| Bernard Free Library | |
|---|---|
 | |
| 16°46′52″N96°09′08″E / 16.781094583518072°N 96.15222711506927°E | |
| Location | Myanmar |
| Established | 1883 |
The Bernard Free Library was the first free public library in Burma (now Myanmar), and a direct predecessor to the National Library of Myanmar. [1]
The Bernard Free Library was established on 21 February 1883 when the Commissioner of Lower Myanmar (Lower Burma), Sir Charles Edward Bernard opened a library, with his collection of books, pre-colonial historical manuscripts, and literary works, in the centre of Rangoon (presently No 1 Basic Education High School, Latha Township). [1]
During the Second World War, the Library was damaged but many books and almost all manuscripts were saved. In 1952, the Library was transferred to the Burmese government, and moved to the Jubilee Hall on the Shwedagon Pagoda Road and was reopened as the National Library of Myanmar under the Ministry of Culture. The library is the legal depository of Myanmar, under the Printers and Publishers Registration Act 1962.
A manuscript was, traditionally, any document written by hand or typewritten, as opposed to mechanically printed or reproduced in some indirect or automated way. More recently, the term has come to be understood to further include any written, typed, or word-processed copy of an author's work, as distinguished from the rendition as a printed version of the same.
Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar and also rendered Burma, is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and has a population of about 55 million. It is bordered by India to its west, Bangladesh to its southwest, China to its northeast, Laos and Thailand to its east and southeast, and the Andaman Sea and the Bay of Bengal to its south and southwest. The country's capital city is Naypyidaw, and its largest city is Yangon.
The Bibliothèque nationale de France is the national library of France, located in Paris on two main sites known respectively as Richelieu and François-Mitterrand. It is the national repository of all that is published in France. Some of its extensive collections, including books and manuscripts but also precious objects and artworks, are on display at the BnF Museum on the Richelieu site.
The Pāli Text Society is a text publication society founded in 1881 by Thomas William Rhys Davids "to foster and promote the study of Pāli texts." Pāli is the language in which the texts of the Theravada school of Buddhism are preserved. The Pāli texts are the oldest collection of Buddhist scriptures preserved in the language in which they were written down. The society first compiled, edited, and published Latin script versions of a large corpus of Pāli literature, including the Pāli Canon, as well as commentarial, exegetical texts, and histories. It publishes translations of many Pāli texts. It also publishes ancillary works including dictionaries, concordances, books for students of Pāli and the Journal of the Pali Text Society.
The history of Myanmar covers the period from the time of first-known human settlements 13,000 years ago to the present day. The earliest inhabitants of recorded history were a Tibeto-Burman-speaking people who established the Pyu city-states ranged as far south as Pyay and adopted Theravada Buddhism.
The National Library of Australia (NLA), formerly the Commonwealth National Library and Commonwealth Parliament Library, is the largest reference library in Australia, responsible under the terms of the National Library Act 1960 for "maintaining and developing a national collection of library material, including a comprehensive collection of library material relating to Australia and the Australian people", thus functioning as a national library. It is located in Parkes, Canberra, ACT.
Chetham's Library in Manchester, England, is the oldest free public reference library in the English-speaking world. Chetham's Hospital, which contains both the library and Chetham's School of Music, was established in 1653 under the will of Humphrey Chetham (1580–1653), for the education of "the sons of honest, industrious and painful parents", and a library for the use of scholars. The library has been in continuous use since 1653. It operates as an independent charity.
The Indian Statutory Commission, also known as the Simon Commission, was a group of seven members of the British Parliament under the chairmanship of Sir John Simon. The commission arrived in the Indian subcontinent in 1928 to study constitutional reform in British India. One of its members was Clement Attlee, who would later become the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
The Bamar are a Sino-Tibetan-speaking ethnic group native to Myanmar. With an estimated population of around 35 million people, they are the largest ethnic group in Myanmar, accounting for 68.78% of the country's total population. The geographic homeland of the Bamar is the Irrawaddy River basin. The Bamar speak the Burmese language which serves as the national language and lingua franca of Myanmar.
Burmese Indians are a group of people of Indian origin who live in Myanmar (Burma). The term 'Burmese Indian' refers to a broad range of people from South Asia, most notably from present-day countries such as India and Bangladesh. While Indians have lived in Burma for many centuries, most of the ancestors of the current Burmese Indian community emigrated to Burma from the start of British rule in the mid-19th century to the separation of British Burma from British India in 1937. During colonial times, ethnic Indians formed the backbone of the government and economy serving as soldiers, civil servants, merchants, moneylenders, mobile laborers and dock workers. A series of anti-Indian riots in the 1930s and mass emigration at the onset of the Japanese invasion of Burma in 1942 were followed in the 1960s by the forced migration of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Indians, exacerbated by internal conflict in Myanmar.
Kinwun Mingyi U Kaung, Duke of Lekaing C.S.I. was a Burmese chief minister during the reigns of King Mindon and Thibaw, as well as a colonial civil servant. He attempted to westernise the Burmese kingdom's existing bureaucracy into a more democratic system. Because of such attempts to do so, he was accused by many as decoy to have allowed Britain to win the Third Anglo-Burmese War.
Sarpay Beikman originated as the Burmese Translation Society. Its first President was Prime Minister U Nu, who started a Burmese translation job at Judson College. The purpose was to translate world culture, literature, education for the Burmese public. In 1963, the society was absorbed into the Ministry of Information's Printing and Publishing Enterprise as the Sarpay Beikman Literature House, and the mandate was extended to encourage local writers and to print and publish books of all types. The society presents the annual Sarpay Beikman Manuscript Awards and Burma National Literature Awards for excellent new unpublished and published writing in various categories.
British colonial rule in Burma lasted from 1824 to 1948, from the successive three Anglo-Burmese wars through the creation of Burma as a province of British India to the establishment of an independently administered colony, and finally independence. The region under British control was known as British Burma, and officially known as Burma from 1886. Various portions of Burmese territories, including Arakan and Tenasserim, were annexed by the British after their victory in the First Anglo-Burmese War; Lower Burma was annexed in 1852 after the Second Anglo-Burmese War. The annexed territories were designated the minor province of British Burma in 1862.
The Myanmar Football Federation is the governing body of football in Myanmar. The MFF oversees the Burmese men's national team, the women's national team, and youth national teams as well as national football championships and professional club competitions.
Palm-leaf manuscripts are manuscripts made out of dried palm leaves. Palm leaves were used as writing materials in the Indian subcontinent and in Southeast Asia dating back to the 5th century BCE. Their use began in South Asia and spread to other regions, as texts on dried and smoke-treated palm leaves of the Palmyra or talipot palm. Their use continued until the 19th century when printing presses replaced hand-written manuscripts.
The National Library of Myanmar, located in Yankin Township, Yangon, is the national library of Myanmar. Established in 1952, the National Library, along with Universities' Central Library, is one of only two research libraries in Yangon. The library houses more than 220,000 books, divided into 10 sections.
Gordon Hannington Luce was a colonial scholar in Burma. His outstanding library containing books, manuscripts, maps and photographs – The Luce Collection – was acquired by the National Library of Australia in 1980, as part of its major research collections on Asia.
The British Library is a research library in London that is the national library of the United Kingdom. It is one of the largest libraries in the world. It is estimated to contain between 170 and 200 million items from many countries. As a legal deposit library, the British Library receives copies of all books produced in the United Kingdom and Ireland, including a significant proportion of overseas titles distributed in the United Kingdom. The Library is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
Sithu Thaw Kaung is a Burmese university librarian, historian and leading authority in Asian library studies. He specializes in the preservation and archival of traditional documents, including palm leaf manuscripts.
Trafford Smith, CMG was an administrator, diplomat, colonial civil servant, and military lieutenant who served in colonial administration in Malta and Burma.
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