Pyu is the name which one gives to old a Ethnicity of language tibéto-Burmese which lived in the basin of the Irrawaddy, on the territory of current the Burma.

According to Georges Cœdès, Pyu, which named themselves Tirchul and came from the borders of the Tibet, were established in the basin of the Irrawaddy in the first centuries of the Christian era and represent the avant-garde of the Burmese migration. The name of Pyu comes from the Chinese P' CAE .

The territory of Pyu was centered on the current city of Prome.

It is in Pyu which one owes the foundation of the kingdom hindouized of Sri Ksetra that Chinese pilgrims mention starting from VIIe century. The penetration of the Bouddhisme at Pyu is former to Ve century, date which one can assign to the fragments of the Buddhist gun, written in language Pâli and found with Maungun, close to the old site of Prome.

Sources

• Georges Coedès, people of the Indochinese Peninsula , Dunod, 1962.

See too