"Environmental change was as much part of the ancient landscape as it is of the present. The landscape, however, is often described as a static ‘other? beneath our feet rather than the world which is all around us.2 In cataloging the rivers and streams where sites and artefacts of first millennium AD Myanmar are located, we draw attention in this paper to the constant alteration to both built and natural elements. Our understanding of these sites and the cultures from which they emerged is distorted, for by and large only a small portion of the country?s river system has been systematically surveyed. Nonetheless, eloquent testimony of human response to environmental inconstancy remains in most regions of Myanmar. Traces of this relationship can be seen in the ?archaeological scars? which are part of today?s landscape.3 Aung Myint, who coined this term, likened it to the process of scar tissue forming over to a deep cut when large quantities of soil are displaced adjacent to natural and manmade features such as in-gyi or seasonal lakes and walls made of earth, laterite and brick.4 We refer often to such features, but also to smaller signs, from stone implements to terracotta urns and tiles. After an overview of the multiple water networks along which sites and artefacts have been recorded, we detail a range of changes, beginning in Lower Myanmar and ending at Tagaung. We devote the final section of the paper to this site, to highlight the use of the natural setting as well as the fresh scope offered by artefacts for understanding patterns of interaction during the first millennium AD..."