The Mingun Pahtodawgyi ( my-Mymr, မင်းကွန်းပုထိုးတော်ကြီး, ) is an incomplete monument

stupa A stupa ( sa, स्तूप, lit=heap, ) is a mound-like or hemispherical structure containing relics (such as ''śarīra'' – typically the remains of Buddhist monks or nuns) that is used as a place of meditation. In Buddhism, circumamb ...

Mingun Mingun ( ) is a town in Sagaing Township of Sagaing Region, north-west Myanmar (Burma), located 11 km up the Ayeyarwady River on the west bank from Mandalay. Its main attraction is the ruined Mingun Pahtodawgyi. Mingun Pahtodawgyi The Ming ...

, approximately northwest of

Mandalay Mandalay ( or ; ) is the second-largest city in Myanmar, after Yangon. Located on the east bank of the Irrawaddy River, 631km (392 miles) (Road Distance) north of Yangon, the city has a population of 1,225,553 (2014 census). Mandalay was fo ...

Sagaing Region Sagaing Region ( my, စစ်ကိုင်းတိုင်းဒေသကြီး, ; formerly Sagaing Division) is an administrative region of Myanmar, located in the north-western part of the country between latitude 21° 30' north and lon ...

in central

Myanmar Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...

(formerly Burma). The ruins are the remains of a massive construction project begun by King

Bodawpaya Bodawpaya ( my, ဘိုးတော်ဘုရား, ; th, ปดุง; 11 March 1745 – 5 June 1819) was the sixth king of the Konbaung dynasty of Burma. Born Maung Shwe Waing and later Badon Min, he was the fourth son of Alaungpaya, fou ...

in 1790 which was intentionally left unfinished. The Pahtodawgyi is seen as the physical manifestation Bodawpaya's well-known eccentricities. He set up an observation post on an island off Mingun to personally supervise the construction of the temple.

Incompletion

Bodaw Maung Wine used thousands of prisoners of war from

Arakan Arakan ( or ) is a historic coastal region in Southeast Asia. Its borders faced the Bay of Bengal to its west, the Indian subcontinent to its north and Burma proper to its east. The Arakan Mountains isolated the region and made it accessi ...

. Which he deported 20,000 people to Central Burma slaves working on the construction of the stupa. The construction was also seen as taking a heavy toll on the people and the state. Thus a prophecy was allegedly created to stop the project. The approach in conveying the dissatisfaction was allegedly to utilize the King's deep superstition. According to the prophecy, "as soon as the building of the pagoda was over, the country would also be gone". A variation states that king would die once the project was completed. Thus, construction was slowed to prevent the prophecy's realisation and when the king died, the project was completely halted. A model pagoda nearby (known as the Pon Daw Pagoda), typical of many large pagoda projects like the

Shwedagon Pagoda The Shwedagon Pagoda (, ); mnw, ကျာ်ဒဂုၚ်; officially named ''Shwedagon Zedi Daw'' ( my, ရွှေတိဂုံစေတီတော်, , ) and also known as the Great Dagon Pagoda and the Golden Pagoda is a gilded stupa ...

and

Thatbyinnyu Temple The Thatbyinnyu Temple ( my, သဗ္ဗညု ဘုရား, ; pi, Sabbannu or "the Omniscient") is a Theravadin Buddhist temple in Bagan (Pagan), Myanmar. The temple is recognized as a monument in the Bagan Archeological Area, a UNESCO Wor ...

, offers a small scale of what would have been a tall temple. However, it holds the record for being the largest pile of bricks in the world.

Current condition

By the time the construction project was abandoned, the pagoda had attained a height of 50 metres, one third of the intended height. An

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

on 23 March 1839 caused huge cracks to appear on the face of the remaining structure. The temple serves more as an attraction than a religious site. However, a small shrine with a

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a śramaṇa, wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist tradition, he was ...

image still serves its purpose as a place of worship and meditation. Pondaw paya or a working model of the stupa can be seen nearby.

Mingun Bell

King Bodawpaya also had a gigantic

bell A bell is a directly struck idiophone percussion instrument. Most bells have the shape of a hollow cup that when struck vibrates in a single strong strike tone, with its sides forming an efficient resonator. The strike may be made by an inter ...

cast to go with his huge stupa. The Mingun Bell, weighing at 90 tons, is today the second largest ringing bell in the world. The weight of the bell in Burmese measurement, is 55,555 viss or ''peiktha'' (1 viss = 1.63 kg), handed down as a mnemonic "Min Hpyu Hman Hman Pyaw", with the consonants representing the number 5 in Burmese astronomy and

numerology Numerology (also known as arithmancy) is the belief in an occult, divine or mystical relationship between a number and one or more coinciding events. It is also the study of the numerical value, via an alphanumeric system, of the letters in ...

Accessibility

Mingun can be reached by a ferry across the

Irrawaddy river The Irrawaddy River ( Ayeyarwady River; , , from Indic ''revatī'', meaning "abounding in riches") is a river that flows from north to south through Myanmar (Burma). It is the country's largest river and most important commercial waterway. Origi ...

from Mandalay and then optionally by foot or by bullock cart from the river jetty. File:Myanmar Irrawaddy Minguin 200302130104.jpg, Looking westward from the Irrawaddy River File:Mingun Pagoda.JPG, Mingun pagoda File:Pahtodawgyi Pagoda (28418345137).jpg, Path to the top of the pagoda File:East portal Mingun Pahtodawgyi, small shrine inside.JPG, Small shrine with a Buddha inside the east portal File:Irrawaddy River from atop Mingun Pahtodawgyi.JPG, On the top of Mingun Pahtodawgyi, a small platform for a great view of the Irrawaddy River File:Mingun-Pagoda-Myanmar-04-Chinthe.jpg, Remains of giant Chinthe File:Mingun Bell 2016.JPG, Mingun Bell

References

{{Buddhist sites in Myanmar Tourist attractions in Myanmar Buddhist temples in Myanmar Buddhist pilgrimage sites in Myanmar Buildings and structures in Sagaing Region

Incompletion

Current condition

Mingun Bell

Accessibility

See also

References