Shwe Hpyin Naungdaw

Shwe Hpyin Naungdaw, also called Shwe Hpyin Gyi or Min Gyi and meaning Goldpot the Elder, is one of the 37 Great Nats in the official pantheon of Burmese nats, the elder of the two Shwe Hpyin brothers and a son of the royal messenger Byatta and the ogress Me Wunna, who herself later became the nat Popa Medaw, already recorded on this atlas. Legend holds that the brothers served King Anawrahta of Bagan as warriors and spies, once infiltrating a Chinese king's bodyguard to frighten him into peace, but were executed for failing to supply a brick each toward Taungbyone Pagoda; after death they became nats and were granted possession of Taungbyon by Anawrahta. He and his younger brother Shwe Hpyin Nyidaw, also recorded in this same wave, are honored together in Myanmar's largest nat festival, the six-day annual Taungbyone festival, whose worshippers avoid pork because the brothers' father is believed to have been an Indian Muslim.