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Arakan’s Place In The Civilization Of the Bay is A study of coinage and foreign Relations of Arakan. The coins found in Arakan belong to both the groups described those of Vaishali ( Wesali ) are Hindu and those of Mrauk-U are Mahomedan. The old capital of Rakhine (Arakan) was first constructed by King Min Saw Mon in the 15th century, and remained its capital for 355 years. The golden city of Mrauk U became known in Europe as a city of oriental splendor after Friar Sebastian Manrique visited the area in the early 17th century. Father Manrique’s vivid account of the coronation of King Thiri Thudhamma in 1635 and about the Rakhine Court and intrigues of the Portuguese adventurers fire the imagination of later authors. The English author Maurice Collis who made Mrauk U and Arakan famous after his book, The Land of the Great Image based on Friar Manrique’ travels in Arakan.
Mrauk U may seem to be a sleepy village today but not so long ago it was the capital of the Arakan empire where Portuguese, Dutch and French traders rubbed shoulders with the literati of Bengal and Mughal princes on the run. Mrauk U was declared capital of the Arakanese kingdom in 1431. Mohomedan coinage, which came into India in 1203 A.D. has opposite characteristics. It is of an inscriptional nature. Save for a few exceptions, it contains not a portrait or a figure. The King’s name, title, date and faith are carefully recorded. The coin’s artistic merit depends upon the calligraphy; and as everyone is aware who has studied the Persian script as a mural decoration this can give a remarkably balanced and vital impression of art. The circumstances which made Arakan turn from the East and look West to the Moslem States were political. In 1404 A.D., Min Saw Mwan was King of Arakan, ruling from Launggret, one of the Lemro cities already mentioned. As the kings of Pagan had regarded Arakan as their feudatory, the Kings of Ava, who succeeded them, saw no reason why they should not reassert that view. Moreover the Arakanese had annoyed them by raiding Yaw and Laungshe. Accordingly, the heir-apparent to the throne of Ava invaded Arakan in 1406. Min Saw Mwan fled the country, taking refuge at Gaur, the capital of the Sultan of Bengal. That kingdom had been independent of the Sultanate of Dehli for eighty-six years. It was one of the many sovereign states of the world wide Moslem polity. The Arakanese king remained there for twenty four years, leaving his country in the hands of the Burmese. Nasir-ud-din Shah became Sultan in 1426 and Min Saw Mwan prevailed on that monarch to restore him to the throne of Arakan, as his tributary. Force of circumstances made him prefer to call himself a feudatory of the Sultans of Bengal than of the kings of Ava. He turned away from what was Buddhist and familiar to what was Mahomedan and foreign. In so doing he loomed form the mediaeval to the modern, from the fragile fairy land of the Glass Palace Chronicle to the robust extravaganza of the Thousand Nights and one Night.
