So far as is known, of all the names by which Rangoon was called, Asitanjana (အသိတၪၥန) is the most ancient. It is a classical name, the literal meaning of which is " a town of collyrium or black colour". In those remote times Asitanjana was on the sea shore with its black colored ground covered with deep forest. Hence this name. In the Shwedagon Mediaeval Mon Inscription which was set up by Queen Shinsawbu and Dhammaceti in the 15th century, it is referred to as " the name of a town in Rammannadesa (ရာမညေဒသ), known during the lifetime of Lord Buddha."
Dr. Forchhammer, a German archaeologist, who served for some time as Superintendent, Archaeological Department, Burma, about three decades agao, writes in regard to the existence of Asitanjana as follows:_
"The Mahavagga and its commentary statre that the two merchants, Taphussa and Bhallika, came from Ukkala, and in the commentary to the Angutttaranikaya Buddhaghosa names the city from which they came and where they erected the pagoda after their return, namely, Asitanjana, which was the name of an ancient twon on the hills north-west of the Shwedagon pagoda in Ukkadesa (ဥကၠလေဒသ), the later Hamsavati (ဟံသာ၀တှ). There can be no doubt that Budddhaghosa (ဗုဒၶေဃာသ) refers in the cited passages to Further India and not to Orissa (ၾသရိႆ), and in the face of the unanimous statements of the native histories, the details of the Shwedagon inscriiptions, the evideences adduced from the Budddhist canon, the commentaries writen in India, and the total absence of reval claims or representations to the contrary, no rsasonable objections can be raised in connection the foundation of the Shwedagon Pagoda with Taphusssa (တဖုႆ) and Bhallika (ဘလႅိက) and to receive the existence of Asitanjananagara (အသိတၪၥနနဂရ) in Ukkaladesa (ဥကၠလေဒသ) in the 5th or 6th century before christ as an accredited fact in the early history of Burma."
ႈIt is stated in the Mon version of the History of Shwedagon Pagoda, the Slapat Wan Dhat Kyak Lagun (လၢဳင္) that Mount Singuttara (သိဂၤုတၱရ) (Mount Horn ) on which the Shwedagon Pagoda is situated had six other classical names, to wit, Trihakumbha (ႀတိဟကုမ ၻ), Sattabhummi (သတၱဘူမိ) , Dhannavati (ဓည၀တှ), Pokkaravati (ေပါကၡရ၀တှ), Bhuridatta (ဘူရိဒတၱ) and Siharaja had three hill-tops looking like water-pots. It was called Sattabhummi (သတၱဘူမိ) because it had seven kinds of earth: golden, silvery, red, white, black, sour and bitter. It was called Dhannavati (ဓည၀တှ) because it had abundance of grains and food. It was called Pokkharavati (ေပါကၡရ၀တှ) because 99 hillocks surrounded this Mount, by way of paying homage as if 99 lotuss opened out their blossoms altogether in homage to the sun. It was called Bhuridatta (ဘူရိဒတၱ) because it was the gift of an auspicious land. And it was called Siharaja (သှဟရာဇ) because from a distance it looked graceful and majestic like the lion.
The Sanskrit word, Trikumbha, is changed into Pali Tikumbha (တိကုမ ၻ) after dropping 'r' and 'h'. Then again Tikumbha cecomes "Tikum" (တိကုံ) "bha" being dropped. Again "Tikum" is corrupted into "Dagum" (ဒဂုံ) when "ti" and "k" are changed into 'da) and 'g' respectively. Hence he pagoda as well as the town has come to be called "Dagum".
Mention of this town as Dagum is frequently made in U Kala's History of Burma, the Glass Palace Chronicle and poems by Nawade, natshinnaung, Letwethondara, Seindakyawthu, etc. But in some Mon historical records, the name of the town is referred to as Lagan (လဂင္) and a story is attaced to it. It is said that there existed a very gig wood0oil tree, Dipterocarpus laevis (ကညင္ပင္) in that place. When a branch of the tree was cut down, it did not fall down to the ground but lay across the other branches of the tree. hence the place was called Lagan ( lagan in Mon means " to lie across"). The story went on to say that "Lagan" was changed into lagum (လဂုင္) later. I am inclined to thinmk that this story is an invented one by which the writer attempted to explain the meaning of the name "Lagun". it seems clear that Lagun is derived from "Dagum" rather than from "lagam". There are certain instances in Burmese where "D" is changed into "L".
In 1752, U Aung Zeya who later became king as Aluangpaya, rose against Banna Tala (ဗညားတလ) the Mon King, who ruled not only over Lower Burma but also over Upper Burma. Mon forces were defeated and twon after town fell into his hands. In 1755, he fought a great battle at Dagum, and captured the twon. he knew that his victory over Banna Tala at Dagum was decisive and so he held that the capture of this twon was in effect the end of the war. So he gave the new name of "Ran-kun" (ရန္ကုန္) to the town. As Ran (ရန္) means strife and Kun(ကုန္) the end, the name is meant to commemortate the end of the war.
By Prof. E. Maung M.A.
Regarding the name "Rangoon", I know you may have a different version. Feedback is welcome.
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