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HOTO80 SMITHSONIAN.COM | December 2019
narratives that introduced audiences to the lives of
the prophets of Islam. Later, Muslim soldiers were in-
cluded among the royal guards. The Muslim presence
increased further in the mid-17th century, after Shah
Shuja (son of the Mogul emperor who built the Taj Ma-
hal, Shah Jahan) was defeated in battle by his brother.
Shah Shuja sought asylum in Mrauk U. Hundreds of his
soldiers became bodyguards of the Arakan aristocracy.
But by the next century, Muslims in Mrauk U were
under pressure. In 1784, the Konbaung dynasty of the
kingdom of Burma—a Buddhist realm dominated by
the Bamar ethnic group, which today makes up 68
percent of Myanmar’s population—conquered Ara-
kan. The Burmese deported leading Buddhist, Mus-
lim and Hindu families from Mrauk U and resettled
them near their capital, Amarapura. Only a small
Muslim population likely remained.
Today, given the ethnic and religious confl ict in the
region, any indicator of a signifi cant Muslim commu-
nity in Mrauk U in ancient times seems
portentous. During a trip there in De-
cember 2018, Leider and fellow Unesco
consultants hiked through the jungle
to another important landmark, the
15th-century Santikan mosque, a domed
building covered with vegetation. Much
of the roof is gone, and weeds colonize
what remains of the fl oor. But the arched
entryways and other handsome archi-
tectural fl ourishes suggested it had once
been a mosque of some distinction—ad-
ditional signs that a community of Mus-
lims had lived alongside Buddhists in
one of the most powerful cities of its era.
“MRAUK U WAS built by Rakhine [Bud-
dhists] and Muslims together,” Abdullah,
a Rohingya rebel leader who withholds
his full name to protect his identity, told the Asia
Times in 2017. He called for a return to the ethnic and
religious tolerance that had characterized the ancient
city. The Rohingyas’ demands for full rights, includ-
ing citizenship, have generated fi erce opposition from
the government and local Buddhists. The regime clas-
sifi es Rohingya as “Bengali,” even those whose fami-
lies go back in Rakhine State for generations, and says
they are simply fl eeing overcrowding in Bangladesh.
“There are 160 million people in Bangladesh, and they
don’t have enough space there; this is one of the rea-
sons that they want their own land in our state,” says
Tun Ne Win, a secretary general of a local branch of
the Arakan National Party, which stands accused of
whipping up hatreds against the Rohingya.
The new attention to Mrauk U has unleashed
equally strong passions among the Arakan Bud-
dhists, who see Mrauk U as the symbol of a great cul-
ture that was snuff ed out by the Burmese. In 2014,
Rakhine Buddhists received permission for the fi rst
time to commemorate publicly the fall of their capi-
tal. Thousands gathered at the site of Mrauk U’s Royal
Palace—now little more than charred foundations—
held marches, made speeches, and handed out food
to Buddhist monks. But the government was wary
of fueling another separatist movement in a country
fractured by aggrieved minorities.
Three years later, police opened fi re on a group of
young protesters, killing seven, all of them in their
teens and 20s, and injuring 12. One protester, whose
name has been withheld to conceal his identity, was
shot in the shoulder and watched one of his former
schoolmates die a few feet away. “They showed haste.
They could have shot with rubber bullets,” he told
me. He, and many of his friends, he said, now support
the Arakan Army, the Rakhine rebel group formed in- It claims to have recruited 7,000 soldiers—far
more than the Rohingya rebels—and has carried out
dozens of attacks against Myanmar mili-
tary and police in recent months.
By the summer of 2019, clashes be-
tween the Arakan Army and the Myan-
mar military, known as the Tatmadaw
(armed forces), were breaking out near
the temples, wiping out Mrauk U’s small
tourism industry and forcing interna-
tional consultants to withdraw. A Bur-
mese source, whose name has also been
withheld for protection, describes the sit-
uation as it has unfolded: “cut-off inter-
net, troops carrying out tight surveillance
in and around temples, abuses to civil-
ians including arrest and torture over
suspicion [of association with the Arakan
Army]. Tatmadaw soldiers have taken
[up positions] in most hills in and around
town.” In August, following a rebel as-
sault on an infantry base near Mrauk U, the Tatmadaw
launched Hellfi re missiles from attack helicopters and
used artillery to bombard Arakan Army emplacements
near Mrauk U town. (Reports indicate that vibrations
from shelling may have damaged the temples.)
THE MAJESTY OF MRAUK U remains undeniable.
Nearing sunset one day, Zaw Myint and I paid about
$1 to an enterprising tea shop owner whose property
extends up one of the tallest hills. We ascended a wind-
ing wooden staircase behind his hut to an observation
point. In the fading light, I gazed west over jungle-cov-
ered outcroppings, a complex of square-based temples
and a giant stupa in a clearing just below us, scatterings
of tin-roofed wooden houses interspersed among the
ruins, and, six miles away, silhouetted by the orange
sun, pagoda spires rising on a low crest beside the
Kaladan River. Wouter Schouten, a Dutch physician,
enjoyed a similar view when he arrived here duringHE, AND
MANY OF HIS
FRIENDS, NOW
SUPPORT THE
ARAKAN ARMY,
NAMED AFTER
THE ANCIENT
KINGDOM.