Binnya E Laung ( my, ဗညားအဲလောင်, ) was heir-presumptive of
Martaban
Mottama ( my, မုတ္တမမြို့, ; Muttama mnw, မုဟ်တၟံ, ; formerly Martaban) is a town in the Thaton District of Mon State, Myanmar. Located on the west bank of the Thanlwin river (Salween), on the opposite side o ...
from 1330 to the 1340s. The only known son of King
Binnya E Law
Binnya E Law ( my, ဗညားအဲလော, ; 1308–1348/49) was king of Martaban from 1330 to 1348. Placed on the throne by his half-sister Queen Sanda Min Hla, this son of King Hkun Law defeated Sukhothai's invasion in 1330–1331, endin ...
had a rival in his half-cousin
Binnya U
Binnya U ( mnw, ဗညာဥူ, my, ဗညားဦး, ; also known as Hsinbyushin; 1323–1384) was king of Martaban–Hanthawaddy from 1348 to 1384. His reign was marked by several internal rebellions and external conflicts. He survived th ...
to be heir-apparent. He died of
smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus) which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) c ...
, and did not succeed his father as king.
Brief
Binnya E Laung was born to Prince
Binnya E Law
Binnya E Law ( my, ဗညားအဲလော, ; 1308–1348/49) was king of Martaban from 1330 to 1348. Placed on the throne by his half-sister Queen Sanda Min Hla, this son of King Hkun Law defeated Sukhothai's invasion in 1330–1331, endin ...
and a concubine in the 1320s. E Laung was probably born in
Pegu
Bago (formerly spelt Pegu; , ), formerly known as Hanthawaddy, is a city and the capital of the Bago Region in Myanmar. It is located north-east of Yangon.
Etymology
The Burmese name Bago (ပဲခူး) is likely derived from the Mon lang ...
(or less probably in
Sittaung), the towns where his father was governor.
[Per (Pan Hla 2005: 42), E Law was governor of Sittaung and later Pegu prior to his accession as king in 1330. Given that E Laung was still young child, he was probably born in Pegu.] He was a still a young child when his father brought him to the capital
Martaban
Mottama ( my, မုတ္တမမြို့, ; Muttama mnw, မုဟ်တၟံ, ; formerly Martaban) is a town in the Thaton District of Mon State, Myanmar. Located on the west bank of the Thanlwin river (Salween), on the opposite side o ...
(Mottama).
[Pan Hla 2005: 42] His father had been summoned by Queen
Sanda Min Hla
Sanda Min Hla ( my, စန္ဒာမင်းလှ, ; 1300s–1363/64) was the chief queen consort of three kings of Martaban, and the real palace power behind the throne. Her murder of her second husband King Saw E, grandson of king of Suk ...
to take over the throne. But E Law did not bring E Laung's mother, a concubine, to Martaban.
[According to the chronicle '']Razadarit Ayedawbon
''Razadarit Ayedawbon'' ( my, ရာဇာဓိရာဇ် အရေးတော်ပုံ) is a Burmese chronicle covering the history of Ramanya from 1287 to 1421. The chronicle consists of accounts of court intrigues, rebellions, diplomat ...
'' (Pan Hla 2005: 42), E Law did not bring any concubines to Martaban because he was concerned that his half-sister and new chief queen Sanda Min Hla, who had engineered the deaths of the previous two kings, might get into a jealous rage.
As a result, E Laung grew up without his biological mother. He was raised by a nanny named Hnin An May Han.
[ Although he was the only son of E Law, the prince was not officially appointed as heir-apparent. E Laung had a rival in his half-cousin ]Binnya U
Binnya U ( mnw, ဗညာဥူ, my, ဗညားဦး, ; also known as Hsinbyushin; 1323–1384) was king of Martaban–Hanthawaddy from 1348 to 1384. His reign was marked by several internal rebellions and external conflicts. He survived th ...
, son of Sanda Min Hla. The king was careful not to antagonize his chief queen, and never officially announced who his heir was. The ambiguity disturbed E Laung. One day, he organized an attack on U's camp. The two princes fought on elephant-back, and E Laung was defeated. The king finally chose sides, and arrested U.[Pan Hla 2005: 43] The king freed U only after intense protestations by queens Sanda Min Hla and Tala Shin Saw Bok
Tala Shin Saw Bok ( my, တလရှင်စောဗုတ်, ) was a principal queen of King Binnya E Law of Martaban. She was a daughter of King Hkun Law and sister of Queen Sanda Min Hla
Sanda Min Hla ( my, စန္ဒာမင်းလ ...
, mother and aunt of U.[Pan Hla 2005: 43–44]
At any rate, E Laung died shortly after from smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus) which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) c ...
.[Pan Hla 2005: 44]
Notes
References
Bibliography
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:E Laung, Binnya
Hanthawaddy dynasty
Deaths from smallpox