Binnaka ( , also spelt Beinnaka) is an archaeological site located in present-day

Pyawbwe Township Pyawbwe Township is a township of Yamethin District in the Mandalay Division of Myanmar Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in nor ...

, Myanmar. It was one of the major

Pyu city-states The Pyu city-states ( ) were a group of city-states that existed from about the 2nd century BCE to the mid-11th century in present-day Upper Myanmar. The city-states were founded as part of the southward migration by the Tibeto-Burman languages, ...

associated with the

Pyu Pyu, also spelled Phyu or Phyuu, United States National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. is a town in Taungoo District, Bago Region in Myanmar Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (th ...

culture and may have been a city as early as the second century BCE. It was also inhabited in later periods, as late as the 1800s.

Location

Binnaka is located in

, Myanmar, near the railway line between

Yangon Yangon, formerly romanized as Rangoon, is the capital of the Yangon Region and the largest city of Myanmar. Yangon was the List of capitals of Myanmar, capital of Myanmar until 2005 and served as such until 2006, when the State Peace and Dev ...

and

Mandalay Mandalay is the second-largest city in Myanmar, after Yangon. It is located on the east bank of the Irrawaddy River, 631 km (392 mi) north of Yangon. In 2014, the city had a population of 1,225,553. Mandalay was founded in 1857 by Ki ...

. It is located southeast of

Bagan Bagan ( ; ; formerly Pagan) is an ancient city and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Mandalay Region of Myanmar. From the 9th to 13th centuries, the city was the capital of the Pagan Kingdom, the first kingdom that unified the regions that w ...

and is in the country's dry zone. It is near the

Kyaukse Kyaukse (, ) is a town and the capital of Kyaukse District in Mandalay Region, Myanmar. Lying on the Zawgyi River, 25 miles (40 km) south of Mandalay, it is served by the Mandalay-Yangon (Rangoon) railway. The first Myanmar probably settled ...

plain, which was historically the main rice-growing area in Myanmar.

Archaeology

A team led by Maung Maung Tin conducted preliminary excavations at Binnaka in 1980 and early 1981. A full excavation of the site has not been done. What Maung Maung Tin's team found included "a large masonry slab" that may have originally been a temple's

plinth A pedestal or plinth is a support at the bottom of a statue, vase, column, or certain altars. Smaller pedestals, especially if round in shape, may be called socles. In civil engineering, it is also called ''basement''. The minimum height o ...

or the foundation of city walls, several terracotta tablets and a brick fragment that all had what appeared to be the Pyu script written on them, burial urns and pottery, coins, and various other objects. The building, pottery, coins, and writing are all very similar to examples found at other "Pyu" sites such as

Beikthano Beikthano (, , also known as Panhtwa city), is situated in the irrigated Magway Region, near present-day Taungdwingyi. In the era of the Pyu city-states it was a city of considerable significance, possibly a local capital replacing Sri Ksetra. Toda ...

and

Maingmaw , conventional_long_name = Pyu city-states , common_name = , era = Classical antiquity , status = City , event_start = Earliest Pyu presence in Upper Myanmar (Burma) , year_start = , date_start = , event_end = Rise of the Paga ...

. A distinct, and probably pre-Buddhist, funerary practice where ash and bone were deposited in urns, seems to have been practiced at all three sites, suggesting that they were roughly contemporary, as early as 200 BCE. Both Maingmaw and Beikthano may have been contemporary of Binnaka. The chronicles mentions Binnaka and Maingmaw and states that the ruler of Binnaka was responsible for the fall of Tagaung, the city identified by the chronicles as the original home of Burmese speakers. Binnaka seems to have remained inhabited until the 1800s, since artifacts from that period also have been found. Artifacts from the period in between have also been found, including some copper items dated to the early Bagan period as well as some items identified with the Awa period. Binnaka appears as late as a palm-leaf ''sittan'' record dated to 1833 and called the "sittan of Binnaka", suggesting that the city was part of the Konbaung domain.

References

{{Reflist Archaeological sites in Myanmar Pyu city-states Pyawbwe Township