ABSTRACT
Location: On the Ayeyarwady (formerly Irrawaddy) River in northern Myanmar (formerly Burma), approximately 365 miles north of Yangon.
Description: The last capital of the Konbaung Dynasty, Mandalay was built as a sacred Buddhist center by King Mindon Min in 1857. It was annexed by the British in 1886 and occupied by the Japanese during World War II. The city is graced with numerous elaborate shrines despite its diminished grandeur. When the government returned to the use of native Burmese place-names throughout the country in 1989, Mandalay's name went unchanged.
