Former Order (Arahan line)

Who holds it

Name

not known for 1 January 1200

Title

Head of the order (senior elder)

Since

not known

Born

not known

Family

Line of teachers on English Wikipedia: Shin Arahan (c. 1034 to 1115, a monk of Thaton), then his pupil Shin Panthagu (born 1083; primate 1115 to 1168 on that page; left for Ceylon in 1168 in protest at Narathu; came back in 1174 and died soon after). Both are dead by 1200.

Confidence

low

English Wikipedia (Shin Arahan, Panthagu, Uttarajiva, Burmese Buddhism), which cite Harvey 1925, Hall 1960 and Coedes 1968; the chronicles (Hmannan, Sasanavamsa) are the base underneath.

What it holds

• Monasteries on the temple plain and in the Mon towns (not itemised for 1200)
• Land and bonded servants given to monasteries and pagodas (inscriptions of the age record them; no figure for 1200 in any source we read)
• The Pali books said to have come from Thaton in 1057

How it was acquired

By royal and private gift since Anawrahta's reign (1044 to 1077).

Allies and rivals

Rival and cousin of the Latter Order; opposed by the Ari memory (Shin Arahan broke them for Anawrahta); the king gives to both.

How things stand that morning

Large and long established, but displaced from the king's first favour by the Ceylon-ordained order for about eight years; headless in the sources.

Wealth

Not itemised. It shares in the tax-free land and bonded people that temples and monasteries hold; the often quoted late-thirteenth-century share of the land is not used for 1200.

Threats

• The king's favour moving to the Latter Order
• Loss of its claim to valid ordination if the Ceylon argument wins

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

1. 1201 to 1300 (across the thirteenth century)The split between the two orders lasts about two centuries (English Wikipedia, citing Hall).Depends on: Neither side accepts the other's ordination. Stopped by: A royal settlement; none is dated.

Places of note

• The temple plain: Where the old order's monasteries stand.

Where the sources disagree

• English Wikipedia's page on Shin Arahan gives both 'within 75 years' and 'within a century' for the turn to Ceylon, and its page on Panthagu says he was primate to 1168 while the page on Uttarajiva makes Uttarajiva primate from 1167. We do not settle it. The campaign board says the quarrel 'outlives Narapatisithu by a century'; the pages say about two centuries from the 1190s.

Evidence: The founders are in the chronicles; the 1200 position rests on a few lines of modern summary, and the two pages on Panthagu and Uttarajiva overlap on who was primate in 1167 and 1168.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

Primary sources for Kingdom of Pagan

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• The Glass Palace Chronicle of the Kings of Burma, The Royal Historical Commission of King Bagyidaw (Monywe Sayadaw and others), drawing on U Kala's Maha Yazawin (about 1724) and earlier chronicles (1829 to 1832). The standard Burmese court chronicle, compiled six centuries after 1200 from older chronicles now lost. Read online
• The later Tai, Lao and Mon chronicles of the north, Ratanapanna (Jinakalamali); Bodhiramsi (Chamadevivamsa); anonymous monks and court scribes (the Chamadevivamsa about 1410; the Jinakalamali 1516 to 1528; the Chiang Mai Chronicle in its surviving form 1827; the Nithan Khun Borom 16th to 17th century). There is no text of 1200 for the Mon kingdom of Haripunjaya, the Tai muang of Ngoenyang (Chiang Saen), Chiang Rung, the Yom and Nan valleys, or the Lao middle Mekong.
• History of Song, chapters 488 and 489: Jiaozhi, Dali, Champa, Zhenla, Pagan, Srivijaya, Java, Brunei, Chola and Tambralinga, Toqto'a (Tuotuo) and the Yuan history office, from the Song court records (1343 to 1345, from Song veritable records and court diaries). The Chinese court's record of its southern neighbours, compiled from Song archives. Read online
• Epigraphia Birmanica, being lithic and other inscriptions of Burma, Various, edited by Taw Sein Ko, C. Duroiselle and C. O. Blagden (inscriptions of the 11th to 15th centuries; the series ran from 1919 to 1936). The Archaeological Survey of Burma's series of edited inscriptions with full translations. Read online
• Inscriptions of Pagan, Pinya and Ava; Inscriptions of Burma, Various (the Pagan kings, queens, ministers and donors), edited by Tun Nyein, Taw Sein Ko, G. H. Luce and Pe Maung Tin (inscriptions of the 11th to 14th centuries; editions 1899 and 1933 to 1956). The dedicatory inscriptions of Pagan are the only contemporary texts for the kingdom of Narapatisithu (reigning 1174 to 1211). Read online
• A Description of the Foreign Peoples (Records of Foreign Nations), Zhao Rukuo (Zhao Rugua) (1225 at Quanzhou). The best single text for the island world around 1200, written by the superintendent of maritime trade at Quanzhou from merchants' reports a generation after the date. Read online
• Notes in Answer to Questions about the Lands beyond the Passes, Zhou Qufei (周去非) (1178, after service in Guangxi). A Guangxi official's notes, written twenty years before 1200, on the south-western frontier of the Song and the countries beyond. Read online