Myeik

關於Myeik

Myeik.rít]; formerly Mergui, ) is a rural city in Tanintharyi Region, Myanmar, located in the extreme south of the country on the coast of the Andaman Sea. As of 2010, the estimated population was over 209,000. Myeik is the largest city in Tanintharyi Region, and serves as the regional headquarters of the Myanmar Navy's Tanintharyi Regional Command. The area inland from the city is a major smuggling corridor into Thailand. The Singkhon Pass, also known as the Maw-daung Pass, has an international cross-border checkpoint.

Myeik was the southernmost part of the Pagan Kingdom from the 11th to 13th centuries. After the Pagan Empire's collapse in 1287, Myeik became part of successive Thai kingdoms from the late 13th century to the middle of 18th century: first the Sukhothai Kingdom and later the Ayutthaya Kingdom. A brief period of Burmese rule interrupted this between 1564 and 1593.

From the 16th century on, the city was an important seaport and trading center with the Europeans, who would land at Mergui, travel upriver to Tenasserim and then cross the mountains...

Overview adapted from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA. Photography via Wikimedia Commons.