page_title: Military history of Myanmar
section_title: Pagan Empire
hierarchical_section_title: Military history of Myanmar / Pagan period / Pagan Empire
caption_attribution_description: English: Kingdom of Pagan at Sithu II's reign circa 1200 Based on Lieberman (2003), pp. 91-92 and Aung-Thwin (1985), p. 100. There is a little mistake in this map. In 1200, in North-East, that's no more en:Nanzhao (737 — 937), but instead, en:Dali Kingdom (937 – 1253). Français&#160;: Royaume de Pagan sous le régne de Sithu II, aux environs de 1200. D'après Lieberman (2003), p. 91-92 et Aung-Thwin (1985), p. 100. Il y a un anachronisme dans cette carte. En 1200, au Nord-Est, ça n'est plus le fr:Royaume de Nanzhao (737 — 937), mais le fr:Royaume de Dali (937 – 1253).
context_page_description: The military history of Myanmar spans over a millennium, and is one of the main factors that have shaped the history of the country, and to a lesser degree, the history of Southeast Asia. At various times in history, successive Burmese kingdoms were also involved in warfare against their neighbouring states in the surrounding regions of modern Burmese borders—from Bengal, Manipur and Assam in the west, to Yunnan in the northeast, to Laos and Siam in the east and southeast.
  The Royal Burmese Army was a major Southeast Asian armed force between the 11th and 13th centuries and between 16th and 19th centuries. It was the premier military force in the 16th century when the Toungoo Dynasty built the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia. The centuries-long warfare between Burma and Siam shaped not only the history of both countries but also that of mainland Southeast Asia. In the 18th and early 19th centuries, highly militaristic Konbaung kings had built the largest empire in mainland Southeast Asia until they ran into the British in present-day northeast India.
context_section_description: By King Anawrahta's accession in 1044, the small principality had gradually grown to include its immediate surrounding area—to about 200 miles north to south and 80 miles from east to west. Over the next 30 years, Anawrahta went on to unify for the first time the regions that would later constitute the modern-day Burma. Anawrahta began his campaigns in the nearer Shan Hills, and extended conquests to Lower Burma down to the Tenasserim coast to Phuket and North Arakan. Anawrahta's conquest of Tenasserim checked the Khmer Empire's encroachment in the Tenasserim coast, and secured control of the peninsula ports, which were transit points between the Indian Ocean and China.
  After a flurry of military campaigns by Anawrahta, Pagan entered a gilded age that would last for the next two centuries. Aside from a few occasional rebellions, the kingdom was largely peaceful during the period. The most serious was the 1082–1084 rebellion by Pegu (Bago), which nearly toppled the Pagan regime. In the 1110s, Pagan sent two separate expeditions to Arakan to place its claimant Letya Min Nan on the Arakanese throne. The first expedition failed but the second in 1118 succeeded. Sinhalese Mahavamsa Chronicles mention a dispute over trade in elephants between Burma and Sri Lanka that prompted the Ceylonese forces to raid Lower Burma in 1180.
  The authority of Pagan continued to grow, peaking in the reign of King Narapatisithu (r. 1174–1211). The king formally founded the Royal Palace Guards in 1174, the first extant record of a standing army. Pagan's influence reached further south into the upper Malay peninsula, at least to the Salween river in the east, below the current China border in the farther north, and to the west, northern Arakan and the Chin Hills. Up to the first half of the 13th century, much of mainland Southeast Asia was under some degree of control of either the Pagan Empire or the Khmer Empire.
caption: Pagan Empire c. 1210
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