Merit Making at Ancient Bagan, Myanmar: A Consideration of Socio-Religious Entanglements and the Rise and Fall of a Classical Southeast Asian State

Summary

Much of the recent discourse surrounding the collapse of archaic states is centered on the impacts of ecoside or climate change. Driven by natural scientists and increasingly sophisticated data generation and analysis methods, such environmentally-based approaches to collapse have tended to gloss over the myriad cultural factors also involved in such severe transformations, thus inhibiting our ability to fully grasp the complexities of the collapse process in the various case studies currently under archaeological scrutiny. This presentation underscores the importance of including considerations of both religion and ritual in our interpretations of socio-political collapse, using insights from the rise and fall of Bagan, Myanmar’s "classical period" capital. The focus of the discussion will be on the roles that Buddhist merit making played in Bagan’s development and denouement, with specific attention to the various ecological, economic, social, and political entanglements that resulted from ideologically charged donations to temples and monasteries.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)   •
• Ritual during Periods of Decline, Collapse, and Regeneration in Archaic States

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 13174