Himalayan Times (1956)

December 23, 1956

'fijimeiogait J,imt«

Seven

people of Tibetan stock
called the Pyu, established
in Central Burma at o:d
Prome on the Irrawadi,
and the Chinese Annals
of the eight century re-
cord that the 'Pews' are
Buddhists and have a
hundred monasteries with
brioks of glass, embellished
with gold and silver. Their
burial urms bear inscrip-
tions, showing that a dy-
nasty named Vikrama,
obviously of Indian blood
was reigning there at the
same period. There is
little to be seen at Tha-
ton now. for Mon capital
was removed to Pegu in
the eleventh century A.D.
and although no Pyu
monastic buildings are
visible some very beau
tiful Buddha images and
caskets in gold and silver
with inscriptions in Sans-
krit and based on the
Gupta models of fifth and
sixth century A. D. have
been dug up at old Prome.

In the middle of the
eleventh century, the Bur-
mese who are also of the
Tibetan stock allied to
the Pew, took possession
of Burma and the nota-
ble King 'Anorata' esta-
blished the capital Pagan,
at the confluence of Irra-
wadi and Chindwin rivers.
He inaugurated a period
of Buddhist temple build-
ing which lasted fort two
and a half centuries.

There is still one
definitely recongized Hindu

temple at Pagan, dedica-
ted to Vishnu with ten
stone figures of his ten
other avatars, the Buddha
being the ninth. But the
mass of buildings to be
seen at Pagan are clearly
Buddhist. It is said that
the remains of the five
thousand stupas can be
seen in or near the city
covering an area of six-
teen square miles. In the
middle of them I saw
and can still see great
white gleaminc Ananda
temple which I call the
Westminster Abbey of
Burma built at the close
of eleventh century by
the son of Anorata,
'Thiansata', and my rea-
ders will, I know be in-
terested to learn that it
was he who entirely res-
tored the famous Bud-
dhist shrine at Bodh Gaya
in Bihar. His mother
was Indian and his spee-
ches are Indian rather
than Burmese. His ins-
piration came from eight
Indian Buddhist Monks
who gave him glowing
accounts of the great cave
temples of Ananta in
Udayagiri hills of Orissa.
There are many other
splendid temples at Pagan
as well as the well known
Khuwedagaon temple at
Rangoon

Hons

The chief port of
embarkation in India in
the second nentury A D.
was Amrawati on the

Krishna river in the
Andhara Desha and
it was from there that
the traders and missionna-
lies set forth on their
perilous journeys to the
land of gold. They pro-
bably landed somewhere
near Moulmein and made
their way to the rice
planes of Thailand, through
the three Pagodas Pass.

A few years before
the war, I saw some tem-
ple, remains which have
been excavated near Csm-
bury, to the west of
Bangkok and which are
clearly of 'Mon' origin.
Since ore Buddha* images
of the Amrawati period
have been found among
them. And at Negam
Patam, that is Nagara
Pata Although the pre-
sent great Stupa of orange
tiles and 380 feet high
is relatively modern based
on the north Indian model,
it is built over an ancient
Mon pagoda.

There are no Mon
temples to be seen now
except one that I visited
at Lampoon in that part
of the north of Thailand
whioh was colonised by
the Mon in the eighth
century A. D. Here, there
is a square monument in
brick with five storeys
rising from a plinth and
on each side of toe Stupa
are fifteen niches fn five
rows of three with the
standing images of the