Chapter 12 The Colonial Period 461sors—his nephew “Raja Charles” and Charles’s son, Raja Vyner, ruled as the
Brooke dynasty for a century, stamping out piracy and protecting the tribal
peoples of their territories from exploitation by outsiders.
Burma and Thailand
The nineteenth century was not Burma’s century. Rather, it was a century
of humiliation and dismemberment at the hand of—not even a proper king—
but the crowd of merchants who called themselves the Government of India.
Burma’s century was the eighteenth century. At mid-century a chief from the
central Burma town of Shwebo proclaimed himself king of all Burma, took the
name Alaungpaya, “The Great Lord Who Shall Become the Buddha,” and
began moving against the ethnic Mons, Shan, Siamese, and other competing
polities, establishing the Third Burmese Empire. From the capitals of Shwebo
and later Ava, both near modern Mandalay, this militant state was in arm’s
reach of a number of significant powers. To the northeast was China’s Yunnan
Province; Burma was historically one of China’s tributary neighbors. To the
southeast was the kingdom of Chiangmai, now Thailand’s second largest city,
but then a small independent kingdom; south of Chiangmai was Ayutthaya,
where Siamese culture had reached a glittering peak. To the west were Indian
territories of Assam and Manipur under the control of the East India Com-
pany. Closer in were any number of tiny states and chiefdoms belonging to
Mon, Shan, Karen, Chin, and Kachin groups.
During the second half of the eighteenth century, Burma moved against all
these neighbors in an expansive effort to restore the lost glory of previous eras.
There is little evidence that these wars were about the things states were to fight
about later—trade, land, or self-defense, though insults to national pride were
high on the agenda. Twice they captured Chiangmai and then moved on to
Laos and to Yunnan Province to demonstrate their control over the whole
region. The great goal, however, was Ayutthaya. The Burmese king Hsinby-
ushin sent his army down the Mekong River from Laos, conscripting addi-
tional soldiers along the way and arrived at the gates of Ayutthaya in January
- The Siamese army, with full confidence in their strength, broke apart the
gates and attacked the Burmese army but were promptly defeated. Those who
could, retreated inside and then settled in for a lengthy siege that did not end
until 1767. When the monsoons came, the Burmese had bricked in their can-
ons, as a protection from being damaged or carried away by the rains, and kept
firing; Burmese soldiers built rafts and cruised the flooded fields, keeping the
Siamese cut off from the world. When the monsoons were over, Burmese sol-
diers dug tunnels beneath the foundations of the city and set fire to the walls,
making an opening for their army. They captured the king and his entire court
and marched the surviving populace off to Burma. The city was stripped of all
its valuables and burned. The walls were leveled and the moats filled in. The
capture of artists and artisans, monks and poets, and the total treasury of Siam
left a ghostly ruin at Ayutthaya but created a cultural renaissance in Burma.