million)—for a total of at least 5.5 million. Estimates for Lan Na, Lan Xang and Manipur are not known. The size of the population of the empire before the devastating wars of 1584–99 was probably over 6 million. The population of the Pegu capital region, according to a 1581 census, was only about 200,000. Burmese language Burmese is

5865-414: The Shan states and Manipur towards Pegu's war effort in Siam. Bayinnaung considered control of the Shan states of utmost strategic importance for his hold of the upcountry. Raids by nearby highland Shan states had been an overhanging concern for successive lowland regimes since the 14th century. The most feared were Mohnyin and Mogaung, the twin Shan states, which led most of the raids. Bayinnaung introduced

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5980-422: The Shan states. However, the advantage of firearms was neutralised against Siam, a prosperous coastal power with its own well-equipped military. Another key factor was Toungoo's "more martial culture" and "more aggressive leadership". Toungoo was a product of Upper Burma's ceaseless wars of the prior centuries. In the age of rampant gubernatorial revolts, any rulers hoping to rule a kingdom needed to take command of

6095-595: The Tai-Shan world finally became quiet, the king turned his attention to Portuguese Goa and the advancing Mughal Empire in the west. In response to competing requests by the Ceylonese kingdoms of Kotte and Kandy for military aid, he finally sent an elite army in 1576 to Kotte, which he considered a protectorate, ostensibly to protect Theravada Buddhism on the island from the Portuguese threat. Goa considered it

6210-520: The Tenasserim coast from Burma but also expanded deeper into Cambodia. After 1614, an equilibrium of sorts prevailed between the two successor states. Neither state extended in any direction to a point her supply lines were more extended than those of her nearest rival. Estimates of the population of the empire point to over 6 million. In 1600, the most populous region of the erstwhile empire was Siam (2.5 million), followed by Upper Burma (1.5 million),

6325-491: The adoption of neologisms. An example is the word "university", formerly ယူနီဗာစတီ [jùnìbàsətì] , from English university , now တက္ကသိုလ် [tɛʔkət̪ò] , a Pali-derived neologism recently created by the Burmese government and derived from the Pali spelling of Taxila ( တက္ကသီလ Takkasīla ), an ancient university town in modern-day Pakistan. Some words in Burmese may have many synonyms, each having certain usages, such as formal, literary, colloquial, and poetic. One example

6440-491: The all-important Kyaukse granary . In 1503, Nyo's forces began surreptitiously aiding ongoing rebellions in the south. In 1504, he openly entered into an alliance with Prome with the intention of taking over all of Central Burma. But Ava was not yet a spent force. It decisively defeated the alliance's raids in 1504–05 and in 1507–08. The setbacks forced Mingyi Nyo to recalibrate his ambitions. He formally declared independence from Ava in 1510 but also withdrew from participating in

6555-516: The army. All senior princes of the House of Toungoo received a military style education since childhood, and were expected to take the field in person. Several Toungoo leaders of the era, including Tabinshwehti, Bayinnaung, Nanda, Thado Minsaw , Minye Thihathu , Thado Dhamma Yaza III and Natshinnaung , first took the field in their teenage years. This kind of martial tradition simply did not exist in "far larger, more secure" kingdoms like Siam. (Indeed,

6670-423: The breakaway states of the empire had been engaged in a series of “confused, many-sided wars” since the mid-1590s. Prome attacked Toungoo in 1595. Prome and Ava fought for central Burma in 1596–97. Prome and Toungoo later agreed to attack Ava in 1597 but Toungoo broke off the alliance and attacked Prome in 1597. In the central mainland, Lan Xang and Lan Na went to war in 1595–96 and again in 1598–1603. Siam supported

6785-525: The close portions of the diphthongs are somewhat mid-centralized ( [ɪ, ʊ] ) in closed syllables, i.e. before /ɰ̃/ and /ʔ/ . Thus နှစ် /n̥iʔ/ ('two') is phonetically [n̥ɪʔ] and ကြောင် /tɕàũ/ ('cat') is phonetically [tɕàʊ̃] . Burmese is a tonal language , which means phonemic contrasts can be made on the basis of the tone of a vowel. In Burmese, these contrasts involve not only pitch , but also phonation , intensity (loudness), duration, and vowel quality. However, some linguists consider Burmese

6900-405: The confused, multi-party wars of 1590s and 1600s. The Pegu court did not possess a centrally run bureaucracy, as Restored Toungoo and Konbaung dynasties would attempt, to administer the vassal states. Unlike in later periods, Pegu even at the height of the empire maintained no permanent military garrisons, or representatives in the vassal states to keep an eye on the local ruler in the peacetime. As

7015-463: The country's history”, ceased to exist; it was also the "shortest-lived" major dynasty. The First Toungoo Empire was "a victim of its own success." Its "stunning military conquests were not matched by stable administrative controls in the Tai world or outlying areas of the Irrawaddy basin," and the "overheated" empire "disintegrated no less rapidly than it had been constructed". Even before the fall of Pegu,

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7130-475: The crown but they generally had a freehand in the rest of the administration. Pegu generally did not get involved in local administration; its remit was national. The court launched standardisation drives to unify laws, weights and measurements, calendars, and Buddhist reforms throughout the empire. The court also drew the borders between the vassal states. But the centuries-old disputes never went away. They resurfaced as soon as Pegu's authority waned, and resulted in

7245-770: The crown. The quotas were fixed until the 17th century, when Restored Toungoo kings instituted variable quotas to take advantage of demographic fluctuations. The earliest extant record of organisation of the Royal Burmese Army dates only from 1605 but the organizational structure of the earlier First Toungoo era is likely to be similar, if not essentially the same. A 1605 royal order decreed that each regiment shall consist of 1000 foot soldiers under 100 company leaders called akyat ( အကြပ် ), 10 battalion commanders called ahsaw ( အဆော် ) and 1 commander called ake ( အကဲ ), and all must be equipped with weapons including guns and cannon. A typical 17th-century regiment

7360-669: The early post-independence era led to a reactionary switch from English to Burmese as the national medium of education, a process that was accelerated by the Burmese Way to Socialism . In August 1963, the socialist Union Revolutionary Government established the Literary and Translation Commission (the immediate precursor of the Myanmar Language Commission ) to standardize Burmese spelling, diction, composition, and terminology. The latest spelling authority, named

7475-495: The entire Tai-Shan world to tributary status: cis- Salween Shan states (1557), Lan Na (1558), Manipur (1560), Keng Tung (1562), the Chinese Shan States (1563), Siam (1564) and Lan Xang (1565). The victories were enabled by a more martial culture and greater military experience of Toungoo armies, Portuguese firearms, and the greater manpower that came with each successive victory. The conquests ended at

7590-425: The entire Tenasserim coast in 1595, and the rest of the vassals had broken away—de jure or de facto—by 1597. The breakaway state of Toungoo and the western kingdom of Arakan jointly invaded Lower Burma in 1598, and captured Pegu in 1599. The allies thoroughly looted, and burned down the imperial capital, “one of the wonders of Asia”, in 1600. The First Toungoo Dynasty, “the most adventurous and militarily successful in

7705-453: The fall of Pagan in 1287. The king attempted to forge a "Mon–Burman synthesis" by actively courting the support of ethnic Mons of Lower Burma, many of whom were appointed to the highest positions in his government and armed forces. But the nascent empire fell apart right after Tabinshwehti was assassinated in 1550. Several vassal rulers immediately declared independence, forcing Tabinshwehti's chosen successor Bayinnaung (r. 1550–81) to reunify

7820-598: The form of nouns . Historically, Pali , the liturgical language of Theravada Buddhism , had a profound influence on Burmese vocabulary. Burmese has readily adopted words of Pali origin; this may be due to phonotactic similarities between the two languages, alongside the fact that the script used for Burmese can be used to reproduce Pali spellings with complete accuracy. Pali loanwords are often related to religion, government, arts, and science. Burmese loanwords from Pali primarily take four forms: Burmese has also adapted numerous words from Mon, traditionally spoken by

7935-473: The full support of the vassal rulers, and presided over the empire's precipitous collapse in the next 18 years. The First Toungoo Empire marked the end of the period of petty kingdoms in mainland Southeast Asia. Although the overextended empire proved ephemeral, the forces that underpinned its rise were not. Its two main successor states— Restored Toungoo Burma and Ayutthaya Siam—went on to dominate western and central mainland Southeast Asia, respectively, down to

8050-498: The general who put down the latest Toungoo rebellion, viceroy-general of the restive province. A distant member of the Ava royalty, Sithu Kyawhtin remained loyal to Thihathura's successor Minkhaung II (r. 1480–1501), who was greeted with a wave of rebellions by lords of Yamethin (1480), Salin (1481) and Prome (1482). Sithu Kyawhtin died in action at Yamethin in 1481, and was succeeded by his son Min Sithu . In 1485, Min Sithu became

8165-453: The intermediary between Pegu and the hill states. But in Nanda's reign, the court became concerned by the overly close relationship between Thado Minsaw and the sawbwas . From 1584 onwards except for 1587–93, Nanda pursued a policy of devolution in the upcountry in which Ava's role was essentially eliminated. The direct rule did not work as evidenced by the near total absence of contribution from

8280-516: The internecine warfare. Ava could not and did not take any action. It was facing an existential threat in the ongoing war with the Confederation of Shan States , and would ultimately fall in 1527. In the meantime, Nyo focused on strengthening the economy and the stability of his kingdom. His policy of non-interference attracted refugees to the only region in Upper Burma at peace. By his death in 1530, Mingyi Nyo had successfully turned Toungoo into

8395-522: The introduction of English into matriculation examinations , fueled growing demand for Burmese to become the medium of education in British Burma; a short-lived but symbolic parallel system of "national schools" that taught in Burmese, was subsequently launched. The role and prominence of the Burmese language in public life and institutions was championed by Burmese nationalists, intertwined with their demands for greater autonomy and independence from

8510-405: The kingdom in the next two years. Bayinnaung then pushed up the Irrawaddy in an effort to join Upper Burma and Lower Burma for the first time since Pagan. Victory in the north "promised to strengthen control over interior gems and bullion, and to supply additional levies." In 1555, Upper Burma fell to the southern forces. Over the next decade, a series of “breathtaking campaigns” reduced Manipur and

8625-400: The land. But he introduced administrative reforms only at the margins. The "absurdly overextended" empire was largely held together by his personal relationships with the vassal rulers, who were loyal to him and not to Toungoo Burma. In the tradition of the prevailing Southeast Asian administrative model , every new high king had to establish his authority with the vassals all over again. This

8740-717: The larger and wealthier but disunited kingdom to the south. In 1534, Toungoo forces began annual raids into Hanthawaddy territory. They finally broke through in 1538, capturing Pegu (Bago) and the Irrawaddy delta. In 1539, Tabinshwehti moved the capital to Pegu where it would remain until the end of the century. Toungoo went on to conquer all of Lower Burma by 1541, gaining complete control of Lower Burma's manpower, access to Portuguese firearms and maritime wealth to pay for them. And Tabinshwehti would quickly exploit these newfound assets for further expansions. By incorporating Portuguese mercenaries, firearms and military tactics as well as experienced former Hanthawaddy military commanders to

8855-413: The late Pagan period . In 1191, King Sithu II (r. 1174–1211) appointed Ananda Thuriya governor of Kanba Myint . In 1279, two great-grandsons of Ananda Thuriya— Thawun Gyi and Thawun Nge —founded a new settlement of 370 households, about 40 km farther south. It was named Toungoo (Taungoo) ( တောင်ငူ , "Hill's Spur") because of its location by the hills in the narrow Sittaung river valley between

8970-589: The late 1530s. The Burmese later learned to integrate matchlocks into both infantry and elephanteer units. In some late 16th-century campaigns, as high as 20–33 percent of the troops were equipped with muskets. But artillery units continued to be manned by foreign mercenaries throughout the 16th century. Toungoo artillery corps never acquired massive siege guns of Europe but they "used Portuguese cannon to good effect by mounting them on high mounds or towers, and then shooting down into besieged towns". Portuguese firearms proved particularly effective against interior states like

9085-476: The late 1580s and early 1590s, Pegu had to lean ever more heavily on the already modest population of Lower Burma for the debilitating war effort. Able men all over Lower Burma fled military service to become monks, debt slaves, private retainers, or refugees in nearby kingdoms. As more cultivators fled, rice prices in Lower Burma reached unheard of levels. The empire's precipitous collapse ensued. Siam seized

9200-515: The literary form, asserting that the spoken vernacular form ought to be used. Some Burmese linguists such as Minn Latt , a Czech academic, proposed moving away from the high form of Burmese altogether. Although the literary form is heavily used in written and official contexts (literary and scholarly works, radio news broadcasts, and novels), the recent trend has been to accommodate the spoken form in informal written contexts. Nowadays, television news broadcasts, comics, and commercial publications use

9315-450: The mid-18th century. The polity is known by a number of names. The prevailing terms used by most international scholars are the "First Toungoo Dynasty"; the "First Toungoo Empire"; and/or the "Second Burmese Empire". In traditional Burmese historiography, however, the period is known as either the "Toungoo–Hanthawaddy Period" ( တောင်ငူ–ဟံသာဝတီ ခေတ် ), or simply the "Toungoo Period" ( တောင်ငူ ခေတ် ). Furthermore, in international usage,

9430-663: The most powerful vassal state, revolted. Leveraging the manpower of much of the western and central mainland, he managed to defeat the Siamese rebellion with great difficulty in 1569. Yet defeating the guerrilla resistance at the remote hill states— Mohnyin and Mogaung in the extreme north also revolted in 1571—proved far more difficult. Toungoo armies suffered heavy casualties from disease and starvation in their fruitless annual campaigns in search of elusive bands of rebels. Pegu reestablished some semblance of control over Lan Xang only in 1575 and Mohnyin and Mogaung in 1576. No sooner than

9545-545: The northwest to the Mong Pai State in the southeast. Manipur was not a Shan state, and its ruler styled himself raja (king). Nevertheless, Pegu classified the raja a " sawbwa ", and treated Manipur as another princely state, albeit a major one. Two other major states were Kengtung and Mogaung, whose rulers retained the full royal regalia. For administrative purposes, the court grouped the states into provinces ( taing (တိုင်း)). During Bayinnaung's reign, Ava served as

9660-410: The official English spelling of the city after which the dynasty is named since 1989 has been "Taungoo", replacing the older spelling of Toungoo; likewise, the older spellings such as Ava, Pegu, Martaban are now Innwa, Bago and Mottama; and so on. However, the changes have not been adopted in international publications on Burmese history. The earliest known record of administration of the region dates to

9775-473: The old Hanthawaddy Kingdom; Bayinnaung later annexed the Siamese Province of Mergui into the core administration for its maritime revenues. The provinces and their constituent divisions were ruled by vassal rulers, who lived off apanage grants and local taxes. The core region's bureaucracy was a continuation of the old Hanthawaddy court. Most local governors as well as most officials and ministers at

9890-668: The peripheral areas of the country. These dialects include: Arakanese in Rakhine State and Marma in Bangladesh are also sometimes considered dialects of Burmese and sometimes as separate languages. Despite vocabulary and pronunciation differences, there is mutual intelligibility among Burmese dialects, as they share a common set of tones, consonant clusters, and written script. However, several Burmese dialects differ substantially from standard Burmese with respect to vocabulary, lexical particles, and rhymes. Spoken Burmese

10005-589: The population in Lower Burma self-identified as Burmese-speaking Bamars; huge swaths of former Mon-speaking territory, from the Irrawaddy Delta to upriver in the north, spanning Bassein (now Pathein) and Rangoon (now Yangon) to Tharrawaddy, Toungoo, Prome (now Pyay), and Henzada (now Hinthada), were now Burmese-speaking. The language shift has been ascribed to a combination of population displacement, intermarriage, and voluntary changes in self-identification among increasingly Mon–Burmese bilingual populations in

10120-436: The princely states as tributaries or protectorates. Scholarship does not accept the claims of control; the states were at least what Pegu considered within its sphere of influence. The claims include: The expansive spheres of influence shrank greatly after Bayinnaung's death. Nanda, according to a 1593 inscription, continued to claim his father's realm even after his latest defeat in Siam. In reality, he never had full control of

10235-425: The region. Standardized tone marking in written Burmese was not achieved until the 18th century. From the 19th century onward, orthographers created spellers to reform Burmese spelling, because of ambiguities that arose over transcribing sounds that had been merged. British rule saw continued efforts to standardize Burmese spelling through dictionaries and spellers. Britain's gradual annexation of Burma throughout

10350-400: The same kind of complacency afflicted later Restored Toungoo kings, who from 1650 onwards stopped taking the field as the country became largely stable.) Their more martial culture and battlefield successes gave the Toungoo command an increasingly greater field experience, which their rival commands in the region simply could not match. According to Lieberman , this was a key factor that enabled

10465-460: The sheer size of the empire, the system was even more decentralised and stretched thinner still. At any rate, it was the only system the Toungoo kings knew, and they "had no choice but to retain it." The kings attempted administrative reforms only at the margins, which proved insufficient to hold the empire after Bayinnaung. Indeed, "Bayinnaung's goal of controlling virtually the entire mainland from Pegu proved utterly mad." The dynasty's original home

10580-764: The spoken form or a combination of the spoken and simpler, less ornate formal forms. The following sample sentence reveals that differences between literary and spoken Burmese mostly occur in affixes: Burmese has politeness levels and honorifics that take the speaker's status and age in relation to the audience into account. The suffix ပါ pa is frequently used after a verb to express politeness. Moreover, Burmese pronouns relay varying degrees of deference or respect. In many instances, polite speech (e.g., addressing teachers, officials, or elders) employs feudal-era third person pronouns or kinship terms in lieu of first- and second-person pronouns. Furthermore, with regard to vocabulary choice, spoken Burmese clearly distinguishes

10695-502: The states were succeeded by ambitious and able rulers: Tabinshwehti (r. 1530–50) at Toungoo, and Min Bin (r. 1531–54) at Mrauk-U (Arakan) . Though Arakan would become a power in its own right, its geographic isolation meant it would remain a marginal player in mainland affairs. This left the tiny Toungoo, which would bring war to much of mainland Southeast Asia till the end of the century. The initial impetus for Toungoo's military campaigns

10810-755: The successive Shan raids in the second half of the 14th century, and both southern vassal states had emerged as new centres of economic activity as well as of Burman (Bamar) culture. Toungoo's growth continued especially after the Forty Years' War (1385–1424) left Ava exhausted. From 1425 onwards, Ava regularly faced rebellions whenever a new king came to power, who then had to restore order, often by war. Toungoo's “relentlessly ambitious leaders” repeatedly tested Ava's resolve by staging assassinations (in 1440, 1452, and 1459) and rebellions (in 1426–40, 1452–59 and 1468–70) at times with Pegu's help. In 1470, King Thihathura of Ava (r. 1468–80) appointed Sithu Kyawhtin ,

10925-431: The sudden death of its warrior king Naresuan (r. 1590–1605). Ava conquered Prome (1608), Toungoo (1610), Portuguese Syriam (1613), Siamese Martaban and Tavoy (1613), and Lan Na (1614). Still, in contrast to 250 years of political fragmentation that followed Pagan's collapse, this interregnum proved brief. As ephemeral as the overextended Toungoo Empire was, the underlying forces that underpinned its rise were not. By 1622,

11040-646: The terms "Toungoo Dynasty/Empire" cover both "First Toungoo Dynasty/Empire" and "Restored Toungoo Dynasty/Empire". Traditional Burmese historiography treats the Restored Toungoo Dynasty/Empire period as a separate era called the Nyaungyan period ( ညောင်ရမ်း ခေတ် ). This article, for the most part, uses prevailing academic names for place names, not the current official English transliterations in use in Myanmar since 1989. For example,

11155-448: The traditional homeland of Burmese speakers. The 1891 Census of India , conducted five years after the annexation of the entire Konbaung Kingdom , found that the former kingdom had an "unusually high male literacy" rate of 62.5% for Upper Burmans aged 25 and above. For all of British Burma , the literacy rate was 49% for men and 5.5% for women (by contrast, British India more broadly had a male literacy rate of 8.44%). The expansion of

11270-612: The troops. The weakness was brutally exposed when the High King was not Bayinnaung. Nanda's troops most probably never totalled more than 25,000. One crucial factor in Toungoo's success was the army's early adoption of Portuguese firearms (arquebus matchlocks and cast-metal muzzleloader cannon ), and formation of musket and artillery units. Portuguese weaponry proved superior in accuracy, safety, ballistic weight, and rapidity of fire than Asian-made counterparts. The first special musket and artillery units, made up mostly of Portuguese and Indian Ocean (mostly Muslim) mercenaries, were formed in

11385-425: The underlying orthography . From the 1500s onward, Burmese kingdoms saw substantial gains in the populace's literacy rate , which manifested itself in greater participation of laymen in scribing and composing legal and historical documents, domains that were traditionally the domain of Buddhist monks, and drove the ensuing proliferation of Burmese literature , both in terms of genres and works. During this period,

11500-544: The upcountry, let alone the peripheral states. In Bayinnaung's reign, the king introduced a measure of legal uniformity by summoning learned monks and officials from all over dominions to prescribe an official collection of law books. The scholars compiled Dhammathat Kyaw and Kosaungchok , based on King Wareru 's dhammathat . The decisions given in his court were collected in Hanthawaddy Hsinbyumyashin Hpyat-hton . According to Huxley,

11615-547: The varieties of Burmese spoken in Lower and Upper Burma. In Lower Burmese varieties, the verb ပေး ('to give') is colloquially used as a permissive causative marker, like in other Southeast Asian languages, but unlike in other Tibeto-Burman languages. This usage is hardly used in Upper Burmese varieties, and is considered a sub-standard construct. More distinctive non-standard varieties emerge as one moves farther away from

11730-486: The vaunted Toungoo military had trouble dealing with guerrilla warfare, and faced severe logistic issues in suppressing rebellions in remote hill states. The Toungoo military organisation drew on its Upper Burma precedent. The military was organised into a small standing army of a few thousand, which defended the capital and the palace, and a much larger conscript-based wartime army. The wartime army consisted of infantry, cavalry, elephantry, artillery and naval units. The navy

11845-529: The weights and measurements such as the cubit, tical , basket throughout the realm. The First Toungoo Dynasty was "the most adventurous and militarily successful in the country’s history." It founded the largest empire in Southeast Asia on the back of “breathtaking” military conquests. The success has been attributed to a "more martial culture" of Toungoo, incorporation of Portuguese firearms and foreign mercenaries, and larger forces. But even at its peak,

11960-466: The wide circulation of legal texts, royal chronicles , and religious texts. A major reason for the uniformity of the Burmese language was the near-universal presence of Buddhist monasteries (called kyaung ) in Burmese villages. These kyaung served as the foundation of the pre-colonial monastic education system, which fostered uniformity of the language throughout the Upper Irrawaddy valley,

12075-410: The word "television", Burmese publications are mandated to use the term ရုပ်မြင်သံကြား (lit. 'see picture, hear sound') in lieu of တယ်လီဗီးရှင်း , a direct English transliteration. Another example is the word "vehicle", which is officially ယာဉ် [jɪ̃̀] (derived from Pali) but ကား [ká] (from English car ) in spoken Burmese. Some previously common English loanwords have fallen out of use with

12190-487: Was the largest empire and the only great power country in the history of Southeast Asia." The "most adventurous and militarily successful" dynasty in Burmese history was also the "shortest-lived." The empire grew out of the principality of Toungoo, a minor vassal state of Ava until 1510. The landlocked petty state began its rise in the 1530s under Tabinshwehti who went on to found the largest polity in Myanmar since

12305-496: Was a disaster: Toungoo barely survived the 1495–96 counterattack by King Binnya Ran II (r. 1492–1526). At Ava, Minkhaung ignored Nyo's transgressions for he needed Nyo's support against Yamethin. Toungoo's inevitable break with Ava came soon after the death of Minkhaung II in 1501. The new king Narapati II (r. 1501–27) was greeted with a new round of rebellions. By 1502, Mingyi Nyo had already decided to break away despite Narapati's desperate attempt to retain his loyalty by granting

12420-399: Was already a difficult task when vassals were situated in the same geographic region but nearly impossible with faraway lands, given inherent difficulties in bringing serious warfare to those lands. King Nanda (r. 1581–99) never gained the full support of his father's chosen vassal rulers. Within the first three years of his reign, both Ava and Ayutthaya revolted. Though he managed to defeat

12535-400: Was armed with 10 cannon, 100 guns and 300 bows. The ability to raise more conscripts depended greatly on the High King's grip over his vassals. Bayinnaung required newly conquered states to provide their quota of manpower for the next campaign. According to scholarship, at the peak of the empire, the imperial army could perhaps raise about 100,000 troops, and the largest initial troop level for

12650-447: Was defensive. The landlocked state was being encircled by the powerful Confederation, which by 1533 had defeated its erstwhile ally Prome. Fortunately for Toungoo, the Confederation's paramount leader Saw Lon was assassinated a few months later, and the coalition suddenly ceased to be a coherent force. Tabinshwehti and his court decided to take advantage of the lull, and break out of their increasingly narrow realm by attacking Hanthawaddy,

12765-543: Was fortunate that a charismatic guerrilla leader like King Setthathirath of Lan Xang (r. 1548–72) was assassinated by a local rival. After Bayinnaung, Lower Burma lost the manpower advantage over a far more populous Siam. Ayutthaya's larger, well-equipped armies not only repulsed Nanda's undermanned invasions but also ended up seizing the Tenasserim coast in the process. The First Toungoo dynasty's military organisation and strategy were adapted by its two main successor states: Restored Toungoo and Siam. Restored Toungoo kings used

12880-426: Was mainly river-borne, and used mostly for transportation of troops and cargo. Conscription was based on the ahmudan ( အမှုထမ်း , "crown service") system, which required local chiefs to supply their predetermined quota of men from their jurisdiction on the basis of population in times of war. The ahmudan were a class of people, who were exempt from most personal taxes in exchange for regular or military service of

12995-738: Was technically at war with Pegu although no war ever broke out. Closer to home, he responded to the Mughals' 1576 annexation of Bengal by claiming the entire swath of lands in present-day northeast India, as far west as the Ganges and by sending an invasion force to Abakan in 1580. Bayinnaung 's empire was "probably the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia," and what the Portuguese regarded as "the most powerful monarchy in Asia except that of China". The king standardized laws, calendars, weights and measurements, and Buddhist religious practices throughout

13110-407: Was that he required sons of his vassal rulers to reside in the palace as pages, who served a dual purpose: they were hostages for good conduct of their fathers and they received valuable training in Burmese court life. His Shan policy was followed by all Burmese kings right up to the final fall of the kingdom to the British in 1885. According to contemporary sources, Pegu also claimed lands far beyond

13225-495: Was the Toungoo region, with the capital at Toungoo. But from 1539 onward, the High King, styled as “King of Kings”, moved the capital to Pegu (Bago), and governed only what used to be the Hanthawaddy Kingdom. This was the first time in Burmese history that a capital, which had the authority over the entire Irrawaddy basin, was located near the coast. The Toungoo kings retained the traditional three-province structure of

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