Isthmian America (1420–1431 CE) In this era,…

Le Loi, after supplying junks to transport the defeated Chinese troops back to China, orders Tran Cao killed and assumes the throne as the first ruler of the Le dynasty, soon afterward concluding a peace with Yongle’s successor.

The hydraulic irrigation system that sustains the Khmer empire is subject to frequent Thai and Cham attacks that threaten the infrastructure of the empire, which is further diminished by intermittent Thai interference in Khmer politics, civil strife, and the loss of soldiers as prisoners of war.

In late 1430, Ayutthayan monarch Borommarachathirat II initiates a siege of Angkor, finally capturing the city after seven months through the treachery of two Buddhist monks and certain Khmer officials.

The Thais sack the city.

The Laotians soon turn against Vietnamese resistance fighter Le Loi and his guerillas, electing to aid the Chinese instead.

Le Loi retreats, then seeks and secures a two-year armistice in 1422.

The death of Ming emperor Yongle in 1424 and the consequent weakening of Chinese imperial power affords Le Loi an opportunity to take the offensive in 1426.

Employing attack elephants, the Vietnamese guerillas seize Nghe An province south of the Red River delta, then march north against the Chinese, who by 1427 control only the city of Hanoi.

Le Loi, after agreeing to a Chinese offer of withdrawal if he permits a member of the deposed Tran dynasty to assume the throne of Dai Viet (or Annam, “Pacified South”), intercepts a Chinese general’s message asking for reinforcements, and resumes the war.

In the ensuing campaign against the one hundred thousand-man occupying force, Le Loi manages to capture or kill most of its generals and, after a lengthy siege, takes Hanoi and forces the Chinese surrender.

Hsinbyushin Tihatu, the surviving son of Burmese monarch Minhkaung, succeeds him in 1422 as king of Ava, the Bamar capital in present Upper Burma.

Hsinbyushin is betrayed by his Shan wife and assassinated while prosecuting a punitive campaign against belligerent Shan tribes to the north in 1426.

Ava’s power declines under Hsinbyushin’s successor, King Mohnyinthado, as unrest increases and the Shans begin to dominate in the Upper Burma region.

The royal tomb chambers of Wat Rat Burana, constructed at Ayutthaya in 1427, feature wall paintings of Buddhist subjects.

The Burmese kingdom of Toungoo, ruled by the Shan monarch Soalu, becomes semiautonomous with the lessening of Ava’s power after 1426, as do …

…Taungdwingyi, …

…Yamethin, and …

…Pinlaung, all aided by the Shan in their defense against Ava.