Rangoon
Presidency capital, 1852–1937
ရန်ကုန်ရန်ကုန်မြို့
Today Yangon, Yangon Region, Myanmar. Same place, renamed.
Key facts
- Historical name
- Rangoon
- Type
- Presidency capital
- Coordinates
- 16.7950° N, 96.1600° E(seed dataset)
- Governance
- Directly administered
- Record confidence
- High confidence
- Identifiers
- Q37995
Directly administered by the Governor-General of India, and therefore part of British India in the statutory sense of the Interpretation Act 1889, s.18.
Location
Pin placed at the coordinates recorded for this place. Colonial-era boundaries are not drawn.
Description
Capital and chief port of British Burma, rebuilt on a grid plan after its capture in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852.
Historical notes
Seat of the Chief Commissioner and later Lieutenant-Governor of Burma and the world's leading rice-exporting port before 1939. Burma was separated from British India in 1937, hence valid_to=1937.
Administrative history
Administrative parenthood changed over time. Each row states the years it is recorded for, and the source it comes from.
| Years | Relation | Unit | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| from 1901 | Part of | BurmaProvince · Directly administeredSnapshot from the 1901 census and the Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908-31). End of the relationship not established; recorded as open rather than inferred. | High confidencesource |
| from 1901 | Part of | Rangoon TownDistrict · Directly administeredSnapshot from the 1901 census and the Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908-31). End of the relationship not established; recorded as open rather than inferred. | High confidencesource |
Recorded names
Every documented spelling and transliteration held for this place. The historical name is canonical; modern names redirect to it.
| Name | Script | Type | Years |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rangoon | Latin | Historical English | — |
| Rangoon City | Latin | Alternative spelling | — |
| Yangon | Latin | Modern English | — |
| Yangon City | Latin | Alternative spelling | — |
| Yangon Region | Latin | Alternative spelling | — |
| ရန်ကုန် | Myanmar | Indigenous | — |
| ရန်ကုန်မြို့ | Myanmar | Indigenous | — |
Records and references
- Imperial Gazetteer of India
- Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908-31), Vol. 21 (21)
- Census of India
- Census of India, 1901, Vol. XII (12): Burma
Sources
- Encyclopedia· generalCC BY-SA
Wikipedia: Yangon, Wikimedia Foundation
Wikipedia contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0
Retrieved 2026-08-29
- Database· identityCC0
Wikidata (Q37995), Wikimedia Foundation
Wikidata, CC0 1.0
Retrieved 2026-08-29
- Gazetteer· administrativeLicence unverified
Digital South Asia Library, University of Chicago — the 1908–31 text is public domain, but DSAL's digital presentation states no licence; link-out only
Retrieved 2026-08-29
- Archive· descriptionPublic domain
Internet Archive scan: in.gov.ignca.31005, Internet Archive
Scanned volume of a pre-1929 publication (Imperial Gazetteer of India 1908–31 / Census of India 1901); public domain. Digitisation courtesy of the Internet Archive.
Retrieved 2026-08-29
Sources tagged “Licence unverified” are linked to rather than reproduced. Scans and images are only displayed inline where the licence is confirmed permissive.