Maps of the lost cities of Myanmar
Beikthano City
An Ancient Center of the Pyu People of Myanmar
Beikthano transliterated from Vishnu the
Preserver, the second of the Hindu triad, is the
oldest of the 3 ancient Centres of Pyu Civilization.
Chronologically Beikthano flourished during the
1st to 5th centuries CE, the second being
Thayekhittayar (Srikestra) now called Hmawzar which
lasted from the 5th Century to the 7th Centugy.
Hanlin, the last Pyu Kingdom was located farther
north in the Shwebo District of Sagaing Division and
was most probably the Pyu Kingdom that the Chinese
chroniclers described in their dealings with the
Piao and records of delegations from the Pyu
kingdom to the Chinese court in 801-802. At any
rate, Halin was sacked and burned in 832 by the
Nanchao Kingdom from the north.
Beikthano city is located 12 miles west of
Taungdwingyi Township, Magway Division on the
Taungdwingyi-Magway Highway. Its co-ordinates are
latitude (20°) North and (95° / 23) East and is
built on ground 450 feet above sea level. The
ancient city of Beikthano covered an area of 3.3
square miles. The eastern city wall was 10,000 feet
in length, the northern wall was 9,000 feet, the
southern wall was 8,000 feet, while the western wall
has collapsed owing to soil erosion caused by the
action of the Yanpθ Creek.
Beikthano was defended by two walls, a City wall
and an inner Palace Wall. Both of these walls were
more circular (or rather rhomboid) than square in
shape.Huge, specially shaped bricks had to be baked
to be fitted as proper corner stones for these
walls. Neither the City walls nor the Palace Walls
were defended by moats. The majority of the Pyu
citizenry lived outside the city walls or in the
surrounding countryside.
They were content to live in houses made of wood
and bamboo but insisted on their monasteries being
built of wood and brick and their city and Palace
also achieving corresponding grandeur. An account of
Beikthano was recorded in the Tang Dynasty (618-907)
Chinese chronicle Man Shu in the chapter The
Southern Barbarians as follows:
The circular wall of his (the Pyu Kings) city
is built of greenish glazed titles (brick) and is
160 li. It has 12 gates and three pagodas at each
four corners. . . Their house tiles are of lead and
zinc. . . They have a hundred monasteries with
bricks of vitreous ware, embellished with gold and
silver, vermillion, gray colours and red kino. [Taw
Sein Kho (1895), The Pottery and Glasware of Burma
1894-95,Superintendent of Govt.Printing, Rangoon.]
The usual dates ascribed to the Beikthano kingdom
are from the 1st Century CE to the 5th Century CE
when the city gates and the Palace Walls were burned
to the ground.
Charcoal from the excavated sites have been radio
carbon-dated to the 1st century C.E. Conflicting
scientific evidence however emerged at the 5th Radio
Dating Conference (1962) of the International Dating
Conference, Cambridge University, U.K., where the
decay of Radio carbon (14) from samples from
Beikthano indicate that they should be more properly
dated to 1950 B.C.E., i.e. to nearly 2000 years
earlier than the First Century C.E. The charcoal
samples for these analyses were taken from the two
lowest strata of a religious edifice unearthed at
site No.(9) as well as charcoal from the two bottom
strata at site No.(10).
Religious Beliefs
One mystery surrounding Pyu religious beliefs is
that although they built hundreds of monasteries and
were Buddhist attested by contemporary Chinese
chronicles, there is a surprising dearth of Buddhist
artifacts in all three Pyu Kingdoms.
This has led to conjectures that the Pyu received
their Buddhism from Andra Pradesh in Southern India.
The excavations have uncovered artifacts that are
related to those found in Andra Pradesh, with dates
corresponding to the periods in which most of the
Andra Buddhist material at Amaravati and
Nagarjunakone was made ( i.e. during the second to
fourth centuries.)
As Prof. R.L.Brown, Professor of Indian and
Southeast Asian Art History at the University of
California at Los Angeles succinctly puts it:
Another problem is that no Buddhist artefacts
have been found at Beikthano. One suggestion is that
this mysterious absence is due to Andran Buddhist
influence predating the adoption of iconic
representations of the Buddha and thus represents
the aniconic period at Amaravati (before the end of
the second century.)[ Brown. R.L. Pyu Art, Looking
East and West]. U Aung Thaw offers a similar
suggestion that the Buddhist sect at Beikthano
rejected the worship of the Buddha image. [U Aung
Thaw, Reports on the Excavations at Beikthano,
Rangoon, 1968. p.66]
Hanlin in Upper Myanmar resembles the two other
Pyu sites in having no Buddhist artefacts either.
Pyu Culture
Beikthano city and its environs reflect the
culture of the Pyus. The populace cremated their
dead and buried the ash in funeral urns or jars
outside or even within their dwellings.
They appear to have gained considerable expertise
in the making of burial urns. Over 700 such urns
have been uncovered together with 45 intact covers
and show the influence of many decorative styles.
They were also accomplished masons, being able to
construct brick walls and edifices that have lasted
to the present day. The insides of some buildings
have been artistically decorated with stucco
figurines, lime-wash and paintings.
The craft of blacksmithing seems to have been
also developed as evidenced by the iron-work on the
City Gates, hinges and decorative scroll work and
the production of iron weapons such as swords,
spear-heads, arrow-heads and bows.
The Pyus also seem to have been adept at pottery
making, judging from the 2060 pots and jars
uncovered comprising pots for water carrying, jars
for water storage, and cooking pots.
The gate to the city wall at dig No.8 has also
revealed a twice life-sized marble figure presumed
to represent a Nat (Animistic) Spirit Guardian of
the City indicating that Pyus were also accomplished
sculptors in marble.
A small paper-thin exquisite gold cup and two
similar silver cups that have been excavated bear
witness that goldsmithy and silversmithy too were
well developed among the Pyus.
Skeletal Remains
When one of the religious edifices (Dig. No. 14)
was excavated a stretched out skeleton near the
south wall was uncovered. Along the north wall were
lined up two piles of human bones. The outstretched
skeleton remains were carefully marked, labeled and
shipped to Prof. Dr. H. Zaw Htun of the Faculty of
Anatomy, Institute of Medicine, Yangon for
scientific examination.
Dr. Zaw Htuns findings indicated that the
remains were of a healthy Mongolian male, 25 years
old and 5 5 tall. The cause of death was due to a
heavy blow delivered to the right temple.
Beads
A total of 780 beads, comprising large numbers of
earthenware beads and (29) stone beads were
recovered from the excavations. At building No. (17)
alone 500 beads were found and possibly indicates
that the building was some sort of bead factory.
Some of the stone beads were coloured either red or
yellow or black. The art of colouring stone beads
seems to have reached an unprecedented high during
the Pyu period.
Conclusion
Beikthano was destroyed in the 4th or 5th Century
C.E. Buildings and city gates were consumed by fire,
indicating that it was the result of enemy attack.
After a short period as a ruined city, it was
rebuilt again as a succeeding kingdom, only to be
sacked again and burnt to the ground. However the
Pyu people continued to occupy the surrounding
countryside in spite their no longer having
city-walls and a Palace to protect them. The next
Pyu kingdom was established down-river at
Thayekhittara (Sri Kshestra), 5 miles west of Pyay
that grew to prominence during the 4th and 5th
Centuries CE.
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