page_title: First Toungoo Empire
section_title: Aftermath
hierarchical_section_title: First Toungoo Empire / History / Aftermath
caption_attribution_description: English: Restored Taungoo Dynasty
context_page_description: The First Toungoo Empire was the dominant power in mainland Southeast Asia in the second half of the 16th century. At its peak, Toungoo "exercised suzerainty from Manipur to the Cambodian marches and from the borders of Arakan to Yunnan" and was "probably the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia." The "most adventurous and militarily successful" dynasty in Burmese history was also the "shortest-lived."
  The empire grew out of the principality of Toungoo, a minor vassal state of Ava until 1510. The landlocked petty state began its rise in the 1530s under Tabinshwehti who went on to found the largest polity in Myanmar since the Pagan Empire by 1550. His more celebrated successor Bayinnaung then greatly expanded the empire, conquering much of mainland Southeast Asia by 1565. He spent the next decade keeping the empire intact, putting down rebellions in Siam, Lan Xang and the northernmost Shan states. From 1576 onwards, he declared a large sphere of influence in westerly lands—trans-Manipur states, Arakan and Ceylon. The empire, held together by patron-client relationships, declined soon after his death in 1581.
context_section_description: Even before the fall of Pegu, the breakaway states of the empire had been engaged in a series of “confused, many-sided wars” since the mid-1590s.
  Prome attacked Toungoo in 1595. Prome and Ava fought for central Burma in 1596–97. Prome and Toungoo later agreed to attack Ava in 1597 but Toungoo broke off the alliance and attacked Prome in 1597. In the central mainland, Lan Xang and Lan Na went to war in 1595–96 and again in 1598–1603. Siam supported a Chiang Rai rebellion against Lan Na (Chiang Mai) in 1599. By 1601, Lan Na was divided into three spheres: Chiang Mai, Siam-backed Chiang Rai, Lan Xang-backed Nan. Chiang Mai defeated the Siam-backed rebellion in Chiang Rai in 1602 only to submit to Ayutthaya later that year. Chiang Mai retook Nan from Lan Xang in 1603. In the western mainland, Siam invaded Lower Burma in 1600, and went on to attack Toungoo only to be driven back by Toungoo's ally Arakan. The Portuguese garrison at Syriam switched allegiance from Arakan to Goa in 1603. Siamese vassal Martaban then entered into an alliance with Portuguese Syriam. Ava had seized cis-Salween Shan states by 1604. Siam planned to invade Ava's vassal southern Shan states in 1605 before cancelling it because of the sudden death of its warrior king Naresuan (r. 1590–1605). Ava conquered Prome (1608), Toungoo (1610), Portuguese Syriam (1613), Siamese Martaban and Tavoy (1613), and Lan Na (1614).
  Still, in contrast to 250 years of political fragmentation that followed Pagan's collapse, this interregnum proved brief. As ephemeral as the overextended Toungoo Empire was, the underlying forces that underpinned its rise were not. By 1622, a branch of the fallen house (known retrospectively as the Restored Toungoo Dynasty or Nyaungyan Dynasty) had succeeded in reconstituting a major portion of the First Toungoo Empire, except for Siam, Lan Xang and Manipur. The new dynasty did not overextend itself by trying to take over Siam or Lan Xang. This was a more “realistic and organic” polity that would last until the mid-18th century. The new dynasty proceeded to create a political and legal system whose basic features would continue under the Konbaung dynasty (1752–1885) well into the 19th century.
caption: The restored Taungoo dynasty, or Nyaungyan dynasty, c. 1650
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