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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

CHAP. LI. p. 98.   MIEN.   87

Mr. John Cain adds (l.c., April, 1879, p. 106) : " The women

are called ` hens ' by their husbands, and the male and female

children ` cock children ' and ` hen children ' respectively."

LI., p. 99 n. " M. Garnier informs me that Mien Kwé or Mien

Tisong is the name always given in Yun Nan to that kingdom."

Mien Tisong is surely faulty, and must likely be corrected

in Mien Chung, proved especially at the Ming Period. (PELLIOT,

Bul. Ecole franc. Ext. Orient, IV., July—Sept., 1904, p. 772.)

LI., LII., pp. 98 seq.

WAR AGAINST THE KING OF MIEN.

The late Edouard HUBER of Hanoi, writing from Burmese

sources, throws new light on this subject : " In the middle of the

thirteenth century, the Burmese kingdom included Upper and

Lower Burma, Arakan and Tenasserim ; besides the Court of

Pagan was paramount over several feudatory Shan states, until

the valleys of the Yunnanese affluents of the Irawadi to the

N.E., and until Zimmé at the least to the E. Narasīhapati, the

last king of Pagan who reigned over the whole of this territory,

had already to fight the Talaings of the Delta and the governor

of Arakan who wished to be independent, when, in 1271, he

refused to receive Kúblái's ambassadors who had come to call

upon him to recognize himself as a vassal of China. The first

armed conflict took place during the spring of 1277 in the Nam

Ti valley ; it is the battle of Nga-Çaung-khyam of the Burmese

Chronicles, related by Marco Polo, who, by mistake, ascribes to

Nasr ed-Din the merit of this first Chinese victory. During the

winter of 1277-78, a second Chinese expedition with Nasr ed-Din

at its head ended with the capture of Kaung sin, the Burmese

stronghold commanding the defile of Bhamo. The Pagan

Yazawin is the only Burmese Chronicle giving exactly the

spot of this second encounter. During these two expeditions,

the invaders had not succeeded in breaking through the thick

veil of numerous small thai principalities which still stand to-day

between Yun Nan and Burma proper. It was only in 1283 that

the final crush took place, when a third expedition, whose chief

was Siang-wu-ta-eul (Singtaur), retook the fort of Kaung sin and

penetrated more into the south in the Irawadi Valley, but

without reaching Pagan. King Narasīhapati evacuated Pagan

before the impending advancing Chinese forces and fled to the

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