The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c23.s4.1

v4.c23.s4.1

Alaungpaya (1752–60) was born in 1714 at Shwebo (Moksobomyo, "Town of the Hunter Chief"), a village of 300 houses. Many of his followers were hunters, but he himself belonged to a better class, the landed gentry as it were; for generations his family had been *myothugyis* (major village headmen), and in later days he even claimed descent from the fifteenth-century Āva chiefs. The anarchy of the last few years led him and many another jungle chief to stockade their villages. Forty-six villages joined him, and between them they raised a few rusty muskets.