Bayingyi people

A 19th-century Konbaung pennant of a Burmese artillery unit made up of European descendants.

During the 16th and 17th centuries the Royal Burmese Armed forces recruited entire corps of European and Muslim mercenaries, who used knowledge of artillery and muskets to assist the Burmese in war. By the mid-17th century, the mercenaries, who had proven politically dangerous as well as expensive, had virtually disappeared in favour of cannoneers and matchlockmen in the Burmese military ahmudan system. However, the men who replaced the mercenaries were themselves descendants of the mercenaries who had settled in their own hereditary villages in Upper Burma (on the vast plain in Sagaing Region) where they practised their own religion (Roman Catholicism) and followed their own customs.[5][7]

Filipe de Brito, Portuguese mercenary and governor of Syriam, Burma, circa 1600.

One of the best-known Portuguese adventurers was Filipe de Brito e Nicote, who served the Rakhine king, Min Razagyi. In 1599, de Brito was made governor of Syriam, a busy port on the Bago River in what is now Yangon’s Thanlyin Township, where the ruins of the country’s first Catholic church can be seen on a hilltop.[5]

De Brito, who commanded a force of about 3,000 men, enraged the Burmese after his forces desecrated Buddha images, and in 1613 Syriam was attacked by the Taungoo dynasty king, Anaukpetlun. De Brito was captured and executed by impaling. The Portuguese community, between 4,000 and 5,000 people, was taken prisoner and marched to the Taungoo capital, Ava. Some sources say it took them 10 weeks to complete the journey.[5]

In 1628, Anaukpetlun was succeeded by King Thalun. He encouraged the Portuguese and their mixed-race families to integrate, and gave them the land where their ancestors live in Sagaing. Now the descendants of these Portuguese, heavily integrated both ethnically and culturally into the Bamar, live scattered across an unknown range of villages and towns in this region known as 'Anya'.[5]