Ethnic Politics in Eighteenth-Century Burma

Ethnic Politics in Eighteenth-Century Burma Author(s): Victor B. Lieberman Source: Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 12, No.
3 (1978), pp. 455-482 Published by: Cambridge University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/312229 . Accessed: 13/11/2013 01:11
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ModernAsian Studies,12, 3 (1978), pp. 455-482. Printed in Great Britain.
Burma Ethnic Politics in Eighteenth-Century

VICTOR B. LIEBERMAN
Polytechnic Hatfield
WE commonly find in the literature on pre-colonial mainland Southeast
Asia a tendency to treat the principal ethnic groups-Burmese, Mons, discrete political categories. Siamese, Cambodians, Vietnamese-as This tendency is particularly marked in the historiography of the Irrawaddy valley, where the recurrent north-south conflicts of the eleventh to the eighteenth centuries have usually been interpreted as 'national' or 'racial' struggles between the Burmese people of the north and the Mon, or Talaing, people of the south. In writing of the last major 'Mon-Burmese' war, that of I740-57, historians have characterized the 1740 uprising at the southern city of Pegu as an expression of 'Mon nationalism'.1 The ensuing conflict reportedly became a struggle between Mons and Burmese each 'fighting for the existence of their race'; and Alahng-hpaya, said to be a champion of 'Burmese nationalism', allegedly made vigorous efforts to destroy the Mon culture and
people once he had triumphed.2

I wish to thank Professor C. D. Cowan, Professor Hugh Tinker, Professor H. L. Shorto, Professor Hla Pe, Mr William Koenig, and especially Mr John Okell for their assistance. Responsibility for the content of the article remains my own. For explanations of the revolt in terms of 'Mon nationalism', the 'Talaing national movement', the 'Talaing... nation', etc., see D. G. E. Hall, Early English Intercourse with Burma, 1587-1743, second edn (London, 1968), pp. 12, 236; B. R. Asia: Its HistoricalDevelopment John F. Cady, Southeast (New York, 1964), pp. 285, 288-9; Sir Arthur Phayre, Historyof Burma(London, 1883; repr., New York, 1969),
pp- 142-3.
2 See G. E. Harvey, History of Burma (London, 1925; new impression, London, I967), pp. 216, 220, 234-6; Phayre, History of Burma,pp. i50-I; Cady, Southeast Asia, pp. 288-9; D. G. E. Hall, A Historyof South-EastAsia, 2nd edn (New York, 1966), pp. 365, 381-6; id., Europeand Burma (London, 1945), p. 6o; British Burma Gazetteer,2 vols (Rangoon, 1879-1880), Vol. 2, pp. i68, 481; Mabel Haynes Bode, The Pali Literatureof Burma (London, 1909; repr. London, I966), pp. 68-9, 83.
Pearn, A History of Rangoon (Rangoon, 1939; repr., Westmead, England, 1971), p. 41;
tion to this school of thought in that Htin Aung recognizes the poly-ethnic character of the initial uprising at Pegu. By 1747, however, he claims that the Mons had begun to massacre Burmese in the south. He characterizes the ensuing wars as a 'racial conflict' (p. 313) and freely uses the terms 'nationalism' and 'patriot' in describing Alaung-hpaya's movement. Nigel Brailey, 'A Re-Investigation of the Gwe of
Htin Aung, A History of Burma (New York, 1967), pp. 153-70,
313, is a partial excep-
455
456
VICTOR
B.
LIEBERMAN
Although they fail to offer a precise definition of the terms 'national' or 'racial', these historians appear to have made three interrelated assumptions: a) each 'racial' or 'national' group constituted an exclusive, stable, empirically-identifiable population; b) 'racial' identity was the only significant factor in determining political allegiance; c) as a result, each of the contending forces was essentially of one 'racial' or 'national' type. This paper examines the validity of these assumptions. In so doing, it provides a theoretical framework for interpreting ethnicallyoriented conflicts in other areas of pre-colonial Southeast Asia, and it attempts to offer some new perspectives on ethnic relations in contemporary Burma.
Theoretical
Considerations
It is not difficult to find evidence of Burmese-Mon awareness and antagonism. The Burmese and Mon tongues, which are mutually unintelligible, belong to different linguistic families.3 Despite a considerable amount of geographic interpenetration, Burmese-speakers were concentrated in the dry zone north of about I8? N. latitude, while Mon-speakers lived principally in the wet coastal zone of the Irrawaddy delta and the trans-Sit-taung littoral. Burmese and Mons shared many cultural traits, but there were also significant differences in religious practices, domestic customs, literary traditions, even physical appearance.4 Burmese were said by a European informant in 1759 to be of a somewhat darker complexion, and only among the Burmese did males commonly tattoo their thighs. Whereas Mon men cut their hair round in front and shaved the backpart of their heads, Burmese men grew their hair long and coiled it into a topknot.5 The Mons, being the earlier residents of the valley and the first to have adopted
with considerable insight on 'Karen' involvement at Pegu. Yet he, too, has tended to think in terms of discrete politico-ethnic categories, e.g. 'Karens' vs. 'the Mon party',
See infra.
3
Eighteenth Century Burma', Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, Vol. I, No. 2 (September 1970), PP. 33-47, has escaped the traditional Mon-Burmese dichotomy by focusing
Peter Kunstadter, 'Population and Linguistic Affiliation of Ethnic Groups of

(ed.), Southeast Asian Tribes, Minorities, and Nations, 1917).
2
Burma', in Kunstadter
4
vols
(Princeton, 1967), Vol. I, pp. 78-9I.

5 A.
See R. Halliday,
2 vols (London, I808; repr., Rangoon, Dalrymple (comp.), Oriental Repertory, The Talaings, pp. I9-20; and Twin-thin-
The Talaings (Rangoon,
taik-wun Maha-si-thu, 'Alaung-min-taya-gyi ayei-daw-bon' (Biography of King

Alaung-hpaya) [AA-T], in Alaung-hpaya ayei-daw-bon hnasaung-dwe (Two Biographies of King Alaung-hpaya), tJ Hla Tin, ed (Rangoon, I96I), pp. I6, I86.
1926) [Dal], Vol. I, p. 99. Cf. Halliday,
ETHNIC
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Buddhist civilization, felt culturally superior to the Burmese, whom they tended to disparage as 'upcountry rustics'. Burmese in turn scorned the 'effeteness' of their southern neighbors, as when one of Alaunghpaya's commanders boasted, 'One hundred Talaing [warriors] don't equal a single Burman.'6 Cultural and physical differences of this sort, however, do not mean that ethnic identity was necessarily static, or that the categories 'Burmese' and 'Mon' were mutually exclusive, as some historians have assumed. Anthropologists of mainland Southeast Asia have demonstrated that ethnic categories can usefully be regarded as roles vis-d-vis other groups, and in that sense are only indirectly descriptive of the empirical characteristics of particular groups.7 If a person wishes to change his ecological or political role within the larger society, he often adopts, either temporarily or permanently, cultural attributes of another group which have a generally-recognized symbolic significance. Thus a 'Kachin', if he chooses, can 'become a Shan' by adopting Buddhism and/or Shan dress and speech, without at the same time abandoning all the items of his Kachin cultural heritage. There is reason to believe that a similar pattern operated in Burma during the precolonial period, and that many people living in bi-lingual districts of the Irrawaddy basin faced a genuine choice as to whether they would identify themselves as 'Burmese' or 'Mons'. The choice seems to have been determined in large measure by political considerations: those people whose communities were politically subordinate to, or allied with, the coast, sometimes cut their hair in Mon fashion or used Mon speech in order to declare publicly their support for the coastal kingdom. On one level at least, these people were deemed to have 'become Mons', although they may also have retained numerous Burmese cultural features. In the sixteenth century the Burmese king Tabin-shwei-hti wore a Mon head-dress and cut his hair in Mon fashion, thereby 'becoming a Mon' in the eyes of his subjects, because a prophecy had said that only Mon kings could rule over Pegu.8 In the mid6 Kbn-baung-zet maha-ya-zawin-daw-gyi (Great Royal Chronicle of the Kon-baung Dynasty) [KBZ], 3 vols (Rangoon, 1967), Vol. I, p. I I4.
7 F.
in Kunstadter,
K. Lehman, 'Ethnic Categories in Burma and the Theory of Social Systems',

Southeast Asian Tribes, pp. 93-124; E. R. Leach, Political Systems of
Highland Burma (London, I964); Michael Moerman, 'Ethnic Identification in a

Complex Civilization: Who Are the Lue?', American Anthropologist, Vol. 67 (1965), pp. 1215-30. 8 t Kala, Maha-ya-zawin-gyi(The Great Chronicle), Vol. 2, Hsaya Pwa (ed.) East Asia (London, 196 ), p. 68.
(Rangoon, n.d.), pp. 214-I6; H. L. Shorto, 'A Mon Genealogy of Kings: Observations on "the Nidana Arambhakatha"', in D. G. E. Hall (ed.), Historiansof South
458
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LIEBERMAN
eighteenth century, as we shall see, some Burmese who fell within Pegu's orbit chose (or were forced) to cut their topknots in order to demonstrate loyalty to Pegu. Conversely, under the stabilized Burmese hegemony over the coast of the Kon-baung period (I757-I852), Monspeakers tended to tattoo their thighs and to acquire Burmese speech because this behavior conferred political and economic advantages. As S. J. Tambiah has indicated in his description of'galactic polities', Southeast Asian kingdoms traditionally comprised a 'central planet' surrounded by an attenuated field of satellite communities whose number fluctuated according to the military strength of the center.9 At a crude level of generalization, the long-term implications of this political pattern for the ethnic composition of the Irrawaddy valley were as follows: the more powerful the northern kingdom of Ava, the greater the percentage of people within the Irrawaddy basin who characterized themselves as 'Burmese'; and the greater the sway of Pegu, the greater the potential number of 'Mons'.10 The wars between Ava and Pegu, therefore, were not 'racial' or 'national' struggles per se, but regional and dynastic conflicts in which cultural traits could be made to serve as a public badge, a visible emblem, of political loyalty.ll To some extent, 'Mon' was a role filled by people loyal to Pegu, while 'Burman' was the role accepted by people loyal to Ava. The possibility of role choices clearly tended to promote ethnic homogeneity within the Peguan and Avan polities, and in this sense, the customary identification of Pegu as the Mon kingdom, and of Ava as the Burmese kingdom, remains valid. Yet we should recognize that this was merely a tendency towards uniformity, not an implacable law. In practice, homogeneity was never achieved, because a number of powerful traditions militated against a direct correspondence between ethnic type and political loyalty. Some members of minority groups within a given polity assimilated to the culture of the majority; but others, perhaps in even greater numbers, retained their original identity while they supported the host population politically and militarily. Thus although Mons dominated Pegu and Burmese dominSimilarly, Moerman, 'Ethnic Identification in a Complex Civilization', p. 1222, has stated that within lowland northern Thailand, all changes among minority Thai communities have been 'toward the language, culture, and identification of the politically dominant people which, for the last 50 to Ioo years, has been the Siamese.' Note, however, that people can adopt another group's language and culture without adopting that group's ethnic self-identification; indeed, this is often the case in Lower Burma. See Lehman, 'Ethnic Categories in Burma', p. I I6. 11Cf. Moerman, 'Ethnic Identification in a Complex Civilization', p. 1219.
9 S. J. Tambiah, World Conquerorand World Renouncer (Cambridge, I976), Ch. 7. 10See Michael Adas, The Burma Delta (Madison, Wise., I974), pp. I7-I9, 57.
ETHNIC
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459
ated Ava, each kingdom was able to incorporate large and strategicallyimportant minority groups. One deeply-ingrained tradition favoring heterogeneity was that of patron-client relations. Political loyalties focused on powerful individuals, or patrons, who protected their clients against abuse and/or provided them with sustenance; in return, their clients rendered personal service. Because authority derived from the power and charisma of the patron, and because each of his clients was tied to him by separate personal bonds, there was no need for a common identity among his followers. We see this on the local level in villages whose headmen attracted military followings of diverse backgrounds; but in its most elaborate form, we see this principle embodied in the structure of the Avan and Peguan monarchies. According to traditional theory, sovereignty resided entirely in the person of the ruler, who owned the land and water of the realm, and the very lives of his subjects. People swore allegiance to him as an individual, and in return were patronized with offices and fiefs. The sacred ideal of royal service was expressed in the Burmese phrase kyei-zi-thit-sa-daw saung-'to remember one's oath of allegiance and one's debt of gratitude for royal patronage'. One could betray his oath to the monarch, but there was no articulated concept of treason to the 'nation' since sovereignty did not reside in the people at large. From this political conception flowed several logical consequences. Throughout the Taung-ngu period (c. I539-I752)12 the composition of the royal service-people (ahmi-ddns) and of the royal court was surprisingly diverse. The crown, chronically in need of manpower, invited to the capital area, or forcibly deported, large bodies of non-Burmese who were settled in separate service communities and allowed to retain their ethnic identity. (Indeed in some instances it would seem that the crown actively encouraged these communities to maintain their original character as a guarantee of group cohesion, and hence of occupational efficiency.) At the same time, individual Mons, Shans, Siamese, Laotians, Yuans (Yiins), even Europeans who boasted special expertise or noble blood were welcomed to high ministerial posts at the capital without being obliged to adopt Burmese customs. The following quotation from a sixteenth-century source expresses the poly-ethnic ideal of personal service at the court of Bayin-naung (1551-81), but it is characteristic of later centuries as well:
12 The c. 1539-99, with period is subdivided into the First Taung-ngu-Dynasty, the capital at Pegu; and the Restored Taung-ngu Dynasty, c. 1597-1752, when the capital was usually at Ava.
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Was it not because of his piety, steadfastness, and wisdom that we all, from ministers and captains... down to pages of noble birth-all his chosen would... have men, in fact, whether Shans, Mons, or Burmans-... declared ourselves willing to lay down our lives?13 Not only the royal court, but the empire as a whole was viewed as a poly-glot institution. The ruler of any non-Burmese territory could be admitted to tributary status merely by swearing an oath; and the expansion of the imperial territories was always motivated by geopolitical, rather than ethnic considerations. Finally and most interestingly, because sovereignty resided in the person of the ruler, there was no necessity that he be of the same ethnic type as the majority of his subjects. Kings of Shan ancestry ruled at Ava in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries but were accepted in the Burmese chronicles as legitimate; while in the south the principal dynasties between 1287 and 1599 were founded by a Shan (Wa Row) and a Burman (Tabin-shweihti)
.14
This cosmopolitan orientation was reinforced by a second tradition, one of incomparable influence, that of Theravada kingship. According to the Scriptures, kingship had been established at the start of the world in order to advance the spiritual welfare of all mankind. Like Mahasammata, the institutional prototype of Theravada monarchs, rulers at Ava and Pegu sought to augment their subjects' store of good karma by exhorting people to virtue and by prohibiting behavior inimical to the Doctrine. Furthermore, by their donations to religious institutions, kings themselves accumulated a great quantity of good karma which, in some mystical fashion, advanced the welfare of their subjects at large. A king's karmatic attainments in this and previous existences were in no sense dependent on his ethnic type. A man of great power (hence ipsofacto great merit) deserved veneration from all Buddhists. And in reciprocal fashion, the spiritual benefits of his rule showered down upon all creatures under his sway, for all are caught in sarhsara (the cycle of rebirths). The kings of Ava and Pegu explicitly proclaimed themselves to be both Cakkavattis, i.e. world-rulers, and Embryo Buddhas. These principles of Theravada kingship had been transmitted by
13Page 82 of a typescript MS which is a translation by H. L. Shorto of the Mon Phra Candakanto, ed. (Pak Lat, Siam, I912), p. I52. NViddna Rdmddhipatf-katha, At Ayut'ia during the seventeenth century Japanese, Mons and even a Greek adventurer achieved high office; while in Arakan Portuguese, Japanese, Afghans and Indians served in the royal forces. 14 Tabin-shwei-hti 'became a Mon' only towards the end of his reign, and none of his successorsfollowed suit.
ETHNIC
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the Mons to the Burmese, who in turn transmitted them (directly and indirectly) to Shans, Palaungs, and other peoples. Although the various ethnic groups retained their own ecclesiastical organizations and animist traditions, by the seventeenth century they were all nominally Buddhist, and as such shared the same terminology and conceptual framework which allowed them to accept the ideological pretensions of the kings at Ava and Pegu. Taung-ngu kings sought to advertise their piety in ecumenical fashion by consulting a mixture of Burmese, Mon, and Shan monks on ceremonial occasions. Even when state ceremonies lacked an explicitly inter-ethnic character, their heavy Buddhist coloring gave them such a character implicitly.15 Finally, we should mention a third tradition which, while failing to support cultural diversity within a given polity, nonetheless served to fragment both the Burmese-speaking and Mon-speaking communities and to inhibit the development of a pan-Mon or panBurmese consciousness. We refer to persistent regional loyalties. The galactic polity, by definition, held within its orbit a large number of satellite centers whose leaders constantly strove to maximize their autonomy. In the south, predominantly Mon-speaking towns such as Bassein, Martaban, and Yei were subordinate to the paramount Mon center of Pegu between c. 1369 and I595, and again between I740 and 1757. This galactic configuration constituted the so-called Kingdom of Ra-manya (Ramafia), which H. L. Shorto has shown formed the background to Mon historical literature.16 Yet the unity of Ra-manya was singularly loose, for each town cherished a tradition of independent sovereignty, and each continued to function as the sacral, administrative, and economic center for a wide hinterland. Local Mon headmen and their followers thus felt strong ties of interest to these regional capitals, and tended to distinguish, for example, between Peguan Mons and Martaban Mons (in fact, each district may have spoken a somewhat different dialect). If Pegu seemed vulnerable, satellite populations were only too willing to ally themselves with Burmese or Siamese against their fellow Mons at Pegu. Essentially the same pattern obtained in the Burmese-speaking sector of the Irrawaddy basin,
15See, inter alia, V. B. Lieberman, 'The Burmese Dynastic Pattern, c. 1590-1760' (Univ. of London Ph.D. Thesis, 1976), Ch. 2; M. Aung Thwin, 'The Nature of State and Society in Pagan' (Univ. of Michigan Ph.D. Thesis, 1976), Chs 2, 4; Shorto, 'Genealogy', p. 68. See, too, Craig J. Reynolds, 'Buddhist Cosmography in Thai History, with Special Reference to Nineteenth-Century Culture Change',
16
Journal of Asian Studies, Vol. 35, No. 2 (February 1976), p. 210, for a discussion of Buddhist literature as an instrument of poly-ethnic political integration in Siam.
Shorto, 'Genealogy', pp. 63-72.
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where Pagan, Salin, Prome, and Taung-ngu nurtured independent traditions which conflicted in varying degrees with their loyalty to Ava. During the so-called Mon-Burmese wars of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, satellites of Ava and Pegu switched allegiance with disconcerting ease. Between I593 and 1714 we find many additional examples of intra-Mon and intra-Burmese provincial splits.17 It was only to be expected that these regional patterns would influence political developments in the mid-eighteenth century. The course of the wars between I740 and I757 therefore reflected a complex interaction between these three traditions-personal loyalty, the one hand, and the Buddhist universalism, and regionalism-on tendency towards ethnic uniformity within a given polity, on the other. Polarization between 'Burmese' and 'Mons' was particularly sharp at the outset of the Peguan revolt in I740 and in the early years of Alahng-hpaya's resistance, perhaps because these were periods of maximum insecurity when people eagerly sought visible symbols of conformity amongst their neighbors in order to allay their anxieties. Yet at no time, even under Alahng-hpaya, did the adoption of a particular ethnic identity become an indispensable prerequisite for political
support.
18
The Revolt of 1740: Burmese
Support
The Peguan revolt of I740 was the most destructive in a series of tributary and provincial uprisings which fed on the debility of the late Restored Taung-ngu Dynasty. In the first half of the eighteenth century
See Lieberman, 'The Burmese Dynastic Pattern', Chs I, 4. We might note that the patterns we are about to describe were by no means peculiar to the Irrawaddy valley, but in varying degrees must have characterized a great many pre-national societies in which quasi-feudal modes of political organization, a universalist Great Tradition, and strong particularist tendencies were noteworthy features. For example, in medieval Britain 'Welsh' and 'English' constituted distinct ethnic categories, each with its own language, culture, and political traditions. English and Welsh authors composed scathing attacks on the moral qualities of their opposite numbers, while a ruler of Snowdonia in the thirteenth century sought to unify the Welsh on the basis of anti-English sentiment. Yet if we examine the course of the so-called Welsh Wars of the thirteenth century, we find that local rivalries, and family and personaljealousies were always more potent than any 'national sense', and that the English infantry on occasion consisted principally of Welshmen. So, too, the 'Mon' army, on occasion, consisted chiefly of Burmese. See John E. Morris, The Welsh Wars of EdwardI (Oxford, I901); Austin Lane Poole, FromDomesday Book to
17 18
Magna Carta, 1087-1216, 2nd edn (Oxford, I955); Thirteenth Century, 1216-1307, 2nd edn (Oxford, I962).
Sir Maurice
Powicke,
The
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the crown suffered a cumulative loss of manpower which led to an upsurge of factionalism at Ava and to an erosion of the capital region's military strength. At the same time, the decline in royal authority encouraged provincial officials to abuse their powers of taxation with little fear of correction by the central government. Not only at Pegu (then subject to Ava), but also at Chiengmai and Ok-hpo, Ava's representatives outraged local opinion with their unrestrained exactions, and thus helped to precipitate successful rebellions. In the case of Pegu, the issue of excessive taxation may have strengthened a more long-standing resentment felt by southern gentry families over their loss of patronage opportunities. Following the shift of capitals from Pegu to Ava in the early seventeenth century, the number of southern families who obtained appointments at the royal court declined steadily until by the early eighteenth century few, if any, could be found in leading positions at Ava. Nor did they retain control over important positions at the southern provincial courts, which were dominated by Burmese from the dry zone. Ironically, the first outbreak at Pegu was organized by Ava's own governor, a Burman named Tha-aung who imagined that he could turn Ava's troubles to his own advantage and reign as sovereign over the Delta. Accordingly, in May of 1740 after a Manipuri raid on Upper Burma had revealed the north's appalling military weakness, he declared his independence. But he was soon slain by local leaders who resented his heavy-handed treatment of dissent, and who, no doubt, remembered his record of tax abuses. Following Tha-aung's murder, Ava succeeded in restoring a measure of control over Pegu. In midNovember, however, a second rebellion erupted which Ava proved helpless to suppress. The people of Pegu assassinated Ava's latest gubernatorial appointee, and then acclaimed as their king a leader of the Gweis (see below for an explanation of this term) who, upon entering Pegu, took for himself the royal title Smin Dhaw (or Smin Dhaw Buddhakeithi). Within three or four months, Smin Dhaw's forces had expelled Ava's supporters from every major position in Lower Burma and had begun penetrating up the Irrawaddy valley towards Prome.19
19For contemporary and nearly-contemporary accounts of these events, see the Burmese translation of the Mon history of the monk of Athwa, British Library, London, Oriental MS no. 3464 [BL OR 3464], pp. I39-41; an abridged version of the same work on unpaginated palmleaves in the Henry Burney Papers of the Royal Commonwealth Society, London, Talaingya-zawin (Talaing History) [RCS-TY]; Thi-ri-ui-zana, Law-kd-byu-ha kyan (Treatise on Customary Usages) [LBHK], tJ Hpo Lat (ed.) (Rangoon, I968), p. 4; India Office Library, London, Lettersto Fort
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What political loyalties motivated the southern rebels? To what extent were they inspired by anti-Burmese, pro-Mon sentiment? The history of the monk of Athwa, written some twenty years after the event by a Mon former resident of Pegu, says that the people of Pegu endured unspeakable abuses at the hands of Burmese officials who had been sent down from Ava, until all the people longed for the resurrection of the independent southern kingdom of Ra-manya, headed by Pegu. His use of the opposition 'Mon'/'Burmese' as a distinction of the 'we'/'they' sort implies that to be a 'Mon' at Pegu in 1740 was to be loyal to Ramanya and hostile to Ava. In describing the assassination of Tha-aung, the monk of Athwa observed: The Mon peopleof the Ra-manya country... conspired together and consulted a brahmin, saying, 'This Thaw-aung [sic] ... is oppressing all the people. The Ava king has yet to take action against this lawless rebel... Therefore we will seize and slay this Thaw-aung. We don'twantto besubjects of the Burmese.What do the stars say the future holds for Han-tha-wadi [i.e. Pegu] ?' . . . and he replied, 'The astrological situation of the Burmese is very poor. But the heavenly signs shine brightly on the country of the Mons (mon-totaing-pyei).'(italics mine)20 A similar picture emerges from contemporary English East India Company records. In December of I740 Smin Dhaw wrote to the English representative at Syriam explaining that he had been compelled to 'kill all the governing Burmars' because the Burmese governor of Syriam had planned to immolate all the Peguans, 'Siamers', Tavoyans, and foreign traders who resided there.21 Fort St George (Madras) heard, perhaps with some exaggeration, that '7, or 8,ooo Burmars' perished in the ensuing attack.22 Most of the victims were probably soldiers, officials, and retainers of officials who had benefited from the ruinous taxation and who, like Tha-aung, were natives of Upper Burma. Nevertheless, the new king of Han-tha-wadi, Smin Dhaw, proudly claimed descent from an uncle of the Burmese king, Tanin-ganwei (I714-33), so he could hardly have sponsored an anti-Burmese moveSt. George, Vol. 26 (I 74 ) (Madras, 1916), pp. 8-9, 35-7. For somewhat later accounts, see Hman-nan-ya-zawin-daw-gyi (Great Glass Palace Royal Chronicle) [HNY], 3 vols (Mandalay, 1909), Vol. 3, pp. 380-4; and the summaries in Yi Yi, Myan-manaing-ngan achei-anei, 1714-1752 (Burma's Condition, I714-1752) (Rangoon, I973),
pp. 67ff. 20 BL OR 21 Lettersto Fort St. Vol. 26 (I74I), p. 9. 3464, pp. I39-40. George, 22 India Office Records, London, Abstractof LettersReceived from 'Coast' and 'Bay'
in Correspondence with India (Examiner's Office), E/4/4, p. 332. See, too, Yi Yi, I734-44, Myan-ma-naing-ngan achei-anei, pp. i65, I79 for evidence that the Burmese identified
their Peguan foes as 'Talaings'.
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ment on ethnic grounds alone. According to the Hman-nan chronicle, Smin Dhaw claimed to be the offspring of a union between Taninganwei's uncle, who had rebelled unsuccessfully against Ava in I7I4 and had then fled to an obscure rural village, and a woman who had served as his concubine in that village. Smin Dhaw had been raised by the local Gwei people (to which tribe his mother apparently belonged) and had now come to Pegu to assume that royal status to which his noble blood entitled him.23 This genealogy was almost certainly spurious, like that of many a low-born pretender. Yet it was a major factor in winning support among the local Mons, who boasted to an Avan commander that their ruler was of the same royal family as the king of Ava.24 This claim was also taken at face value by Burmese who thought that in fighting for Smin Dhaw, they were serving a scion of the old Burmese royal house. Indeed, after the initial uprisings, growing numbers of Burmese began to attach themselves to Smin Dhaw's cause, particularly in the south. H. L. Shorto has estimated that only about sixty per cent of the Delta population was Mon, and of the remaining forty per cent Burmese were probably the chief element.25 They were found not only in towns, where they served as officials, soldiers, and traders, but also in rural districts in the western and northern Delta, where they engaged in agriculture. Like so-called Chin and Karen villages, Burmese communities had been an integral part of the Delta landscape for generations.26 Some Burmese gentry leaders, particularly those in rural districts, probably enjoyed no closer connection with Ava than did their Mon neighbors. Given the strong tradition of poly-ethnic political organization at Pegu and the universal nature of Smin Dhaw's religious appeals (see below), it is therefore not surprising that these southern Burmese-and later some of their northern counterparts as wellshould have pledged allegiance to Ra-manya. The bitter anti-'Burmese'
achei-anei, pp. 387-8; Myan-ma-naing-ngan pp. I64-6; See, too, ibid., p. 178. 25 H. L. Shorto, personal communication, 1974. A 1759 report in Dal, Vol. I, p. 99 said, 'Even in Pegu their Numbers [i.e. Burmese to Mons] are Ioo to '. For
23 HNY, Vol. 3, pp. 383, 390-I. 24 Ibid., Yi Yi,
other evidence of a significant Burmese population south of Prome during the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, see Dal, Vol. I, pp. 133-42 passim; Zam-budi-pdok-hsaung kyan(Treatise of the Crown ofJambudipa Island), J. S. Furnivall and Pe Maung Tin (eds) (Rangoon, 1960), pp. 46, 58; KBZ, Vol. I, p. 105. 26 We do not know whether their ethnic distinctiveness within southern society was due to separate ahmu-dan roles, to a specialized economic function, to continual infusions of northern migrants, or to some other factor(s). On the determination of Chin communities within Lower Burma to maintain their separate identity, see
Lehman, 'Ethnic Categories in Burma', pp. I 2-13.
466
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B.
LIEBERMAN
outbreaks of I740 reflected the fact that many Burmese, particularly northern migrants concentrated in the coastal towns, were associated with abuses by officials appointed by Ava. 'Burman' could be used as a short-hand expression for 'pro-Ava man'. But clearly this term was not always so restrictive, because Smin Dhaw, a 'Burmese prince' who had no political connection with the current Ava court, was accepted by the Mons; and so were a number of lesser figures who also proclaimed themselves to be Burmese.27 Among Smin Dhaw's early supporters was (J-taya-thari, identified in a 1766 Mon-language document as 'a Burman from Pegu', whom Smin Dhaw made governor of Martaban.28 A noted Peguan infantry commander Ein-da-bala-kyaw-thu readily acknowledged to his enemies that he was one of a group of 'Burmese ... from Han-thawadi.'29 Smin Dhaw's commander-of-the-right the Let-ya-bo was also a Burman, apparently from the south; as one of the two or three most senior military figures at Pegu, he became so influential that when Smin Dhaw abdicated, the leading commanders begged him to succeed (he declined).30 In Middle Burma at both Taung-ngu and Promeprovincial capitals which had strong traditions of independence and which had never been particularly loyal to Ava-pro-Peguan factions overawed pro-Avan factions and helped to deliver the towns to Smin Dhaw.31 Since both of these towns had a predominantly Burmese population, in each instance the pro-Peguan faction probably included many self-proclaimed Burmese. As Pegu's forces pushed further up the Irrawaddy valley, the number of Burmese who defected to her cause continued to grow, so that by 1752, three-quarters of the army sent against Alaung-hpaya was said by a qualified observer to have been
Burmese.32
27 It is probable that a number of bi-lingual 'Burmese' at this time found it desirable to pass as 'Mons'. Unfortunately, we have no firm evidence of such conversions prior 28
to 1752.
1766 Martaban Land Roll MS in the possession of H. L. Shorto. 29KBZ, Vol. I, p. 55; AA-T, p. I99. This is apparently the same individual identified as Nan-da-bali-kyaw-thu in KBZ, Vol. I, pp. 170, 235; and in Let-we-nawyahta, 'Alauing-min-taya-gyi ayei-daw-bon' (Biography of King Alaiung-hpaya) [AA-L], Alaung-hpaya ayei-daw-bon hnasaung-dwe, p. 93. 30 U sa-dan (Record of Administration under the Tin, Myan-ma-min ok-chok-pon
Burmese Kings), 5 vols (Rangoon, 3464, p. 141.
31
32
391-2. This is probably the same man as Let-ya-bo-chok Min-nge-kyaw, BL OR Yi Yi, Myan-ma-naing-ngan pp. 76, 8i. achei-anei, 'The Testimony of an Inhabitant of the City of Ava', Phra Phraison Salarak
1957), p. 32. See, too,
I931-33),
Vol. 2, pp. 242-3; HNY, Vol. 3, pp.
(trans.), Journal of the Siam Society, Vol. 45, Pt 2 (October HNY, Vol. 3, p. 405.
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467
Mons Who Failed To Support Pegu

At the same time a significant number of 'Mons'-i.e. people who bore Mon titles, who spoke Mon, and/or who were identified in confaithful to the northern temporary sources as being Mons-remained court because of personal ties or local loyalties. They constituted a sort of mirror image to the Burmese supporters of Pegu. The first major expedition which the Ava king Maha-dama-ya-za-dl-pati (I733-52) sent against Smin Dhaw was composed largely of Mon troops from the so-called 'nine townships' of the Delta.33 They enjoyed some initial success and performed as well as their Burmese comrades. Even after the Delta was overrun, Mons continued to figure quite prominently among Ava's commanders, particularly in the army headed by Mahadama-ya-za-di-pati's uncle, Taung-ngu-ya-za.34 It is unclear whether these Mon leaders and their men came originally from the Delta, or from Upper Burma, where since at least the early seventeenth century there were small communities of Mon deportees with connections to the Ava court. Moreover, within Lower Burma various Mon communities showed a decided aversion to both Ava and Pegu, preferring to support the independence of their regional capital, much as during the fourteenthand fifteenth-century wars. Some sources suggest that in early I74I Smin Dhaw had to seize by force the Mon city of Martaban.35 Thereafter it is certain that he governed Martaban much as Ava had always done, i.e. by filling all key positions with followers from the capital rather than with local residents. In I743, people at Martaban rebelled and killed Smin Dhaw's governor; but after quelling this revolt, Smin Dhaw resumed the appointment of Peguans, even to very subordinate posts. Most significantly, one of these appointees, the aforementioned O-taya-thari, was identified in the 1766 Martaban Land Roll as a 'Burman from Pegu'. In other words, a Burman from Pegu was more trustworthy than a Mon from Martaban. Martaban and adjacent districts contributed forces to the victorious invasion of Ava in 752. Nevertheless Peguan commanders soon had to withdraw the bulk of their forces from Upper Burma, because
33Yi Yi, Myan-ma-naing-ngan pp. 74-5. achei-anei, 34Mon leaders who remained loyal to Ava between 1744 and I752 included Banya-ui-pa-ya-za, Banya-kyan-daw, Banya-dama-ya-za, Ya-za-di-ya-za, and probably Banya-su, Banya-byat-ta, and Banya-thi-ha. 35 Cf. HNY, Vol. 3, p. 384, and the 1766 Martaban Land Roll.
468
VICTOR
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they feared that districts east of Martaban as well as Yei, Tavoy, and Tenasserim, might be scheming with Siam at Pegu's expense.36 The districts east of Martaban, and Yei were inhabited chiefly by Mon-speakers; Tavoy and Tenasserim, by speakers of a Burmese dialect. Yet neither population demonstrated any particular allegiance to Pegu. One is led to conclude that the so-called 'Mon national movement' of I740 might more accurately be termed a Peguan regional revolt.
'Karen' Involvement Speakers of Karen dialects played a role in the Peguan uprisings. In fact, it seems likely that Smin Dhaw himself and his mysterious Gwei followers were actually members of a Karen tribal group, which is also at variance with the usual 'national' interpretations of the 'Mon revolt'. The Gweis have been identified with various peoples (Shans, Lawas, Was, etc.), but the most convincing hypothesis has been presented by Nigel Brailey, who has argued that they were a people known as Taungthus who speak a dialect of Karen and are now concentrated in an area of hill-country on the edge of the Shan States. According to Brailey, who relied on the Siamese version of a Mon chronicle, it was the sudden arrival of three thousand of these people from the eastern hills which let Smin Dhaw take power at Pegu.37 Brailey's identification is strengthened by Burmese sources, unavailable to him, which show that Smin Dhaw gave five of his first seventeen appointments to officials with recognizably 'Karen' names.3s Furthermore, Burmese sources identify the Gwels as 'Gwei-Karens' some of whom were based at a 'Karen village' north of Pegu; and they suggest a well-established pattern whereby groups of Karen-speakers, possibly including Taung-thus, migrated from the eastern hills to the southeast lowlands.39
36AA-L, p. 1737Brailey,'Re-investigation of the Gwe', pp. 33-47. 38 HNY, Vol. 3, p. 383; tJ Pyin-nya, Kayinya-zawin (History of the Karens) (Rangoon, 1929), pp. 145ff.
39HNY, Vol. 3, pp. 382-3; Zam-bu-di-pd ok-hsaungkydn, pp. 83, 98; tJ Kala, Maha-ya-zawin-gyi,Vol. 3, Hsaya J Hkin So (ed.). (Rangoon, 1961), pp. 332-40 passim; R. S. Wilkie (comp.), BurmaGazetteer-The ramethinDistrict, Vol. A (Rangoon, 1934), pp. 26-33, 45 passim; G. H. Luce, 'Introduction to the Comparative Study of Karen Languages', Journal of theBurmaResearch Society,Vol. 42, Pt I (June
1959), pp. I-i8.
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469
Brailey has pictured the events of I740 as a virtual 'Karen' coup. According to him, the hill Karens, in loose alliance with some of their lowland 'brethren', forced Smin Dhaw's acceptance on the Mons of Pegu, who became 'highly resentful' of their subjection to the primitive 'Karens'. While there is some evidence of tension of this sort, it is clear that different groups of Karen-speakers recognized no common the very category 'Karen' was a derogatory invention identity-indeed, of the Burmese which was only given respectability by Christian missionaries in the nineteenth century-and that while some groups of people whom the Burmese called 'Karens' supported Smin Dhaw, others were implacably hostile.40 It is equally clear that the Mons themselves never formed a united front against Smin Dhaw, who succeeded at an early stage in developing a poly-ethnic following based on personal loyalty. All accounts suggest that Smin Dhaw only entered Pegu after large numbers of Mons had joined his original Gwei supporters. Of his first seventeen ministers, five had 'Karen'type names, one was Shan, but the other eleven had Mon names. Even the five 'Karens', if (as is likely) they spoke Mon, may have considered themselves to be Mons in certain contexts. Although most Taung-thus were animist, Smin Dhaw himself was thoroughly familiar with Buddhist court culture. That the 'Gwei king' could pass for a Burmese prince is only the most obvious indication of this fact. According to Mon and Siamese histories, he had once served as a Buddhist monk and had acquired supernatural powers which were a major factor in winning him support in 1740 among the Mons of Pegu, and presumably among Burmese and Gweis as well. These histories claim that he was an expert in magic and astrology, and was invulnerable to weapons.41 After he had taken the throne, he further enhanced his charisma by acquiring a revered spotted elephant, and by renewing the practice, abandoned by the last three Ava kings, of making regular donations to the shrines of the Delta. The Mon monk of Athwa, who, it must be emphasized, wrote as a private individual outside the control of Smin Dhaw's court, thus praised him as a righteous ruler, imbued with 'great reverence for the affairs of
Religion'.42
40
'Karens' forced Smin Dhaw temporarily to abandon Pegu (cf. Brailey, 'Re-investigation of the Gwe', p. 34). See, too, HNY, Vol. 3, p. 383. 41 Prince Damrong, 'Our Wars with the Burmese', U Aung Thein (trans.), Journal
of the Burma Research Society, Vol. 40, Pt 2(a) (May 1958), pp. 285-6; BL OR 3464, p. 141. 42 BL OR 3464, pp. I40-I.
Yi Yi, Myan-ma-naing-ngan achei-anei, p. 85 reports that in 1744 an attack by
470
VICTOR
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Events from 1747 to 1752 Despite his popularity and his early success, Smin Dhaw never reigned long enough to defeat Ava, for he was overthrown by a coup in 1747, while hunting elephants east of Sit-tauing. He was succeeded by his daughter principal minister, the Lord of Dala-Banya-dala-whose Smin Dhaw had married and whose support had probably been instrumental in securing the throne for Smin Dhaw in 1740. A Shan elephanteer who had originally been appointed by Ava, Banya-dala was director of the Pegu elephant corps in 1740 and was thus well placed to expand his influence in subsequent years. Siamese accounts suggest that he and Smin Dhaw had become estranged as early as 1745 in the aftermath of Smin Dhaw's marriage alliance with Chiengmai, which apparently threatened Banya-dala's position at court.43 In all probability he solicited the military expedition to Sit-taung which forced Smin Dhaw's abdication. Htin Aung and Brailey have both portrayed Banya-dala as the champion of Mon interests against Smin Dhaw, whom Htin Aung sees as favoring fellow Burmese (Htin Aung accepts at face value Smin Dhaw's royal genealogy) and whom Brailey sees as representing the 'Karens'.44 Htin Aung's interpretation seems quite suspect. As we shall show, Burmese support for Pegu increased, if anything, after I 747. Moreover, Banya-dala was chosen king at a conference of Peguan leaders only through the recommendation of the Burmese general, Let-ya-bo, one of his principal allies.45 There may be more substance to Brailey's interpretation of the coup, in that some Mons may have seen through Smin Dhaw's genealogical pretensions and resented his early association with animists. Yet we can see that in 1747, as in 1740, factional alignments cut across simple ethnic divisions, and loyalties revolved primarily around rival patron-client networks. Thus Smin Dhaw in his subsequent attempts to recapture the throne of Pegu, enjoyed the support of individual Mons as well as of his father-in-law, the Tai Buddhist ruler of Chiengmai. On the other hand, the man who usually ranked third at Banya-dala's court after Banya-dala's own brothers
1747 (some sources date it to 1746), see, too, Yi Yi, Myan-ma-naing-ngan achei anei,
43Brailey, 'Re-investigation of the Gwe', pp. 35-6. On Banya-dala and the coup of
PP. 89-95, 99; HNY, Vol. 3, pp. 383, 389-93; LBHK, p. 5; RCS-TY; AA-T, p.
209; Hall, English Intercourse,p. 305.
44For Htin Aung's views, see his History,pp. 154-5; for Brailey's, see 'Re-investigation of the Gwe', pp. 35-6, 44-5. 45Same as note 30.
ETHNIC
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47I
was his son-in-law, the general Saw-bya, one of the five men with 'Karen' names who had originally served Smin Dhaw. If ethnic considerations were paramount, it is also curious that the so-called 'Mon party' should have found it necessary to place their hopes in a man who was generally recognized as a Shan. Once he had ascended the throne, Banya-dala was accepted as 'king of the Talaings' like Wa Row, Smin Dhaw, and other non-Mon kings before him. As we know from his subsequent correspondence with Alaung-hpaya, he presented himself in traditional fashion as an aspirant Buddha and a Patron of the Faith in whom all men could take refuge. He also claimed that his reign fulfilled a prophecy uttered by Gotama Buddha that in the Buddhist year corresponding to A.D. 1746 or 1747, a 'master of the white elephant' and a king of great glory would arise in Han-tha-wadi.46 According to the monk of Athwa, after his coronation he formally addressed his court, recalling the grandeur of former Peguan kings. He claimed that various Tai rulers had already recognized his sovereignty, and vowed to reduce Ava to a similar state of subjection.47 Banya-dala succeeded in this boast within five years of his accession. Because of factional in-fighting and the strain of endless campaigns, Ava's loss of manpower became so acute that the administration virtually collapsed of its own weight. Revolts broke out within forty miles of Ava,48 whereupon the southern forces arrived to deliver the coup de grace and to seize the ancient capital of Upper Burma in March of 1752. The victorious army-which was identified in contemporary sources as 'the Talaing army' but which, according to the same sources, included Burmese in both command and subordinate positionsproceeded to establish its authority over the surrounding countryside. Most Burmese gentry leaders swore allegiance to the king of Pegu and were confirmed in their hereditary positions. In the provincial capitals of Middle and Upper Burma, adherents with recognizably Burmese names and titles received a number of high-ranking appointments, far more in fact than Ava in recent decades had been willing to confer on Mons in the Delta.49 At the same time, the invaders deported to the
Hkin Sein (comp. and ed.) (Rangoon, 1964), pp. 56-7, 83-4. Cf. Yi Yi, Myan-manaing-ngan achei-anei, pp. 99-oo00, 47 BL OR 3464, p. 141. 77, 178.
48 These were the uprisings at Madaya and Ok-hpo which Harvey, Hall, Cady, and Brailey have erroneously dated to 1740 rather than 1747.
46Alaung-min-taya amein-daw-mya (Edicts of King Alaung-hpaya)
[AAm],
Hkin
49 See BL OR 3464, p. 142, and KBZ, Vol. I, p. 105.
472
VICTOR
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south a very substantial number of Burmese courtiers and soldiers, possibly as many as fifteen thousand altogether, who also took an oath to the southern king. Their leaders were honored with titles and offices at the Peguan court, serving along with Mons, 'Karens', and southern Burmese. At least one former Ava minister, Thi-ri-ui-zana, who was offered a post as senior minister in the Peguan Hlut-daw, declined to accept the appointment; but he acted out of a personal commitment to the deposed Ava king, rather than from a sense of Burmese ethnic loyalty.50 We find a clear tendency towards ethnic polarization in the fact that shortly after Ava fell, Pegu's garrison commander at Ava was criticized for taking into his service Burmese who had failed to cut their hair in Talaing fashion; it was intended that those who cut their topknots should receive preferential treatment.51 Curiously enough, however, this rule was not enforced among pro-Peguan gentry leaders in the north; nor, until I754, did it apply to the numerous Avan deportees at Pegu, who continued to wear topknots and to regard themselves as Burmese.
Growing
Polarization
Under Alaung-hpaya
In the five years between Ava's fall in 752 and Pegu's collapse in I757, the we/they distinction between Burmese and Mons became somewhat more pronounced, in part through the efforts of Alaunghpaya, the Upper Burma headman who founded the Kon-baung dynasty. Alahng-hpaya obviously did not introduce the dichotomy between 'Burmese' and 'Mons' as political categories, for as we have seen, this was a basic, if at times subdued, theme since the opening days of the uncle, Taung-ngu-ya-za, Pegu revolt. Maha-dama-ya-za-di-pati's once observed that 'Burmese kings' ruling at Ava and 'Talaing kings' ruling at Pegu had frequently been locked in prolonged wars such as the current conflict.52 Following the collapse of Ava, however, the population of Upper Burma was no longer attached to a single political center as in Taung-ngu-ya-za's day; so in seeking to re-unify the region and to crush those local leaders who cooperated with Pegu, Alaunghpaya found it necessary to appeal with unprecedented vigor to that
50 LBHK, p. 6. As we shall see, these same sentiments of personal loyalty prevented some Ava officials from swearing allegiance to Alaung-hpaya. 51 AA-L, p. 28. 52 Letter quoted in Yi Yi, Myan-ma-naing-ngan achei-anei, p. I79.
ETHNIC
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their role of being 'Burmese'-which tradition-i.e. disthe the northern from their bulk of southern tinguished population neighbors. His appeals for 'Burmese' unity were strengthened by the fact that the north was at that time suffering from an appalling state of famine and social dislocation as a result of the southern invasions. The Peguan army, as we have seen, was in fact quite mixed, but Mons were certainly the most visible element; and the misery of these years nurtured a xenophobic reaction against the 'Mon invader' which Alahng-hpaya was quick to exploit. In appealing to the headman of Hkin-h village, Let-ya-pyan-chi, Alahng-hpaya reportedly wrote: 'Although you, Let-ya-pyan-chi, are a Burman (myan-malu-myo) and are a brave man, in planning to remain a subject of the Talaings, you are acting contrary to both your lineage (amyb-anwe) and your abilities.'53 At the battle of Myaung-wun, he issued orders to spare Burmese opponents, but no consideration was given to Mons.54 At the battle of Ti-daw his basic strategy sought to drive a wedge between Mons and northern Burmese who were fighting in mixed formations.55 At the battle of Prome his men unfurled their topknots to show soldiers with whom they could not communicate verbally that they were comrades.56 We find no precedent before 1752 for systematic appeals and discrimination of this sort. as we shall see, was due Alahng-hpaya's military success-which, in this to those deportees only part psychological strategy-heartened at Pegu who were still hostile to Banya-dala. They gave undue credence to reports circulating from the opening phase of Alahng-hpaya's resistance that he was dedicated to restoring the old Ava house. Accordingly, they formed a conspiracy to place the captive king Mahadama-ya-za-di-pati on the throne of Pegu. This plot does not appear to have been ethnically-oriented: the plotters included numerous local Mons, and their goal of establishing a Burmese prince at Pegu was in the tradition of Smin Dhaw. Yet the frightened Peguan courtreacting perhaps to the explicit ethnic element in Alahng-hpaya's movement-came to doubt the loyalty of many of its Burmese subjects, those recent particularly deportees from Upper Burma, where Alahnghpaya's movement was centered. On the discovery of the conspiracy, in October of 1754 the court executed over a thousand leading deportees implicated in the plot, including Maha-dama-ya-za-di-pati himself, and ordered the remaining Burmese at Pegu to wear in their ears an amulet stamped with the seal of the Pegu-Heir-Apparent and to cut
53AA-L, p. 29. Cf. AA-T, p. I62. 55 AA-T, pp. 170-71.
54 56 AA-T,
common
AA-L, p. 28; KBZ, Vol. I, p. 44. p. I86; KBZ, Vol. I, p. I22.
474
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their hair in Mon fashion as a token of loyalty.57 Like their counterparts at Ava in 1752, those who cut their hair were probably considered on some level at least to have 'become Mons'. This Peguan policy was disastrous in the extreme. On the one hand, ethnic homogeneity was never achieved, because the order on haircuts was not enforced systematically and Burmese continued to be identified among Peguan defenders until I757. On the other hand, the reprisals were sufficiently severe to force many people, especially Avan deportees, who considered themselves to be Burmese but who had hitherto cooperated with the Peguan court, to throw their support behind Alaunghpaya. Indeed, with Maha-dama-ya-za-di-pati dead, those opposed to Banya-dala had no one else to whom they could turn. After the executions started, a former Ava official who had not taken part in the original conspiracy organized a successful revolt of Burmese leaders which opened the way for Alaing-hpaya's entry into the Upper Delta. Over the next two years, from his descent to Prome until his final seizure of Pegu in May of I757, Alaung-hpaya sought to undermine remaining Burmese support for Pegu, in the knowledge that Mons and 'Karens' alone could never resist his advance.58
Universal Elements in Alaung-hpaya's Ideology

Nevertheless, deeply-ingrained universalist traditions still exercised a sufficiently powerful influence to justify a major revision of the customary image of Alaung-hpaya as a 'racial' or 'national' leader. Some of his early appeals to Burmese were in fact directed simultaneously to Shans and Kadus. These northern peoples had also suffered at the hands of the southern invaders and Alaung-hpaya needed their support. This was despite the fact that the Peguan king Banya-dala was a Shan. More importantly, appeals to particular ethnic categories, whether to Burmese or to Burmese and Shans, appeared in only a fraction of Alahng-hpaya's letters and edicts, and when they did appear, they were always subordinate to more traditional and universal themes of religious veneration and personal patronage. These concepts, not ethnicity, constituted the essential basis of the ideology by which he attracted people to his cause and legitimized his authority. The aforeAA-T, pp. I83-4; KBZ, Vol. I, pp. I04-5. Thus, for example, he disseminated a chain letter quoting a prophecy which said that the Talaings were not destined to found a kingdom because the Burmese were 'the principal group' (AAm, p. 28). See, too, AAm, pp. 3-4, 9-10, 28, 129; and KBZ, Vol. I, p. 184.
57
58
ETHNIC
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mentioned letter to Let-ya-pyan-chi in which Alahng-hpaya urged him to act in accord with his 'lineage and abilities' represents the single most explicit appeal to Burmese solidarity. After this introductory sentence, however, the letter continues as follows: Because I am of true royal lineage and because the benevolent deities [thammadei-wd] aid me in accordance with prophecies and omens, I am promoting the welfare of the Faith and the comfort of the people. Thus not only my current foes, but all the umbrella-bearing kings on the face of the earth will be unable to resist me. You, lord of Hkin-u Let-ya-pyan-chi, are overlooking these facts ... Now, however, if you come over to my allegiance, I shall act as patron to you and your family without bitternessso I inform you.59 As this and numerous other documents make clear, Alaiung-hpaya, like all sovereigns, viewed himself as something much grander than the leader of a particular ethnic community. He was simultaneously a 'lord of karma', an Embryo Buddha, and a universal monarch. Both the Restored Taung-ngu Dynasty and Banya-dala's kingdom were fated to collapse because the good karma of their rulers was exhausted. Alaing-hpaya, however, had a tremendous amount of good karma which was manifest in his incomparable glory and military success.60 In some future incarnation, when his spiritual perfections were yet more developed, Alauing-hpaya expected to attain Perfect Buddhahood, as his royal title 'Alaiing-min-taya-gyi' announced. His military campaigns had but one purpose: to proclaim the universal Law of the Buddha. For Alaung-hpaya was no ordinary king, but the very ruler of whom ancient writings had prophesied: 'There shall arise an Embryo Buddha who shall rule the people of many lands-Shans, Talaings, Manipuris, Chinese, Siamese, Indians, Arakanese-like the children of his own bosom.'61 In token of his mission, the god Sakka had given Alaung-hpaya the magical set-kya weapon of a Cakkavatti. These claims were set forth repeatedly in communications to Burmese and non-Burmese alike. All were invited to do homage and to recognize that Alaung-hpaya's victories were the result of unique religious merit. Some Mons responded favorably. In late I753 and early 1754, Mons as well as Burmese who had served under Taung-ngu-ya-za entered Alafng-hpaya's camp and were welcomed without discrimination.62 Mons fought as part of the northern forces during
61
59AA-L, p. 29. 60 See AAm, pp. 9-10, 12-13, KBZ, Vol. I, p. 237. Cf. AAm, p. 28.
62 Mon
28-30,
212-13.
adherents included Banya-ui-pA-ya-za and Ya-za-di-ya-za.
476
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Alaung-hpaya's descent downriver, while others defected along with Burmese troops in the south, albeit less frequently. One southern Mon defector, Daw-zwe-ya-set, received a major military command and was later made governor (myo-zaung) of Martaban in preference to Burmese aspirants for the post. (Thus whereas the so-called Mon national champion Smin Dhaw appointed a Burman to head Martaban, the Burmese hero Alaung-hpaya chose a Mon.)63 Nor were Mon adherents culled entirely from the ranks of latecomers and opportunists. At least one of Alaung-hpaya's myzn-yei-tet followers was a Mon, Nga-htaw-aing, who apparently came from Madaya in Upper Burma. The myin-yei-tet were a highly exclusive fraternity of senior relatives and trusted warriors organized by Alaung-hpaya in 1752 at the very outset of his resistance. During the first and most perilous engagement of Alaung-hpaya's career, Nga-htaw-aing singlehandedly burned a collection of straw-filled carts with which the enemy had planned to fire the Mok-hso-bo stockade. Shortly thereafter he and another Mon saved Alaiing-hpaya's life from Peguan attackers who had shot Alaunghpaya's horse from under him.64 It is important to note that these followers retained their Mon hairstyle and dress, and were recognized as 'Mons' by friend and foe alike. If anti-Mon sentiment per se had been the principal basis of Alahng-hpaya's authority, it would have been impossible to obtain their allegiance. The assertion that Alaung-hpaya and his sons sought to destroy the Mon 'nationality' also finds little support. Certainly he razed the city of Pegu, massacred its defenders, and ruthlessly persecuted those monastic and lay leaders who continued to foment resistance. Many bilingual southerners who had hitherto identified themselves as 'Mons' may suddenly have found it politic to become 'Burmese'. Yet we find no evidence in any of Alaung-hpaya's extent edicts nor in any of the voluminous chronicles of his reign that he encouraged such changes in ethnic identification, much less passed a binding edict on the subject. Alaung-hpaya sponsored resettlement projects within the Delta of people who were explicitly identified as Mons, and revenue records
63 KBZ, Vol. I, pp. I87-9, I9I, 257. Daw-zwe-ya-set's successor at Martaban was also a Mon. Moreover, Michael Symes, An Account of an Embassy to the Kingdom
of Ava (London, I8oo; repr., Westmead, England, 1969), pp. 38-9, says that Alaunghpaya gave a 'distinguished station' to the Martaban Mon leader, Talaban. An edict (AAm, pp. 9-10) which Alaung-hpaya issued at the start of his southern campaign, although addressed to 'my Burmese subjects...', specifically invited Talaings to do homage on equal terms. also refer to the incident of the carts, but identify the Mon hero as Nga-thaik-sat.
KBZ, Vol. I, p. 29 lists Nga-htaw-aing as myin-yei-tet No. I4.
64 This follows BL OR 3464, p. 144. AA-L, pp. 25-6
and KBZ, Vol. I, p. 38
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BURMA
477
show that Mon headmen families enjoyed virtually complete continuity of office throughouthis reign and those of his sons.65 The literary activity of the Mon monk of Athwa in the I760S and I770S, which received official encouragement from Burmese monks near the capital, seems to gainsay any sustained effort to suppress Mon culture.66Similarly, Alaung-hpaya and his sons respected the customs of captive Tavoyans, Europeans, Indians, Manipuris, Chins, Shans, Lus, etc. whom they required to appear in 'national' costume on ceremonial occasions. Indeed, Alaung-hpaya seems to have gloried in their diversity as a validation of his universal political pretensions. In practical terms, non-Burmese were of considerable importance, as they usually constituted at least a quarter of Alaiing-hpaya's infantry, and a much larger proportion of specialized units like artillery. Burmese Opposition to Alaiung-hpaya At the same time as pluralist traditions facilitated the entry of nonBurmese into Alauing-hpaya's service, personal loyalties and local ties prevented many men who identified themselves as 'Burmese' from supporting the Mok-hso-bo headman. Very large numbers of Burmese, indeed one is tempted to say most Burmese, supported Alaung-hpaya out of sheer opportunism in much the same way as they had aided Pegu when its star was ascendant. During the first year of his resistance, the armies which Alaung-hpayat faced in the Mu and Chin-dwin valleys consistedprincipally of Burmese recruited by northern headmen and former Ava commanders who had allied themselves with Pegu. As noted, Alauing-hpaya sometimes appealed to their anti-Mon prejudices, but without factors quite independent of ethnicity-Alaung-hpaya's sound tactical sense; his plethora of devoted relatives; methodical training of his troops; his insistence on ruthless discipline; above all, the religious themes by which he explained his success-he would never have triumphed and his enemies would have been content to continue under the Peguan regime. Ye-gaung-san-kyaw, whose career Alaung-hpaya summarized before executing him in I755, was representative of many such individuals:
65 Dal, Vol. I, p. 204; 'Some Historical Documents',J. S. Furnivall (ed. and trans.), Journal of the Burma Research Society, Vol. 6, Pt 3 (I916), pp. 213-23; Vol. 8, Pt I (1918), pp. 40-52; Vol. 9, Pt I (I919), pp. 33-52 passim. 66 R. Halliday, 'Immigration of the Mons into Siam', Journal of the Siam Society, Vol. Io, Pt 3 (September I913), pp. 6-7.
478
VICTOR
B.
LIEBERMAN
When he sees that the foe resists too strongly, he is in the habit of deserting mindless of his oath. While Ava yet flourished, he did service under Taungngu-ya-za and enjoyed office as a general because of his abilities. When he saw that the Talaings' strength was waxing, he went over to them. In turn when he saw my glory and might shine forth, he abandoned the Talaings and came over to me. He is a man who would act like this again in the future [and thus doesn't deserve to live].67 At least four categories of Burmese steadfastly refused to accommodate themselves to Alaung-hpaya even in the manner of Ye-gaungsan-kyaw. (a) Motivated by local pride or by jealousy, a number of northern gentry leaders fled to the wilds or joined Pegu rather than acknowledge Alaung-hpaya. They included the headmen of Kyauk-ka, Yon-ga, and Tha-zi; and the aforementioned Let-ya-pyan-chi, whose village of Hkin-u had long vied with Mok-hso-bo for regional leadership. Let-yapyan-chi, rather than the Mon commander at Ava, proved to be Alahng-hpaya's most determined and resourceful opponent in the north. In rejecting Alaung-hpaya's demand for surrender, he concluded: 'I don't want to do homage to a fellow Burman, only to a Talaing will I bow.'68 (b) Even after Maha-dama-ya-za-di-pati's execution, some Burmese continued to look to remnants of the old Ava court for leadership. One of Maha-dama-ya-za-di-pati's sons (the Shwei-daung prince) doggedly resisted Alahng-hpaya, and on the latter's death retained sufficient popularity that one of Alahng-hpaya's generals reportedly asked him to become king. Moreover, the poet later known as Sein-da-kyaw-thu declined to serve at Alahng-hpaya's court until 1756 or I757.69 He was still loyal to the memory of his original patron, Taung-ngu-ya-za, Maha-dama-ya-za-di-pati's uncle who until his death had fought to restore the Ava house and had opposed Alahng-hpaya's royal pretensions. (c) The inhabitants of Tavoy in the peninsula, who spoke a dialect of Burmese, never showed any particular enthusiasm for Alahnghpaya, and used the occasion of a fresh uprising at Pegu in 1758-59 to declare their independence. Whether one chooses to classify Tavoyans as 'Burmese' is a matter of convention. A letter from Alaunghpaya's commanders shows, however, that not only 'Tavoyans'
67AA-T, pp. I94-5. There is no evidence to suggest that Ye-gaung-san-kyaw changed his hairstyle to mark these changes in political allegiance. 68 AA-L, p. 29. Cf. AA-T, p. 162. 69Ba-thaung, Sa-hso-daw-mya at-htok-pat-ti(Biographies of Royal Authors) (Rangoon, 1971), pp. 241-52.
ETHNIC
POLITICS
BURMA
479
(dd-we kyun-daw-myo), but 'Burmese' proper (myan-ma kyun-daw-myo) joined local Mons fleeing to Siam following the collapse of the 175859 Tavoyan revolt.70 Furthermore, according to one report, the revolt itself was organized by a Burmese commander who allied himself with Mon refugees from Pegu in an attempt to revive Tavoy's independent sovereignty.71 (d) Most important of all, the tradition of Peguan regionalism continued to captivate many Burmese despite the trend towards ethnic polarization after October of 1754. Burmese sources identify individual Burmese commanders and sizeable contingents of Burmese soldiers who, alongside Mon contingents, helped defend the southern kingdom until its final collapse. One such Burmese force was said to have numbered between five and six thousand men.72 Avan deportees may have served Pegu after I754 under some degree of compulsion, but local Burmese fought enthusiastically. One suspects that in October and November of I754, the Burmese leadership in the south split between, on the one hand, men with long-standing attachments to the old northern court, and on the other hand, southern Burmese who had thrown in their lot with Pegu well before 1752. The key organizers of the uprisings in the Upper Delta in late I754 (Kyaw-din-thet-dawshei, Thad6-kyaw-thu, A-ka-shwei-daung, etc.) were all former Ava servicemen and ministers; while the most prominent Burmese partisans of Pegu after 1754 (such commanders as Let-ya-bo and Einda-bala-kyaw-thu) had never enjoyed Ava's patronage, so far as we know, and had all fought for Pegu while Ava yet stood. Ein-da-balakyaw-thu reportedly declined an invitation from Alaung-hpaya in 1752 in these words, which show that in his view, personal loyalty was a more noble ideal than ethnic solidarity: It is true that we [i.e. my men and I] are Burmese [myan-ma lu-my6]but we are servicemen who have come from Han-tha-wadi. We have already sworn allegiance to the Talaing king, and although we are indeed Burmese, we cannot now do domage to Alaung-min-taya-gyi.73 No doubt he was among those Burmese lords still loyal to Banyadala whom Alahng-hpayai seized shortly before Pegu fell.74
70AAm,
71
Burmese defenders, see AA-L, p. I 6; AA-T, p. 202; KBZ, Vol. I, pp. 128, 141, 159, 184; Dal, Vol. I, p. I66; and supra, note 32. The total Peguan army by '757 probably did not exceed twenty-five thousand, so Burmese represented a significant element indeed. 73 KBZ, Vol. I, p. 55. 74 Phayre, Historyof Burma,p. I65.
to theKingdom Symes,AnEmbassy of Ava,pp. 49-50. 72They garrisoned to Hson-gunfort-see AA-L, p. 12. For additionalreferences
p. 149.
480 Epilogue:
VICTOR
B. LIEBERMAN
Some Contrasts
with Modern Ethnic Revolts
In summary, we find in the mid-eighteenth century a strong tendency for populations subject to the same political center to use cultural traits as a badge of their common identity, particularly in periods of transition and uncertainty. Yet the correlation between cultural, i.e. ethnic, identity and political loyalty was necessarily very imperfect, because groups enjoying the same language and culture were fragmented by regional ties, and because the dominant modes of political on concepts of religious universalism and organization-resting personal, quasi-'feudal' allegiance-were essentially indifferent to cultural distinctions. We lack space to prove the point, but we can say with confidence that the basic patterns of the period I740-57 re-occurred during the ephemeral southern uprisings of I758-59, I773-74, 1783,
and 1826-27.
These findings are of some relevance to our understanding of colonial and post-colonial Burma. If the southern resistance to Ava and to Alahng-hpaya was, as has generally been assumed, motivated by 'ethnic separatism', one could logically conclude that the so-called Mon, Karen, Shan and other ethnic rebellions which developed following the withdrawal of British power from Burma in the I940S were the lineal descendants of that eighteenth-century resistance. In fact, our findings lead us to suspect that the colonial period introduced a basic discontinuity into the structure of Burmese ethnic relations. At this point we will essay some brief contrasts between the revolt of the mideighteenth century and those of the mid-twentieth century, in the hope that scholars specializing in modern Burma may expand on this theme. Certainly in both the eighteenth and twentieth centuries, rebellion fed on the discontents of non-Burmese communities on the outskirts of the Burmese heartland, while the central government was controlled predominantly by Burmese. In both periods as well, the insecurity attendant on the decline of an established regime accentuated ethnic divisions, and helped make cultural traits into powerful symbols of political identification. However, the universalist traditions which had mitigated this tendency towards ethnic exclusiveness in the mideighteenth century and which had permitted large numbers of selfproclaimed 'Burmese' to support the Peguan revolt, had largely disappeared by 1947. Differences between the two periods of rebellion are apparent in personnel, territorial ambitions, and intellectual orientation.75
75
I am particularly
indebted
to F. K. Lehman for the perspectives
offered in
ETHNIC
POLITICS
BURMA
481
As we have seen, the revolt of 1740 rivetted popular loyalties to an idealized political entity-the kingdom of Ra-manya or Peguas much as to a particular ethnic identity. Smin Dhaw was apparently a Taung-thu posing as a Burmese prince, and Banya-dala was a Shan. By contrast, the Karen National Defense Organization (KNDO), the Mon National Defense Organization, the Kachin Independence Army, the Shan State Army, and other such post-1947 rebel movements in each instance tended to be mono-ethnic. It is true that the KNDO included a Kachin brigadier in 1949 and Burmese and Indian followers by 1955, but the highest leadership of the KNDO always identified themselves as Karens and their official pronouncements sought to appeal exclusively to the so-called 'Karen nation'. So, too, the Mon National Defense Organization, while cooperating with the KNDO, viewed itself as the sole legitimate expression of the 'Mon nation'. The eighteenth-century revolts sought to extend Pegu's authority over as many tributary states and provinces as possible, regardless of the ethnic composition of the inhabitants. Its essential thrust was expansive and integrative. The same was true of Alaung-hpaya's countermovement. By contrast, post-1947 dissident groups postulated the existence of discrete national territories requiring either independence or a degree of autonomy considerably greater than that permitted under the federalist constitution of I947. Whereas in the pre-colonial period various ethnic groups had always lived in close proximity to one another, the post-I947 rebellions sought to carve out of the Union of Burma an independent 'Karen country', a fully autonomous or independent Shan state, a Mon national area (or a Karen-Mon state), and an independent Kachin state with compact well-defined ethnic majorities. Finally, both the revolt of 1740 and Alahng-hpaya's movement had their intellectual roots in Buddhist political theories which placed sovereignty in the person of the ruler in the expectation that he, as
his article 'Ethnic Categories in Burma'. Other sources on which I have relied for the post-colonial period include: four publications by the Ministry of Information of the Union of Burma entitled A Brief Review of Disturbances in Burma (1949?), the Insurrections (1949); Hugh Tinker, The Unionof Burma,4th edn (London, I967); Burma(Ithaca, 1958; 4th print. with supp., 1969); John F. Cady, A Historyof Modern Frank N. Trager, Burma:FromKingdom to Republic(London, 1966); Dorothy Guyot, 'Communal Warfare Between Burmans and Karens in 1942' (Paper Presented to the 29th Congress of Orientalists, Paris, July, 1973); Josef Silverstein, 'Part TwoandPoliticsof Southeast Burma', in George M. Kahin (ed.), Governments Asia, 2nd edn (Ithaca, I964); various editions of The Nation newspaper, Rangoon, 1952-58;
The Washington Post, April
I I,
KNDO Insurrection (X949), Events Relating to the Karen Rising (1949), and Burma and
I976.
482
VICTOR
B. LIEBERMAN
Patron of the Faith and defender of the Sahgha, would help make known the path to salvation among all creatures under his rule. This soteriological goal was the ultimate rationale of eighteenth-century kingship. Buddhist political doctrines were often combined with magical elements which, although not necessarily sanctioned by the Scriptures, also had a potentially universal appeal. By contrast, contemporary nationalist movements have their intellectual roots in post-Enlightenment European political theories which are entirely secular in inspiration. They place sovereignty in the population at large, and exalt secular and popular culture as the source of national creativity. In seeking to identify and preserve 'national' units, contemporary movements have necessarily stressed the particular at the expense of the universal. European notions about peoples and nations were accepted by most Western-educated leaders, Burmese as well as non-Burmese, and deeply influenced the federalist structure of the 1947 Constitution of the Union of Burma.76 Historians may wish to determine whether these same pre-colonial/ post-colonial dichotomies which we have outlined in the Irrawaddy valley were also found in Burmo-Siamese, Siamese-Cambodian, and perhaps Cambodian-Vietnamese relations. At first glance, it would seem that the pre-nineteenth century wars between Burma and Siam, for example, were not national conflicts in the modern sense, but regional and dynastic wars in which ethnic identity was but one of several factors determining political loyalty. Only in this way can we explain (particularly during the sixteenth- and early-seventeenth-century wars) the lack of guilt with which individuals swore allegiance to kings of different ethnic type than themselves; the ease with which regional centers detached themselves from the capital in the face of external assault; and the prevalence of universal religious themes in the diplomatic intercourse between rival monarchies.
76 Lehman,
'Ethnic Categories in Burma', p. 103.

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Ethnic Politics in Eighteenth-Century Burma Author(s): Victor B. Lieberman Source: Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 12, No.

ModernAsian Studies,12, 3 (1978), pp. 455-482. Printed in Great Britain.

Burma Ethnic Politics in Eighteenth-Century

people once he had triumphed.2

Htin Aung, A History of Burma (New York, 1967), pp. 153-70,

313, is a partial excep-

Peter Kunstadter, 'Population and Linguistic Affiliation of Ethnic Groups of

(Princeton, 1967), Vol. I, pp. 78-9I.

The Talaings (Rangoon,

taik-wun Maha-si-thu, 'Alaung-min-taya-gyi ayei-daw-bon' (Biography of King

1926) [Dal], Vol. I, p. 99. Cf. Halliday,

K. Lehman, 'Ethnic Categories in Burma and the Theory of Social Systems',

Highland Burma (London, I964); Michael Moerman, 'Ethnic Identification in a

Shorto, 'Genealogy', pp. 63-72.

The Revolt of 1740: Burmese

their Peguan foes as 'Talaings'.

Vol. 2, pp. 242-3; HNY, Vol. 3, pp.

Mons Who Failed To Support Pegu

Yi Yi, Myan-ma-naing-ngan achei-anei, p. 85 reports that in 1744 an attack by

46Alaung-min-taya amein-daw-mya (Edicts of King Alaung-hpaya)

49 See BL OR 3464, p. 142, and KBZ, Vol. I, p. 105.

AA-L, p. 28; KBZ, Vol. I, p. 44. p. I86; KBZ, Vol. I, p. I22.

Universal Elements in Alaung-hpaya's Ideology

adherents included Banya-ui-pA-ya-za and Ya-za-di-ya-za.

and KBZ, Vol. I, p. 38

with Modern Ethnic Revolts

to F. K. Lehman for the perspectives

'Ethnic Categories in Burma', p. 103.

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