When De Brito invaded the Toungoo Dynasty

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“Between Ceylon and Malacca there were several Portuguese colonies; but these had no official status under the Estado da India: they were the haunt of freebooters and renegades. Hooghly (on the river of that name) lay on the fringe of Mughal India. Akbar gave permission to the Portuguese to occupy the town in return for an assured supply of luxury goods from China. Augustinian monks arrived in 1599 and founded a monastery and a church: but most of the arrivals were soldiers of fortune. Dianga, near Chittagong, was even worse: a scorpion’s nest of pirates and slave traders. They were tolerated because they provided auxiliaries to the king of Arakan in his encounters with his enemies. Outstanding among these renegade Portuguese was Felipe de Brito, a cabin boy turned buccaneer; a man of courage and some vision. Despatched by the king of Arakan to attack Pegu, and its outport, Syriam, he conceived the plan of taking Syriam for Portugal. De Brito went to Goa and obtained Viceregal support: the Viceroy even awarded him the hand of his niece (whose mother was Javanese) in marriage. He returned to Syriam with Portuguese ships and established his command — a few score Portuguese, some Eurasians, Negroes, and Malabaris. De Brito preyed upon shipping in the Bay of Bengal, and compelled all foreign traders to berth at Syriam. Then he took to raiding into Lower Burma, and finally in 1612 sacked Toungoo. This provoked the king of Ava, and he mustered his forces to conquer Syriam. De Brito was betrayed and his stronghold captured. The Burmese king impaled him upon a stake, facing his fortifications, and left him to linger for days between life and death, gazing in agony on his little kingdom. The Portuguese captives were marched away into Upper Burma, and settled in villages near Ava to provide gunners for the Burmese army. Centuries later, their descendants still looked on themselves as Catholics, and the women still wore the mantilla, the veil of Iberia.”

p. 101, South Asia; a short history by Hugh Tinker

The viceroy sent a mercenary to seize an important port of the Toungoo Dynasty and attempt to conquer the Kingdom. :joy:

Yesterday’s successes pave the way for the failures of tomorrow.

“The prince who bases his power entirely on fortune collapses when fortune changes.” Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince

Renaldo

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That one is for all the historiophiles and antiquarians. But actually, history is full of examples of these kinds of sufferings in samsara, and this is a good opportunity to reflect on that. The Assu Sutta (SN 15.3) states:

“As we understand the Dhamma taught to us by the Blessed One, this is the greater: the tears we have shed while transmigrating & wandering this long, long time — crying & weeping from being joined with what is displeasing, being separated from what is pleasing — not the water in the four great oceans.”

And as the Visuddhimagga (Chap. XIX) beautifully says:

"No doer is there of the deed,
Nor one who feels the fruit thereby;
Empty phenomena roll on—
This view alone is right and true.

And while the deeds and fruits roll on,
Based on conditions, one to one,
No first beginning can be shown,
Just as with seed and tree, ’tis so.

No God, no Brahmā, makes it turn,
No ‘self’ is in this wheel of life;
Empty phenomena roll on,
Dependent on conditions all."

Nevertheless, it’s because phenomena are empty that freedom and liberation are possibilities.

Renaldo

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