Filipe de Brito e Nicote

Filipe de Brito e Nicote on an elephant, already as a king, (image from Japanese Nambo art)

Filipe de Brito e Nicote , Spanish Felipe de Brito y Nicote (* 1566 in Lisbon , Portugal ; † April 1613 Syriam , today Thanlyin in Myanmar ) was a Portuguese adventurer, trader and mercenary leader . As Nga Zinkar, he was king of Syriam, a kingdom in Burma (1605 to 1613).

Life

Filipe de Brito e Nicote was born as the son of Jules Nicot / Júlio de Nicote, possibly a brother of the French ambassador to Portugal and namesake of nicotine , Jean Nicot , and of Marquesa de Brito ("Marquesa" was her first name, not her title of nobility ) . His maternal grandfather was Filipe de Brito, Chamberlain of the Infante Duarte and his sister Maria of Portugal . Due to the rank and prestige enjoyed by his mother's family, Filipe de Brito e Nicote preferred to use her name and put the paternal family name in second place.

He was a knight of the Order of Christ and worked as a nobleman at the court of the Spanish King Philip II . Like many sons of the lower nobility, he traveled to India - presumably around 1580 - in order to gain honor and fortune. He left the service of the Portuguese crown and became a trader and privateer in the Bay of Bengal . He traded in coal and received the monopoly of the salt trade on the island of Sandwip off the coast of East Bengal from the King of Arakan (Rakhine) .

He later put himself in the service of the King of Arakan as a gunner before becoming an officer in a group of Portuguese mercenaries in the army of Arakan. In a letter from a Jesuit missionary, he was described as "a rich and honorable man and captain of many Portuguese whom he brought with him to Pegu". In 1599 the Siamese were on the verge of taking the Burmese capital, Pegu . The Arakanese King Min Razagyi / Selim Shah decided in this situation with the ruler of Taungu to forestall them and to conquer the city himself. To this end, he sent an army under his son Min Khamaung and his Portuguese mercenaries under Filipe de Brito. After the capture of Pegus, the Prince de Brito deployed one hundred boats and three warships as general of a force of two thousand men in 1600 to conquer the port city of Thanlyin in the Principality of Syriam for him, which he succeeded.

Rule as king

Initially appointed as governor by the ruler Arakans , Brito quickly made himself independent from him and in 1600 declared the principality of Syriam a vassal state of Portugal. He placed it under the protection of Aires de Saldanha , the viceroy and governor of India . Brito married his daughter Luisa de Saldanha, with which he tied himself closely to the viceroy. From this Brito received six Portuguese warships to protect Syriam. The marriage produced a son, Marcos Simão de Brito e Nicote, who was married to a princess from Martaban . Filipe de Brito was initially transferred to the office of governor of the province of Syriam and received the titles "Commander of Syriam" and "General of the conquest of Pegu ". He had the Fort São Jago (Santiago) built. In addition to Brito and his family, around fifty other Portuguese lived in the city, all of whom belonged to his followers.

Viceroy Aires de Saldanha died in 1605. Brito increasingly emancipated himself from his successor Martim Afonso de Castro and also from Portugal and finally declared the Syriam governorate to be a sovereign kingdom. It consisted of the city, the port, the hinterland and the area around Dagon, today's Rangoon , so it corresponded to a larger city-state . Brito called himself in Burmese "Nga (King) Zinkar" and ruled with an iron hand. Portugal called him the "King of Pegu". The population wanted to convert Brito to Christianity by force. He had Buddhist monks renamed and destroyed Buddhist pagodas and temples. In 1608 Brito tried to steal the famous golden bell from King Dhammazedi in order to melt it down and pour cannons from it. The attempt failed because the raft used to transport the bell capsized.

Non-Portuguese ships passing the coast upset Brito and forced them to unload their cargo in port. He kept part of the cargo, with the other part he traded with the kingdoms and principalities on the coasts of the Bengal and Oberbirmas. Some income was also given as a tribute to the Governor of India with whom he was still associated. Only Portuguese ships were allowed to dock undamaged in the port and, thanks to the trading post, were allowed to trade.

death

In April 1613, the kingdoms of Upper Burma, led by the Anaukpetlun of Ava, planned an invasion of the kingdom of Syriam. Brito found out about this and wanted to counterattack an allied king with the enemy troops. The capital of a neighboring kingdom allied with the north was plundered and the royal palace there was set on fire. The king of this kingdom, on the other hand, raised a huge force, blocked the city for days and one night had traitors open the gates of the capital of Syriam and marched in. The king, allied with Brito, was killed. Brito was first cruelly tortured before being staked , primarily for his desecration of Buddhist shrines. His head was impaled and shown to the people. In Martaban, the local ruler had Brito's son murdered, although he was married to his daughter and thus had the rank of prince.

De Brito is now buried in the old Catholic Church in Thanlyan. The descendants of Brito and the other Portuguese still live in the region today and are called Bayingyi in Burmese .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Donald F. Lach, Edwin J. Van Kley: Asia in the Making of Europe. Volume III: A Century of Advance. University of Chicago Press, Chicago / London 1993, p. 329.
2. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Henrique Salles da Fonseca: Portugueses quase esquecidos 3 - Filipe de Brito e Nicote. In: A bem de Nação , March 10, 2014.
3. ↑ ^{a b} Suthachai Yimprasert: The Portuguese in Arakan in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. In: Manusya - Journal of Humanities , Volume 7, No. 2 (2004), pp. 66-82, at pp. 68-69.
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Hpone Thant: Parting The Curtains Of History On Thanlyin. In: Enchanting Myanmar , Volume 6, No. 3 (July – September 2007)