RuinscapeLost places of Earth All 216 entries

No. 93

Bagan

On land East & Southeast Asia
Bagan, Burma
Corto Maltese 1999, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Travel there with Lyra
Where
Myanmar
Built by
Pagan kingdom
Era
1044-1287
Known for
More than 2,000 surviving temples on one plain.
How it ended
The kingdom collapsed after Mongol invasions in 1287.
Bagan Sunset
Gordon Johnstone, CC BY-SA 3.0
Hot air balloon over a pagoda in Bagan
Christopher Michel, CC BY 2.0
Pumpkin Pagoda [Bupaya Pagoda], Pagan, Upper Burma
Jackson, J., Public domain
Lyra Kael

Lyra Kael can take you here on the globe, tell you the story out loud and answer your questions. Start the time jump.

Background

Bagan ( bə-GAN; Burmese: ပုဂံ Băgam [bəɡàɰ̃]; formerly Pagan) is a medieval 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 would later constitute Myanmar. During the kingdom's height between the 11th and 13th centuries, more than 10,000 Buddhist temples, pagodas and monasteries were constructed in the Bagan plains alone, of which the remains of over 2,300 temples and pagodas survive.

The Bagan Archaeological Zone is a main attraction for the country's nascent tourism industry.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Related