Everything on Bengal & Eastern India

Regional Divisions

38 items

• Five Unrelated Dynasties: The Bengal Sultanate, 1352–1576 — essay · Bengal Sultanate · 15 sources
  A delta kingdom that beat the Delhi Sultanate twice, sent embassies to Ming China, minted the taka, and built the largest mosque in the subcontinent. Its throne passed through five unrelated dynasties — Turkic, Afghan, a converted Hindu raja's son, four Abyssinian former slaves, and an Arab wazir who murdered the last of them. Its capital was, by one count, the fifth-largest city on earth; by a better one, a fifth that size. The archive prefers the smaller figure and says why.

• Bengal — the Delhi Governors and Independent Sultans — Dynasty · 1198 – 1576 · Bengal Sultanate
  One row spanning the Delhi-appointed governors from Muhammad Bakhtiyar Khalji's 594/1198 conquest of Bihar and Bengal, through the independent Ilyas Shahi (from 740/1339) and Husain Shahi (from 898/1493) sultanates and the intervening Bengal rulers, to the Mughal absorption of Bengal in 984/1576.
• Fakhruddin Mubarak Shah — Person · r. c. 1338 – 1340 · Bengal Sultanate
  Killed the Delhi governor of Bengal, Kuddur Khan, and proclaimed himself king, founding this line, until he was defeated, captured and put to death by the rival claimant Ala-ud-din Ali Shah.
• Ala-ud-din Ali Shah — Person · r. 1338 – c. 1340 · Bengal Sultanate
  Proclaimed himself king at Lakhnauti in 1338 after his forces killed Fakhruddin Mubarak Shah's commander Mokhlis Khan, then defeated and killed Fakhruddin Mubarak Shah himself in 1340, before being assassinated after roughly a year and some months on the throne.
• Shams-ud-din Ilyas Shah — Person · r. c. 1342 – 1358 · Bengal Sultanate
  Assumed the throne on the death of Ala-ud-din Ali Shah, whose army he is said to have tampered with beforehand, and reigned about sixteen years, resisting Delhi's forces under Firuz Tughluq, until his own death.
• Ghiyas-ud-din (Bengal) — Person · r. 1367 – 1374 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his father Sikandar Shah by inheritance and reigned seven years until his death; Briggs does not give him the epithet 'Azam Shah' used for the historically attested Ghiyasuddin Azam Shah, so the identification is uncertain.
• Sultan-us-Salatin (Bengal) — Person · r. 1374 – 1383 · Bengal Sultanate
  Elevated to the throne by the nobles as his father Ghiyas-ud-din's son and reigned ten years until his death.
• Shams-ud-din II (Bengal) — Person · r. 1383 – 1386 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his father Sultan-us-Salatin on the vacancy of the throne and reigned three years until his death.
• Raja Kans — Person · r. 1386 – 1392 · Bengal Sultanate
  A Hindu zemindar who took the throne of Bengal from the Muslim line after Shams-ud-din II's death and reigned seven years until his own death.
• Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah — Person · r. 1392 – c. 1409 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his father Raja Kans, converted from Hinduism to Islam before the assembled nobles and clergy and took the title Jalaluddin, then reigned about seventeen years until his death.
• Ahmad Shah (Bengal) — Person · r. c. 1400/1409 – c. 1420 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his father Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah as heir-apparent and reigned eighteen years until his death, after which a personal attendant briefly seized the throne.
• Nasir-ud-din Gholam — Person · r. 1420 (days) · Bengal Sultanate
  A palace slave who usurped the throne on Ahmad Shah's death and distributed the dead king's property to buy support, before the nobles found and installed a descendant of Shams-ud-din Ilyas Shah and deposed him within days or hours.
• Nasir Shah (Bengal) — Person · r. 1420 – 1428 · Bengal Sultanate
  Installed by the nobles as a lineal descendant of Shams-ud-din Ilyas Shah after they deposed the usurper Nasir-ud-din Gholam, and reigned two years until his death.
• Barbak Shah (Bengal) — Person · r. 1428 – 1435 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded Nasir Shah and reigned peaceably for seventeen years until his death.
• Yusuf Shah (Bengal) — Person · r. 1435 – 1457 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded Barbak Shah and reigned between seven and eight years until his death.
• Sikandar Shah II — Person · r. 1457 (one day) · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded Yusuf Shah but gave such offence to the nobles that they deposed him the same day and installed Fath Shah in his place.
• Jalaluddin Fath Shah — Person · r. 1457 – 1481 · Bengal Sultanate
  Installed by the nobles in place of the deposed Sikandar Shah II, raised a household guard of Hindu Paik infantry, and was murdered by a eunuch who suborned that guard after a reign of about seven years and five months.
• Barbak Shah (Habshi) — Person · r. 1481 (two months) · Bengal Sultanate
  The palace eunuch who murdered Jalaluddin Fath Shah, took the title Shahzada, and was himself killed after about two months by the Abyssinian noble Malik Andil.
• Saifuddin Firuz Shah — Person · r. c. 1480 – 1493 · Bengal Sultanate
  The Abyssinian noble Malik Andil, elevated by the nobles under the title Firuz after killing the eunuch usurper Barbak Shah, and reigned thirteen years at Gaur until his death.
• Nasiruddin Mahmud Shah II — Person · r. 1493 – c. 1494 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his father (Firuz Shah in Briggs's main account, though he elsewhere cites a rival claim that his father was Fath Shah instead) and surrendered power to his slave Hubbush Khan before being murdered by another slave, Siddi Badr, after about a year on the throne.
• Shamsuddin Muzaffar Shah — Person · r. c. 1492 – 1496 · Bengal Sultanate
  The slave Siddi Badr, who killed Hubbush Khan and then Mahmud Shah II before proclaiming himself king under the title Muzaffar, and was killed in battle after about three years when his own former minister Sayyid Sharif led a revolt against him.
• Alauddin Husain Shah — Person · r. 1496 – 1523 · Bengal Sultanate
  The Meccan-born minister Sayyid Sharif, who took the throne the morning after Muzaffar Shah's death under the title Ala-ud-din, disbanded the Paik guard and the Abyssinians, and reigned twenty-seven years until he died a natural death.
• Nasiruddin Nusrat Shah — Person · r. 1523 – 1538 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his father Alauddin Husain Shah as eldest son, sheltered refugee princes of the deposed Delhi Lodi dynasty, and reigned eighteen years until his death, by murder or natural causes Briggs could not determine.
• Ghiyasuddin Mahmud Shah — Person · r. 1538 · Bengal Sultanate
  One of Nusrat Shah's ministers, named only as Mahmood by Briggs, who usurped the throne on Nusrat Shah's death before being defeated and expelled from Bengal by Sher Khan (Sher Shah Suri).
• Bahadur Shah Sur — Person · r. c. 1544 – 1549 · Bengal Sultanate
  Son of the Delhi-appointed governor Muhammad Khan Afghan, who proclaimed himself independent king under the title Bahadur on his father's death, and was deposed after about five years.
• Sulaiman Karrani — Person · r. 1553 – 1573 · Bengal Sultanate
  An Afghan noble who threw off allegiance to Delhi after Islam Shah's death, subdued Orissa while still sending tribute to Akbar, and reigned twenty-five years in Bengal until his death.
• Bayazid Karrani — Person · r. 1573 (one month) · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his father Sulaiman Karrani as eldest son and was murdered by his cousin Hansu after about a month on the throne.
• Daud Khan Karrani — Person · r. 1573 – 1584 · Bengal Sultanate
  Succeeded his murdered brother Bayazid Karrani, fought Akbar's generals across Bihar, Orissa and Bengal for over a decade, and was defeated, captured and executed as a rebel in 1584, ending independent Muslim rule at Gaur.
• Nawabs of Bengal (Nawwab-Nazims) — Dynasty · 1704 – 1765 · Nawabs of Bengal
  Dated by the archive's own convention (content/DATE-CONVENTIONS.md) from Murshid Quli Khan's appointment as diwan/governor of Bengal under Aurangzeb in 1116 AH/1704 to the 1765 grant of the Diwani that transferred real fiscal and administrative power to the East India Company — the settlement that extinguished the polity as a sovereign actor, even though titular Nawabs continued at Murshidabad.
• Murshid Qulī Khān, Ja'far Khān 'Alā' al-Dawla — Person · r. 1704 – 1725 · Nawabs of Bengal
  Became dīwān (governor) for Bengal under Awrangzīb and founded Murshidābād, naming it after himself, as his capital.
• Shujā' Khān, Shujā' al-Dawla — Person · r. 1725 – 1739 · Nawabs of Bengal
  Son-in-law of Murshid Qulī Khān; succeeded him as governor of Bengal in 1725.
• Sarfarāz Khān, 'Alā' al-Dawla — Person · r. 1739 – 1740 · Nawabs of Bengal
  Son of Shujā' Khān; succeeded his father as governor of Bengal in 1739.
• 'Alīwirdī Khān, Mīrzā Muḥammad 'Alī Mahābat Jang Hāshim al-Dawla — Person · r. 1740 – 1756 · Nawabs of Bengal
  Ruled Bengal from 1740, part of the line that repelled several Marāt́hā raids and incursions but lost Orissa to them.
• Zayn al-Dīn Aḥmad — Person · named only as father of Sirāj al-Dawla · Nawabs of Bengal
  Named in the table only as father of Sirāj al-Dawla; did not himself reign.
• Mīrzā Maḥmūd, Sirāj al-Dawla — Person · r. 1756 – 1757 · Nawabs of Bengal
  Succeeded 'Alīwirdī Khān in 1756; defeated by Clive at the Battle of Plassey in 1757, who then placed Mīr Ja'far on the throne in his stead.
• Sayyid Aḥmad Najafī — Person · named only as father of Mīr Ja'far Muḥammad Khān · Nawabs of Bengal
  Named in the table only as father of Mīr Ja'far; did not himself reign.
• Mīr Ja'far Muḥammad Khān, Hāshim al-Dawla — Person · r. 1757 – 1760 (first reign); restored 1763 – 1765 (second reign) · Nawabs of Bengal
  Placed on the throne by Clive after the Battle of Plassey in 1757; returned to a second reign in 1763, which ended with the incorporation of the territory into British India in 1765.
• Mīr Qāsim 'Alī — Person · r. 1760 – 1763 · Nawabs of Bengal
  Son-in-law of Mīr Ja'far; ruled Bengal from 1760 to 1763 and died in 1191/1777.

Art & Crafts

1 item

• Woven Air: Dhaka Muslin, and How an Industry Was Actually Killed — essay · Bengal & Eastern India · 15 sources
  A cotton so fine that a whole sari passed through a ring, spun from a plant that grew on fifteen miles of one riverbank and now no longer exists. For two thousand years Bengal made the finest cloth on earth; within a century of Plassey the craft, the cotton and the market were all gone. The most repeated story about how that happened turns out to trace to a single sentence in a single book from 1772 — which says something different. What actually destroyed it is on the statute book.

Religion & Philosophy

1 item

• A Handful of Soil: Shah Jalal, Sylhet, and the Limits of a Saint's Record — essay · Bengal & Eastern India · 16 sources
  His name is on the largest airport in Bangladesh, a university, and mosques across Britain. His shrine is the most visited religious site in the country, and a British Resident in 1779 left his shoes at its threshold because his subjects would not accept him until he had. Yet the earliest inscription naming him comes 159 years after his death, no source agrees on which country he came from, and the two-century gap between the man and the literature about him is where almost everything now believed about him was made.