January 12: Bayinnaung who formed the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia, is crowned King of Burma in 1554.

Statue of Bayinnaung in front of the National Museum of Myanmar. 

Bayinnaung Kyawhtin Nawrahta was king of the Toungoo dynasty of Burma, what is now known as Myanmar.

During his reign, that lasted 31 years, from 1550-1581, history recognizes him as "the greatest explosion of human energy ever seen in Burma", and thus managed to assemble a great and prosperous Asian empire that included Southeast Burma and now Myanmar, Chinese Shan States, Na Lan, Lan Xang, Minipur, as well as the kingdom Siam, now Thailand.

                               Toungoo military campaigns (1534–1547)

The Portuguese called this region "Pegu" and considered it the second largest empire after China. Courting Shan State, where today is Myanmar, was what Byinnaung regarded as his greatest legacy.

King Bayinnaung was a monarch who had grand visions for himself. He established the 2nd Myanmar Empire, which stretched from the borders of India to parts of Thailand and Laos, and was one of the most popular Myanmar kings. The Kanbawzathadi Palace was built in 1553, two years into his reign.

There, in "Pegu" reduced power of hereditary " Shan Saophas", and unified rules were respected and continued by the successive kings until Great Britain invaded them and ended the kingdom imperial expansion, during the nineteenth century, and particularly in 1885. Despite his efforts, he could not replicate its administrative policy everywhere because the rule of Bayinnaung was a "patchwork quilt" of separate kingdoms whose kings were loyal to him and considered him as a "Cakkavatti" or "Universal Ruler" but did not accept the Kingdom of Tuongoo. Indeed, the kingdom of Siam revolted two years after Byinnaung´s death.