The ancient city in Myanmar that is a UNESCO World Heritage Site for its thousands of Buddhist temples is Bagan.
From the 9th to the 13th centuries, Bagan was the capital of the Pagan Kingdom, which unified much of what is now Myanmar. During its height, rulers, nobles, monasteries, and ordinary donors built more than 10,000 Buddhist temples, pagodas, and monasteries across the surrounding plains. More than 2,200 monuments survive today.
Bagan’s monuments include stupas, monasteries, and hollow temples decorated with Buddha images, murals, and inscriptions. The city developed into a major religious and scholarly center, attracting monks and students from places such as India, Sri Lanka, and the Khmer Empire. Although Theravada Buddhism became dominant, other Buddhist traditions, Hindu practices, and local spirit beliefs also existed there.
UNESCO inscribed Bagan in 2019, recognizing its outstanding architectural and cultural landscape. A common mix-up is to treat Bagan as a single temple; it is actually an ancient city and archaeological zone containing thousands of religious structures. The name is also sometimes written as Pagan, its older English form.