Ava

For other uses, see Ava (disambiguation)}}}.

Innwa (Burmese: အင္‌းဝမ္ရုိ့; MLCTS: ang: wa. mrui.; formerly Ava) is a city in the Mandalay Division of Myanmar, situated just to the south of Amarapura on the Ayeyarwady River. It is also called Ratanapura (ရတနာပူရ), which means City of Gems in Pali. The name Innwa means mouth of the lake, which comes from in (အင္‌း), meaning lake, and wa (ဝ), which means mouth.

Ava was capital of Burma from 1364-1841 founded by King Thadominbya on an artificial island at the confluence of the Ayeyarwady and the Myitnge created by digging a canal linking the two rivers . Prior to this, Sagaing had been capital, but after Sagaing fell to the Shan, the court moved across the river to Ava. The kings of Ava set about restoring Burmese supremacy, which had disintegrated after the fall of Bagan to the Mongol invasion under Kublai Khan that ended the First Burmese Empire founded by King Anawrahta in 1057.

In 1555, Ava fell to the southern Burmese Kingdom of Taungoo which led to the founding of the Second Burmese Empire by King Tabinshwehti, but in 1636, the king of Taungoo relocated his own capital to Ava. In 1752, the Mon revolted against Burmese rule and sacked Ava. A couple of years later, the founder of the new Konbaung Dynasty and the Third Burmese Empire, Alaungpaya, crushed the Mon revolt, and after a period with Shwebo as his capital, re-established the court in Ava.

Following the British conquest of Lower Burma after the Second Anglo-Burmese War (1852-53), Upper Burma was commonly called the Kingdom of Ava or the Court of Ava. During the reign of King Bodawpaya (lit. Lord Royal Grandfather,1781-1819), the capital was moved to nearby Amarapura. However, his successor, King Bagyidaw (lit. Royal Elder Uncle, 1819-1837), moved the Court back to Ava in 1823. When a tremendous earthquake caused extensive damage in 1841, Ava was finally abandoned for Amarapura. Little remains of the ancient capital today.

The city is a popular tourist day-trip destination from Mandalay.

Other sights of interest include:

Maha Aungmye Bonzan – A Buddhist monastery built by Nanmadaw Mè Nu, the wife King Bodawpaya in 1818, in traditional style except it was masonry instead of wood (popularly known as Mè Nu Ok Kyaung)
Nanmyin Watch Tower – a 27 meter high masonry tower, all that is left of the Ava Palace
Judson Memorial - a stone that marks the site of Let Ma Yun (lit. no pulling punches)prison where the American missionary Adoniram Judson was incarcerated during the First Anglo-Burmese War (1824-26)
Htihlaing Shin Paya - a stupa built by King Kyanzittha of Bagan period (11th c.)
Ava Bridge – a 16 span cantilever bridge built by the British in 1934, and the only structure to cross the Ayeyarwady River. A new bridge is currently under construction nearby.

References

External Links

From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.