Nawrahta Minsaw
[8] The three children grew up at the Kanbawzathadi Palace in Pegu, and they officially became part of the most senior royalty in March 1563 when their mother was elevated to the king's third (and last) principal queen with the style of Yaza Dewi.
[4] He was married to his first cousin Hsinbyushin Medaw, daughter of his uncle Thado Dhamma Yaza II of Prome, by Bayinnaung himself on 27 February 1574.
[11] The couple moved to Tharrawaddy (Thayawadi), a small town in present-day Bago Region, where Sit had been made governor.
On 26 November 1576,[note 1] the prince received a seemingly futile assignment to lead a search operation of a fugitive chief of Mogaung in the northern Kachin Hills.
His army (16,000 troops, 1300 horses, 130 elephants), made up of conscripts from Upper Burma and Shan States, had fruitlessly combed the remote northern hills at the foot of the Himalayas.
On 28 January 1579,[note 5] he was appointed the next viceroy of Lan Na to succeed Queen Visuddhadevi, who had died a month earlier.
The king regarded Lan Na as the most important of all his vassal states,[16] and selected Nawrahta from a list of candidates after careful deliberation with his court.
[17] The king impressed upon Nawrahta the importance of the appointment, highlighting that Lan Na was larger than Ava, Toungoo, and Prome; that it was strategically located among mainland Burma, the Shan states, Siam, Lan Xang and Annam; that it had a large population and plenty of natural resources; and that he was to obey Nanda, the heir-apparent.
[17] Nawrahta Minsaw and Hsinbyushin Medaw ascended to the Lan Na throne at Chiang Mai on 2 July 1579.
[18] Although he was the first Burmese-born ruler on the Chiang Mai throne, he did not face any serious issues governing the Tai Yuan-speaking former sovereign kingdom.
[note 6] The initial tranquility however was to give way to increasingly more turbulent times after King Bayinnaung's death in October 1581.
Nawrahta like other vassal rulers, who governed what used to be sovereign states as recently as only a few decades ago, adopted a "wait-and-see attitude" with Nanda, an experienced military commander in his own right.
[19][20] In the following years, he would be repeatedly asked to contribute to Nanda's manic efforts to maintain the extremely overextended empire intact.
[21] Two small northernmost Shan states (in present-day Dehong and Baoshan prefectures in Yunnan, China) never sent obligatory tribute to the new king.
The combined army of 16000 men, 1600 horses and 100 elephants spent five months at Sanda before finally taking the town.
About three months later, Viceroy Thado Minsaw of Ava sent secret embassies to Prome, Toungoo and Chiang Mai to raise simultaneous rebellions.
In the next nine years, Nanda would launch five disastrous campaigns against the "proud kingdom" of Siam, which had been preparing for the eventual showdown with Pegu since Bayinnaung's death.
When Nanda asked for help to break the Siamese siege of Pegu in December 1594, Nawrahta faced great difficulty in rounding up the troops.
By late 1598, Vorapita had decided to renew the hostilities, and sent in an army led by Cetabut, not just to retake Nan but to sack Chiang Mai itself.
To make matters worse, "the people of the south attacked Chiang Mai", which could mean Siamese forces invading Lan Na.
In 1601/02,[note 10] Ram Decho, ruler of Chiang Saen, revolted and his rebellion spread to much of Lan Na.
[40] Four months after the failed invasion, the Vientiane court forced Vorapita to abdicate in favor of his son Voravongsa.
[36] For the next three years, Nawrahta tried desperately and ultimately unsuccessfully to stay out of Ayutthaya's increasing grip on Lan Na.
The Burmese chronicles say that in the dry season of 1604–1605, Naresuan was in Lan Na, preparing to invade the Shan states.
[43][44] Although various chronicle accounts differ greatly and have many contradictions among them,[note 13] they all agree that Nawrahta's independent reign of Lan Na was at peace for at most two years between 1597 and 1599.
From 1599 onward, he had to deal with two major foreign-backed rebellions in Nan (by Lan Xang) and in Chiang Rai/Chiang Saen (by Siam).
[46] Thirteen months after Nawrahta's death, in late 1608/early 1609,[47] Tu Laung died outside the city, and his Siamese army retreated.
The poem generally evokes a mood of wistful sadness through the contemplation of nature in the changing seasons or the yearning for a loved one temporarily separated.
[2] His children by the chief queen were:[1] His children by the junior queens were:[2] Nawrahta is notably portrayed by veteran actor Chalit Fuengarom in the Thai film hexalogy The Legend of King Naresuan, which also depicts the campaigns that he launched against Siam at the behest of his brother, Nanda Bayin.
