Bago, Myanmar: History
=== Establishment ===
Various Mon language chronicles report widely divergent foundation dates of Bago, ranging from 573 CE to 1152 CE while the Zabu Kuncha, an early 15th century Burmese administrative treatise, states that Pegu was founded in 1276/77 CE.
The earliest extant evidence of Pegu as a place dates only to the late Pagan period (1212 and 1266) when it was still a small town, not even a provincial capital. After the collapse of the Pagan Empire, Bago became part of the breakaway Kingdom of Martaban by the 1290s.
The earliest possible external record of Bago dates to 1028 CE. The Thiruvalangadu plate describe Rajendra Chola I, the Chola Emperor from South India, as having conquered "Kadaram" in the fourteenth year of his reign – 1028 CE. According to one interpretation, Kadaram refers to Bago. More modern interpretations understand Kadaram to be Kedah in modern day Malaysia, instead of Bago. A Chinese source mentions Jayavarman VII adding Pegu to the territory of the Khmer Empire in 1195.
The small settlement grew increasingly important in the 14th century as the region became most populous in the Mon-speaking kingdom. In 1369, King Binnya U made Bago the capital. During the reign of King Razadarit, Bago and the Ava Kingdom were engaged in the Forty Years' War. The peaceful reign of Queen Shin Sawbu came to an end when she chose the Buddhist monk Dhammazedi (1471–1492) to succeed her. Under Dhammazedi, Bago became a centre of commerce and Theravada Buddhism.
In 1519, António Correia, then a merchant from the Portuguese casados settlement at Cochin, landed in Bago (known to the Portuguese as Pegu) looking for new markets for pepper from Cochin. A year later, Portuguese India Governor Diogo Lopes de Sequeira sent an ambassador to Pegu.
The city remained the capital until the kingdom's fall in 1538. The ascendant Toungoo dynasty under Tabinshwehti made numerous raids that the much larger kingdom could not muster its resources against. While the kingdom would have a brief resurgence for 2 years in the 1550s, Tabinshwehti's successor Bayinnaung would firmly come to control Bago in 1553.
In late 1553, Bago was proclaimed the new capital with commissioning of a new palace, the Kanbawzathadi Palace and Bayinnaung's coronation itself in January 1554. Over the next decade, Bago gradually become the capital of more land and eventually the largest empire in Indochina.
After the 1565 rebellion by resettled Shans in Pegu, he faced no new rebellions for the next two years (1565–1567). Because the rebellion burned down major swaths of the capital, including the entire palace complex, he had the capital and the palace rebuilt. The new capital had 20 gates, each named after the vassal who built it. Each gate had a gilded two-tier pyatthat and gilded wooden doors.
The newly rebuilt Kanbawzathadi Palace was officially opened on 16 March 1568, with every vassal ruler present. He even gave upgraded titles to four former kings living in Pegu: Mobye Narapati of Ava, Sithu Kyawhtin of Ava, Mekuti of Lan Na, and Maha Chakkraphat of Siam.
As a major seaport, the city was frequently visited by Europeans, among these, Gasparo Balbi and Ralph Fitch in the late 1500s. The Europeans often commented on its magnificence. Pegu also established maritime links with the Ottomans by 1545. …