Page 214 - The Rough Guide to Myanmar (Burma)

212 BAGAN AND AROUND BAGAN
5 Pickings are thinner up on the first floor, although the “Buddha Images” room is
worth a quick peek as it includes further images from the Nagayon Paya, an eleventh-
century Buddha fashioned from an alloy of five metals (now protected by stout golden
bars), and some fine wooden, stone and lacquer Buddha images.
Mimalaung Kyaung
• Directly behind the drink stalls opposite the Bagan Archeological Museum • Daily 8am–6pm
The engaging Mimalaung Kyaung (“The Temple Which Fire Cannot Burn”) is one of
Old Bagan’s prettiest monuments. Built in the reign of Narapatisithu, the small temple
acquired its soubriquet after surviving a devastating conflagration in 1225. Its
fire-resistant qualities are enhanced by the unusually high platform on which it’s built,
reinforced with huge buttresses and ascended via a small staircase lined with a large pair
of cheerfully grinning chinthe. The small shrine on the platform at the top is similarly
unusual, topped with a fancifully sculpted roof and slender spire. Its elevated position
also provides one of the finest views in Old Bagan, with the monumental Thatbyinnyu
close by, the Ananda temple rising behind and various other monuments dotted below.
Pahtothamya Paya
• Follow the dirt road in front of the Mimalaung Kyaung for around 250m • Daily 8am–6pm
Built sometime in the tenth or eleventh century, the brooding Pahtothamya Paya is a
low-set, heavy structure in classic early-period style, with tiny latticed-brick windows
and an incongruously slight and inconsequential Sri Lankan-style stupa plonked on top
– typical of the city’s oldest temples before the curved shikhara-style tower became the
superstructure of choice. Entrance to the interior is through an arched antechamber
that looks rather like the inside of a capsized ship. Blackened mosaic-style murals line
the walls, while a brooding Buddha sits in near-darkness in the central shrine. Past
here, a gloomy and intensely atmospheric ambulatory leads around the shrine. Shine
a torch, and the walls come alive with marvellously detailed murals – some of the
oldest in Bagan – captioned in Mon and including scenes showing Prince Siddhartha
on a boating trip and a fine panel depicting the legendary visit of Kaladevila to the
infant Buddha-to-be, the sage splendidly bearded and clad in an extravagant red cloak,
holding the tiny Prince Siddhartha aloft in one hand.
Nathlaung Kyaung and around
• Daily 8am–6pm
The modest Nathlaung Kyaung is one of the oldest temples in the city, possibly dating
from the reign of Anawrahta, or perhaps as much as a century earlier. It’s also notable
for being Bagan’s only Hindu temple, built for Indian merchants visiting the city and
dedicated to Vishnu (the name means “Temple Where The Nats Are Confined”
– perhaps a reference to the foreign Hindu deities contained within). The compact
square structure, topped with an elaborately moulded spire, is now somewhat reduced
from its former dimensions, the original entrance hall having disappeared long ago.
Niches lining the exterior formerly housed images of the ten incarnations of Vishnu,
although only seven survive, all pretty battered. Also note the dramatic flame-shaped
pediment over the entrance, which is perhaps the oldest of its kind in Bagan and marks
the first appearance of what would become one of the city’s most distinctive
architectural motifs.
Inside, a small ambulatory surrounds a single shrine. Facing the entrance is a
modern sculpture of Vishnu reclining on the cosmic serpent Anata-Sesha, whose
successive coilings and uncoilings are said to alternately move time forward and
instigate creation, and then reverse it, causing the universe to end. Smaller images
of the three major gods of the Hindu pantheon – Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva – hover
above. Further images of Vishnu adorn the three other sides of the shrine, each
holding a disc, mace, trident and lotus.