1873.] 
Sir Arthur P. Phayre —On the III story of Pegu. 
27 
to a Italian!a, the lord Gautama himself came through the air and visited 
Tha-htun. This was thirty-seven years before he entered Nirvana. The 
country is spoken of reproachfully as a land where fishermen and hunters 
abound, these being callings opposed to the tenets of Budhism. But 
the king and the people of the city listen to the preaching of Bud- 
ha, and the future greatness of the country is predicted. But though the 
people immediately around the city were well disposed, those at a distance 
were savage and resentful. It is related how the great teacher, attempting 
to land near the mouth of the Than-lwin river, was stoned by the Bln-1 us and 
evil Nats who dwelt there. In these words is shadowed forth the rejection 
of Budhist doctrine by the native inhabitants, who afterwards became dis¬ 
tinguished for their religious zeal. 
Prom this time the historians of Tha-htun profess to have a list of all 
the kings who reigned in Thuwanna bhumi, distinct from the kings of Pegu. 
It is now impossible to decide how much of this list is historical and how 
much fictitious, until near the time of the destruction of the monarchy in the 
eleventh century of the Christian era. Tha-htun was then taken and de¬ 
stroyed by Anaurahta, king of Pu-gan; and the king Manu-ha, with his 
whole family, the nobles, monks, artificers, mechanics, and skilled workmen 
of every description, were carried away captive. There are the names of 
fifty-nine kings in the list, who are said to have reigned for sixteen hundred 
and eighty-three years. The events of their reigns are discreetly veiled 
under the obscure phraseology of metrical lines. By the chronology it seems to 
be intended that the reign of the son of the first king Tlii-ha Radza, commenced 
in the year that Gautama attained Nirvana. Taking this as a starting point 
and accepting the Burmese era of religion as commencing 513 B. C., then, as 
Tlii-ha Radza is said to have reigned sixty years, we find the year 603 B. C. as 
the commencement of the monarchy. This would give the year 1080 A.D. 
as the year of its destruction by Anaurahta. The time thus deduced for the 
latter event does not differ very much, considering all things, from the Bur¬ 
mese account. Anaurahta, according to the Malia Radzaweng, ascended the 
throne of Pugan in the year 1017, A. D., and reigned forty-two years. Within 
that period therefore he captured Tha-htun. The list of the kings as given in 
the native chronicles is added. But it is not considered to have any historical 
value, except as a generally correct representation of the existence of the 
monarchy, and its destruction with the city, about the period stated, by the 
Burmese king. 
Among the few facts recorded in the native annals of Tha-htun which 
need be mentioned here, is the arrival of the great missionaries Thauna and 
Uttara, which is put down as having occurred in the year 223 of religion, 
being 320 B. C., instead of the true date 241 B. C. On their arrival, they 
and their disciples were denounced by the existing teachers as bhil-us, 
