A History of Assam c9: Chapter III. Events of Thirteenth to Fifteenth Centuries (Excluding Ahom History)

A History of Assam c9

Language: English

Chapter III. Events of Thirteenth to Fifteenth Centuries (Excluding Ahom History)

FOR sixty years after the copper-plate inscription of Vaidya Deb, we are left without any knowledge of the condition of Kāmarupa. About 1198 A.D., Muhammad Bakhtyār Khilji overthrew Lakshmaniya, the last Sen king of Bengal, and a few years later he set out on a filibustering expedition to the north.* At this time the ruler of Kāmarupa bore the title Kāmesvar, and his western boundary was the Karatoya river. Guided by a Mech Chief, Muhammad Bakhtyār marched northwards along the right bank of this river for ten days, through a country inhabited by the Koch, Mech and Thāru tribes. He crossed the river by a bridge of twenty-nine arches of hewn stone, and soon afterwards entered the hills. He wended his way through defiles and passes among lofty mountains until, on the sixteenth day, he again emerged in an open country, studded with large villages. He plundered the inhabitants, but was at last checked by an army of Mongol horsemen and compelled to retrace his steps. The return journey was disastrous. The people had removed from the line of march and had burnt everything, and for fifteen days the troops endured great privations. On reaching the plains of Kāmarupa he found that the Raja had destroyed the bridge and was preparing to attack him with an overwhelming force.

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He took shelter in a temple, but the Raja besieged him and threw up a bamboo palisade all round his encampment. He broke through this, but most of his followers were drowned in trying to cross the river, and only Muhammad Bakhtyār himself with a few hundred horsemen succeeded in reaching the other bank. He was there assisted by the Mech inhabitants, and with their aid managed to find his way to Deokot in the south of Dinajpur.

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∗ The story of Muhammad Bakhtyār's invasion of Tibet is told in the *Tabaqāt-i-Nāsiri*, vide Raverty's translation, Vol. I, page 560. See also *Riyaz-us-Salātin* (Abdus Salam's translation), pages 65 to 68.

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Ghiyās-ud-din, a Governor of Bengal in the early part of the thirteenth century, is said to have ascended the Brahmaputra as far as Sadiya, but in the end he was defeated and driven back to Gaur. This invasion is mentioned in the *Tabaqāt-i-Nāsiri** where it is assigned to the year 1227 A.D., but the seizure of his own capital by Nasiruddin, eldest son of the Emperor Altamsh, is there given as the cause of his hasty return from Assam.

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The next invasion was that of Ikhtiyār-uddin Yuzbak Tughril Khān, about 1257 A.D. For a time he was successful, and he celebrated his conquest by erecting a mosque, but when the rains set in and the country was flooded, his men were reduced to great straits, and large numbers died. The king of Kāmarupa returned from the hills, where he had taken refuge, and gave battle. The Sultan was killed and his army defeated, and only a few succeeded in making good their escape to Bengal.†

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In 1337 Muhammad Shah "sent 100,000 horsemen well-equipped to Assam, but the whole army perished in that land of witchcraft and not a trace of it was left. He sent a second army to avenge the former disaster, but when they came to Bengal they would go no farther, and the plan had to be given up."‡

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The scanty accounts of these expeditions throw very little light on the internal condition of the country east of the Karatoya. They prove that that river was still the western boundary of a kingdom of considerable power and extent, but there is nothing to show how far it stretched to the east. For enlightenment on this point we must turn to the *Buranji*s of the Ahoms, who entered the eastern corner of the Brahmaputra valley early in the thirteenth century, and whose appearance on the scene not only changed the whole course of Assam history, but has provided us, from that time forward, with a connected and reliable account of the progress of events there. It appears from these records that a line of Chutiya kings ruled the country east of the Subansiri and the Disang, with the exception of a strip to the south and south-east, where several small Bodo tribes enjoyed a precarious independence. Further west, there was a Kachāri kingdom, on the south bank of the Brahmaputra, which probably extended at least half-way across the Nowgong district. There are no records referring to the time when the Kachāris were the dominant tribe in this part of the country, beyond a few scanty references to collisions between them and the Ahoms in the Buranjis of the latter. They survived, however, as a separate nation until the early part of the last century. Of the latter part of their history, a few scraps of information are forthcoming; and these have been collected in Chapter X. West of the Kachāris on the south bank, and of the Chutiyas on the north, were a number of petty chiefs called Bhuiyās. Each was independent of the others within his own domain, but they seem to have been in the habit of joining their forces whenever they were threatened by a common enemy. The boundary between the tract ruled by these Bhuiyās and the kingdom of Kāmarupa doubtless varied from time to time; a powerful prince would bring many of them under his control, but they would again become independent when the sceptre passed into the hands of a weaker ruler.

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∗ Raverty's translation, Vol. I, page 594. † *Ibid*, page 263. ‡ *Alamgirnāmah*, page 731.

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The Bāro Bhuiyā. These chiefs are well remembered in Assam legends as the “Bāro (twelve) Bhuiyā,” a title which was formerly supposed to indicate a connection with the aboriginal tribe of the same designation in Chota Nagpur. This, of course, is not the case; and the late Dr. Wise has clearly shown* in connection with Eastern Bengal, where there was also in former times a group of chiefs bearing the same title, that, in this connection, the word “Bhuyā” or “Bhuiyā” has nothing to do with caste, but is merely the Sanskrit equivalent of the Persian word “Zamindar.” It is not clear why the number “twelve” should always be associated with them, both in Bengal and Assam. Whenever they are enumerated, twelve persons are always mentioned, but the actual names vary, just as in the case of the Muhammadan "Panch Pir," different saints are counted by different people. It seems to have been the practice in this part of India for kings to appoint twelve advisers or governors. Nar Nārāyan had twelve ministers of State; twelve chiefs or dolois administered the hilly portion of the Raja of Jaintia's Dominions, and there were twelve State Councillors in Nepal. The number may thus have become connected in the minds of the people with all dignitaries ranking next to a Raja, and so have come to be used in a purely conventional sense.

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∗ J. A. S. B., 1874, Pt. I, page 197; and 1875, Pt. I, page 181.

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There are various stories regarding the Bāro Bhuiyā, but it would be useless to try and reconcile them; they often refer to entirely different groups of chiefs, and they are, to a great extent, mere legends. The Bhuiyās who were ruling north of the Brahmaputra and east of the Chutiya kingdom at the time when the Ahoms entered Assam claimed to be the descendants of Samudra, the minister of Arimatta who, it is said, seized the throne on the expulsion of Arimatta's son Ratna Singh. Samudra was succeeded by his son Manohar, and the latter's daughter Lakshmi gained the love of the Sun God, by whom she had two sons Santanu and Sāmanta. The former became a Vaishnava by sect and the latter a Sākta; they accordingly separated, Santanu and his sons going to Rāmpur in Nowgong, while Sāmanta remained at Lakshmipur, the place from which the modern district of Lakhimpur takes its name. His sons succeeded him there, and maintained their independence against the Kachāri king who then ruled in Central Assam and the Chutiya king of Sadiya. They were eventually defeated by the Ahoms, as will be narrated further on. One of Santanu's descendants named Rājdhar settled at Bardowa in Nowgong; and his son Kusambar was the father of the great religious reformer Sankar Deb.

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In the *Guru Charitra*, and also in the *Sankara Charitra*, another version is given of the origin of the Bāro Bhuiyā of Nowgong. A Raja of Kāmatāpur, named Durlabh Nārāyan, went to war with another Raja named Dharma Nārāyan, who styled himself Gauresvar, or Lord of Gaur.

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This title was often claimed by quite petty chiefs; and in the eighth and ninth centuries there were at times as many as six princelings in North Bengal all calling themselves Gauresvar simultaneously.* Gaur was also the ancient name of part of the modern district of Sylhet. It is thus impossible to say where Dharma Nārāyan ruled, but the story goes that when peace was concluded he sent seven families of Brāhmans and seven families of Kāyasths to Durlabh, who settled them on the frontier, as wardens of the marches, and gave them lands and slaves. The ablest of them was a Kāyasth named Chandibar, who became their leader. Their head-quarters were at Paimaguri, where they earned the gratitude of the people by erecting a bund. Subsequently the Bhutias raided and carried off a number of people, including the son of Chandibar, but the latter, with the other Bhuiyās, followed the raiders and rescued the captives. He subsequently settled at Bardowa in Nowgong, where his great-grandson Sankar Deb was born.

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When the Koch kings rose to power they subdued a number of local chiefs who ruled the country between the Sankosh and the Bar Nadi, but these, though also called Bhuiyās, were not in any way connected with those whose traditional origin has been narrated above.

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The Chutiyas now number about a twelfth of a million, and are found chiefly in Lakhimpur and the adjacent part of Sibsāgar. Their language, which is still known to the Deoris, or priestly section of the tribe, is unmistakably Bodo, but their appearance suggests that they have in their frames a considerable infusion of Shān blood. They occupied a tract not far removed from the home of the Shāns, and the probability is that they absorbed considerable numbers of the earlier immigrants of that race, just as in more recent times they have intermarried with the Ahoms, to such an extent that, at the census of 1891, one-third of those who recorded their sub-tribe described themselves as Ahom-Chutiyas.

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∗ *Archaeological Survey of India*. Vol. XV, page 111.

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The Chutiyas have numerous traditions, all of which point to their having followed a Hindu dynasty in Sadiya, or Vidarbha. The said dynasty appears to have collapsed by a process of internal decay, leaving the people of Upper Assam split up into a number of small independent communities. The Chutiya legends are full of all sorts of impossible absurdities which it would be useless to repeat, and it is questionable how far even the main incidents, which are summarized below, represent real facts.*

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The founder of the Chutiya kingdom is said to have been a chief named Bir Pāl, who claimed descent from the mythical Bhishmak, and ruled over sixty families on a hill called Sonagiri. His son, who is called in the legend Sonagiri Pāl, *alias* Gauri Nārāyan, brought under his yoke the Chutiyas on the neighbouring hills (Rangalgiri, Nilgiri, Chandragiri, etc.). He then turned his arms against a Raja named Bhadra Sen, who ruled in the plains, and defeated him, taking a large quantity of booty and many prisoners of various Hindu castes. He built a capital at Ratnapur and assumed the name Ratnadhvaj Pāl. Subsequently he subdued another chief named Nyāya Pāl and, it is alleged, marched to Kāmatāpur and compelled the Raja of that country to give him a daughter in marriage. He was followed by nine kings of his line, the eighth of whom, Dhir Nārāyan, had a daughter but no son. The girl married a Chutiya lad of low origin, who had beaten all his rivals in the contest prescribed for her hand. Dhir Nārāyan afterwards had a son named Sādhak, and while the boy was still a minor, he made his son-in-law regent and abdicated. The regent, who proved a very incompetent ruler, was attacked and killed by the Ahoms; but they spared the life of the young Raja and gave him an estate in Lower Assam, bounded on the north by the Kobirār Ali, on the south by the Brahmaputra, on the east by the Rota and on the west by the northern Dhansiri of Darrang. Thus far the legends. All that we really know is that Chutiya kings were reigning at Sadiya at the beginning of the thirteenth century, that there were frequent wars between them and the Ahoms, who finally overthrew them and subverted their kingdom in the early part of the sixteenth century. These events will be dealt with in the narrative of Ahom rule.

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∗ A fuller account of one legend will be found in my *Report on Historical Research in Assam*, and two others are given in Mr. W. B. Brown's *Deori-Chutiya Grammar*.

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The religion of the Chutiyas was a curious one. They worshipped various forms of Kālī with the aid, not of Brāhmans, but of their tribal priests or Deoris. The favourite form in which they worshipped this deity was that of Kesāi Khāti, "the eater of raw flesh," to whom human sacrifices were offered. After their subjugation by the Ahoms, the Deoris were permitted to continue their ghastly rites; but they were usually given for the purpose, criminals who had been sentenced to capital punishment. Failing them, victims were taken from a particular clan, which in return was accorded certain privileges. The person selected was fed sumptuously, until he was in sufficiently plump condition to suit the supposed taste of the goddess, and he was then decapitated at the Copper Temple at Sadiya, or at some other shrine of the tribe. Human sacrifices were also formerly offered by the Tipperas, Kachāris, Koches, Jaintias and other Assam tribes,* and it is thus easy to see how they came to be regarded favourably by the Tāntrik sect of Hinduism which is believed to have had its origin in this corner of India.

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It remains to deal with the western part of the Brahmaputra valley, which in former times, as we have seen, was included in the ancient kingdom of Kāmarupa, whose western boundary was the Karatoya. At the period with which we are now dealing, the whole tract up to the Karatoya seems still, as a rule, to have formed a single kingdom, but the name had been changed from Kāmarupa to Kāmatā.† The Muhammadan historians sometimes speak as if the terms Kāmarupa and Kāmatā were synonymous and applicable to one and the same country, but on other occasions they appear to regard them as distinct, and it would seem that at times the tracts east and west of the Sankosh owed allegiance to different rulers, just as they did in the latter days of Koch rule.

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∗ Further details will be found in my paper on *Human Sacrifices in Ancient Assam*, J. A. S. B., 1898, page 56.

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† Shown as Comotay in the Map of India given in Blaev's *Theatrum Orbis Terrarum* (Amsterdam, 1650). In the *Bahāristan-i-Ghaibi* the Koch king Lakshmi Nārāyan, who ruled west of the Sankosh, is called the Raja of Kāmatā.

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One of the legends of the Bāro Bhuiyā mentions Durlabh Nārāyan as a Rājā of Kāmatā and, if it can be relied on, he would seem to have ruled, at the end of the thirteenth century, over the country between the Bar Nadi and the Karatoya. About the same time, mention is made in the Ahom Buranjis of a war between the Ahoms and the Kāmatā Raja, in which the latter was worsted and forced to give a daughter in marriage to the Ahom monarch. In the reign of the latter's successor, a Raja of Kāmatā intervened in a quarrel between him and his rebellious half-brother, who was a son of the Kāmatā princess, invaded his country and compelled him to agree to a reconciliation.

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The only Kāmatā dynasty of which we have any connected account is that of the Khyān, or Khen, kings, whose last representative, Nilāmbar, was overthrown by Husain Shāh in 1498 A.D.

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The Khen kings.

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To what race the Khens belonged it is impossible to say. The great majority of them have now been absorbed in the ranks of other communities. The few who still retain the tribal name claim to be Kāyasths, and are said to betray in their physiognomy a considerable infusion of Aryan blood, but this was probably received after their rise to power, and affords no clue to their origin. The defeat of their last king by Husain Shāh is a historic fact. In other respects the traditions regarding them lack corroboration, but they are not, in their main features, improbable. It is said that the founder of the dynasty was a cowherd whose master, a Brāhman, is said to have foretold that he would become king, and helped him to overthrow the last degenerate descendant of the Pāl family. On ascending the throne he embraced the Hindu religion, assumed the name Niladhwaj and made his old master his chief mantri or minister. He is reputed to have imported many Brāhmans from Mithila. His capital was at Kāmatāpur, on the left bank of the Dharla, but he did not apparently exercise control over more than a very small part of the old kingdom of Kāmarupa. Buchanan Hamilton who visited the ruins of Kāmatāpur, estimated its circumference at nineteen miles. The palace, as in the case of Burmese and Chinese towns, stood in the centre.

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His son, Chakradhvaj, succeeded him, and the latter was in turn followed by his son Nilāmbar, who attained to great power and extended his rule, eastwards to the Bar Nadi and westwards as far as the Karatoya; he also included within his dominions the north-eastern part of the tract which had previously belonged to the Muhammadan rulers of Bengal. He did much to improve communications and, amongst other works, constructed a magnificent road from Kāmatāpur to Ghorāghat, a portion of which still forms part of the main road between Koch Bihār, Rangpur and Bogra.

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According to tradition, the fall of Nilāmbar was in this wise:

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The son of his Brāhman Councillor had an intrigue with the queen, and the king, hearing of it, caused him to be killed. He then invited the father to a banquet, and, after making him partake of his son's flesh, told him the whole story.* The Councillor at once left the kingdom under the pretence of making a pilgrimage to the Ganges in order to wash away the sin committed by his son. But his real object was revenge. To obtain it, he went to Husain Shāh, the Muhammadan ruler at Gaur, and, telling him of the weakness of Nilāmbar's kingdom, persuaded him to send a large army to invade it. Husain Shāh laid siege to Kāmatāpur, but all his efforts to take it were frustrated. At last, it is said that he announced to the king his intention to return to his own country, but begged that before doing so his wife might be permitted to pay a visit to Nilāmbar's queen. By means of this subterfuge some armed men were introduced into the city in litters, and with their aid it was captured. Nilāmbar was taken prisoner, and it was intended to carry him to Gaur, but on the way he made his escape and was never heard of again. The capture of Kāmatāpur is generally assigned to the year 1498.

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∗ Similar barbarities were perpetrated by the Ahom kings Sukāphā and Gadādhar Singh.

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The Muhammadan accounts of Husain Shāh’s invasion are very brief, but it appears that after sacking Kāmatāpur he reduced the country as far east as the Bar Nadi and left his son at Hājo as governor of the conquered territory. He celebrated his success by the erection of a Madrasah at Malda, the inscription of which bears a date corresponding to 1501–02 A.D. Some years later, an attempt was made to annex the Ahom country, and this led to the destruction of the entire Muhammadan army and the loss of the whole of the newly conquered territory.*

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After the departure of the Muhammadans there was, for a time, no king of the whole country, which was ruled by a number of petty independent chiefs. Amongst others, two brothers named Madan and Chandan are said to have ruled at Marālāvās. This state of affairs continued for a few years and then the Koches under Biswa Singh made themselves masters of the country west of the Bar Nadi.

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∗ The war with the Ahoms is dealt with separately further on. I have not referred to the tradition of Ismāil Ghāzi’s alleged victory over the king of Kāmatāpur about 1460 A.D. (J. A. S. B., 1874, page 216) as it is wholly uncorroborated.

Linked texts (2)

Gurucaritra — Gaṅgādhar Sarasvatī, Marathi
Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī — Minhāj al-Dīn Jūzjānī