158 Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. [April, 1910. 



which Mr. Gait gives an account from the Buranjis on pp. 87 

 — 92 of his History of Assam. 



On the ruins of the kingdom of Kama tap ur arose the 

 Koch Power, and the fact that Nara Narayan adopted a coin 

 of the Husaini dynasty as a type for his own coinage, probably 

 points to his father Bisva Siriiha having been a tributary 

 of 'Ala'u-d-Din and his successors. The issue of coins by Nara 

 Narayan is also easily accounted for by the fact that the 

 Husaini dynasty came to an end in 1538, i.e., just prior to the 

 date when Nara Narayan came to the throne. 



The interesting coin figured as No. 8 of Plate XXII fur- 

 nishes us with the first example of a h&lf-tanka of the Koch 

 kings. 



No. 8. — A silver h&\i-tanka of Lakshmi Narayan. 



Weight 85-1 grains. Size M8" (from the Cabinet of Mr. J. C. 



Higgins, I.C.S., late Sub-Divisional Officer, Jorhat.) 



Obverse and Reverse. The same as the full coin of 

 Lakshmi Narayan in the Shillong cabinet already described. 

 The weight is somewhat high, but closely conforms to half the 

 weight of the Husaini coin on which the Koch coin was model- 

 led, which in turn was supposed to represent a tanka of 175 

 grains. The highest full coin of Husain Shah in the I.M.G. 

 weighs 167 grains (No. 181), while there is a coin of his son 

 Ghiyasu-d-Din weighing 168 grains (No. 225). As has been 

 already noted, the weights of the ordinary half-coins in the 

 Shillong cabinet, which are similar to those described by Mr. 

 Gait in his Koch paper, range from 66*8 grains in the case of the 

 present Maharaja to 73*1 and 732 in the case of Pran Narayan 

 and his successor Mada Narayan (1666 — 1681), so that Pran 

 Narayan evidently adopted for this coinage half the weight of 

 his large coins taken as a standard, irrespective of their theo- 

 retical weight. 



Under Nara Narayan the Kochs soon came in contact 

 with the Ahoms, who had just previously (1536) driven the 

 Kacharls out of the Brahmaputra valley into the present 

 Kachar Hills, and extended their dominion west as far as 

 Gauhati. At first, in 1547, Nara Narayan was unsuccessful, 

 but in 1563, a fresh conflict ended in the Ahoms suing for 

 peace and acknowledging the Koch suzerainty (Gait, History, 

 p. 51). Once the Ahoms had been crushed a rapid process of 

 conquest of the surrounding nations ensued, the Kochs under 

 Silarai, the brother of Nara Narayan, successively conquering 

 the Kacharis, the Jaintias, the Sylhetis, and even, it is said, the 

 Raja of Tippera. In the case of the Jaintias, their Raja 

 was killed by Silarai with his own hand, and his son was 

 placed on the throne on condition that he paid regular tribute 

 and undertook in future not to strike coins in his own name. 



