A Burmese wonderland; a tale of travel in Lower and ... - Khamkoo

102 A BURMESE WONDERLAND.
record it is clear that the shrine and adjacent monastery
were built by a minister \^dth the encouragement of
King Alaung-Sithu (Narapati-Sithu), showing that
royal patronage of the Ari (previously withdrawn, as we
have seen, by Anawratta), still continued. There is also
mention of revenue for supplying the priests with
meat and spirit twice a day, morning and evening,
in direct defiance of the monastic rules of Southern
Buddhism. The Ari in fact appear to have sufiered no
further
check until the rehgious movement under King
Dhammacheti in the 15th century ; and until, a century
later stiU, Sinbyushin prohibited intoxicating offerings
and bloody sacrifices. The last direct mention of the
Ari occurs in the 14th century when at Pinya (Ava)
they are represented as soldier-priests.
But even later " Boxing-monks " are referred to as
Ari-gyi-do-anhway— (Descendants of the great Ari).^
Such priests were numerous at Ava and Sagaing, where
they boxed, drank, womanised, bred and sold horses,
and dabbled in alchemy and amulets. In the 18th
century a thousand miUtant monks set out from Ava
to fight the Takings. 2 No further references occur, but
no doubt the old turbulent Ari spirit, which so shocked
Anawratta, still survives. Stories are whispered now
of monks " turning men " at night in Mandalay. Shan
phoongyis in Keng Tung openly keep women {vide my
A Burmese Loneliness, page 86). In the restless days in
^ Sasanalan-kanisadan. • Taljatha dipankyam.