The Comprehensive History of Assam (Set of 5 Volumes)

Email

Whatsapp

Facebook

Pinterest

Twitter

Copy link

The idea of writing a comprehensive history of Assam may be traced to early 1950s when Dr. S.K. Bhuyan. Honorary Director, Department of Historical and Antiquarian Studies, Assam, held informal discussions with a few scholars including the present editor. He had actually drafted a scheme, but it proved abortive. The University of Gauhati could not follow up the scheme though J.P. Naik, Secretary ICSSR. New Delhi, during his visit to the University in early 1974 assured financial assistance to a project on the history and culture of Assam. It was to the lasting credit of the Publication Board Assam at Guwahati to undertake the project in the following year when it called upon the undersigned to thekker the responsibilities of the editorship of the work in four volumes from the Prehistoric times to 1947 AD. The tank before him was formidable Apart from planning, he was required to make allotment of chapters of different volumes, and allotment on account of inability or non- availability of experts who could work these out. At the initial stage luckily the members of the Board were highly accommodating. They shared in editors views: that in a project of national importance the best talents of the country need be utilised, and that the volumes should represent the latest researchers on the subject on the model adopted in Indian historical series published by the Cambridge University Press.

The task of compiling a comprehensive history of Assam is not an easy one-not because of the dearth of materials, but because they are yet to be salvaged and unearthed. We do not have indigenous chronicles of the nature of Kalhana's Rajatarangini or the Buranjir as in medieval times, but we have innumerable ancient monuments, sculptures and icons at different corners of the State yet unnoticed and uncared for and on the verge of destruction. The recently unearthed Ambari finds and the Narakasura hoard amply demonstrate that excavations at potential sites would not only throw new light on the life and culture of ancient times, but supply some of the missing links in our national history the newly discovered thirty-three bronze coins at the Dhola Padung tea-estate in the present district of Sonitpur. Have exploded the myth that there is no numismatic tradition in the country of Kamarupa. Pending excavations the reconstruction of the history of ancient Assam has to depend by and large on the few epigraphic records which do not throw adequate light on the subject. Thus our knowledge of the early history from the middle of the seventh to early ninth century A.D. is neither connected nor comprehensive. Without reliable corroborative evidence, it is difficult to maintain that Jayapala of the Silimpur grant was in any way related to the Pala Line or that the four kings of the Chandra dynasty of the Vallavadeva plates were direct successors of Vaidyadeva or had anything to do with Prägiyotisha-Kamarupa.

Evidently without scientific exploration and excavation, which is yet to begin as elsewhere in North-Eastern India, the historians on ancient Assam will be groping in darkness. Their assessment on the basis of fragmentary or unreliable data is not likely to be correct or the conclusions they arrive at are bound to be controversial. The problem of Aryanisation in Assam is said to have set at rest with the discovery of Barganga and Umachal rock inscriptions, but it is difficult to maintain that Buddhism, in any of the earlier forms, had ever a hold in Assam on the basis of literary sources alone. We are yet uncertain about the origin of the Kalitas or of the nature and extent of Alpine influence in North-Eastern India. Amongst scholars there is no unanimity as to the identity of too many place names Opinions also differ as to the western limit of Kamarupa under Bhaskaravarman or with regard to the question whether Harshadeva of the Patupatinath inscription was in reality 'the lord of Gauda. Odra or other countries as well as Kalinga and Kosala. H.C. Ray places the accession of Brahmapala, the first ruler of the Pala dynasty, in about 1000 AD while K.L. Barua and others in between 850-90 A.D. How can this be reconciled if Ratnapala, the second in the dynasty, as stated in the newly discovered Gachtal plates of Gopala, defeated the Gauda ruler Rajyapala the 90K-AD) and former's grandson Indrapala fought with Kalyanachandra who is placed in c.975-95 A.D. If the Pala Line is to be pushed back by three quarter of a century, the political history of Kamarupa since the tenth century AD has to be revised.

**Contents and Sample Pages**