Abstract
Manugye, compiled at the start of Burma's Konbaung dynasty, has become the best known of the forty or so surviving Burmese dhammathat, or law-texts. This paper analyses the collection of judgement tales that makes up the first volume of Manugye. These nineteen judgement tales are set within a frame story that derives in part from the Pāli Buddhist scriptures. Each of the other nineteen tales is traced to its source in the Pāli scriptures and variations between the canonical and the legal accounts are noted. This paper proposes that the volume as a whole is a conscious reflection on human society, a work (as we would now say) of social theory. It contrasts the wisdom of the capital city with the wisdom of the provincial villages and market towns and prefers the latter to the former.
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