 Civil and criminal laws were codified in the vernacular, Burmese, to become the basic jurisprudence for subsequent ages.Sithu II formally founded the Palace Guards in 1174, the first extant record of a standing army, and pursued an expansionist policy.Over his 27-year reign, Pagan's influence reached further south to the Strait of Malacca, at least to the Salween river in the east and below the current China border in the farther north.