Studies in the Geography of Ancient and Medieval India c24.1

c24.1

Dacca is the Anglicised form of the name of the capital of East Pakistan (East Bengal). It is written in Bengali as Dhākā (cf. the same word literally meaning ‘covered’). The principal deity worshipped there is called Dhākeśvarī. The name Dacca is also applied to a District and a Division of the Province. The real meaning of the name Dhākā (Dacca) has not been satisfactorily determined, although ‘Dacca Muslin’ was famous in the medieval world and Dhākā (apparently derived from the name in question) was the name applied to all muslins, imported through Kābul, throughout Central Asia. Prior to 1801, the annual advances for the Dacca muslin are said to have amounted to £250,000. According to the Hobson-Jobson by Henry Yule and A. C. Burnell, the name is derived from the tree called Dhāk or Palās, and means ‘the wood of Dhāk trees.’¹ But nobody has taken the explanation seriously. According to some writers, Dacca is a corruption of the name of the ancient state of Davāka mentioned in the Allahabad pillar inscription of Samudragupta as a pratyanta, i.e. a state bordering on the Gupta empire, about the middle of the fourth century A.D.² Unfortunately the theory was always viewed at with a considerable amount of doubt and recent writers on the subject believe that the ancient kingdom of Davāka lay actually about the Dabokā region in the valley of the Kapili river running through the Nowgong District of Assam.³