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



Jayantapur." Gradually however the Koch dominions lessened 

 in size and the power of the Rajas decreased (vide Hunter, 

 Statistical Account of Bengal, Vol.X) till finally, in 1731. the pre- 

 tence of submitting to the Koch kingdom ceased and we find 

 the names of the Jaintia Rajas appearing for the first time on 

 their coinage. The direct cause was probably the appointment 

 in 1727 of Mlrza Muhammad SaTd to the post of Faujdar of the 

 Chaklah of Ghoraghat, Rangpur and Kuch Bihar, as it is record- 

 ed by Muhammad an historians that this officer conquered the 

 Rajas of Kuch Bihar and Dinajpur, " and acquired possession 

 of their treasures, buried hoards, jewelleries and effects " (Riyaz, 

 'Abdu-s-Salam's trans., p. 306). 



The section may conveniently be concluded by a reference 

 to the coin figured as No. 10 of Plate XXIII. This coin, which 

 belongs to Mr. E. C. Stuart Baker, Deputy Inspector- General of 

 the Criminal Investigation Department, Eastern Bengal and 

 Assam, was brought to him when stationed in 1896 or 1897 at 

 Maibong in the Kachar Hills by a Kacharl who said he had 

 found it among some bricks at the side of one of the old tanks 

 in the neighbourhood. Maibong was established as the Kacharl 

 capital in 1536 after their defeat by the Ahoms had caused 

 the Kacharis to desert their old capital at Dlmapur, and it 

 remained the Kacharl headquarters until 1 706 when the defeat 

 of King Tamradhvaja by the Ahom King Rudra Simha led to 

 another migration to Khaspur in the Kacharl Plains. The 

 history of Gaur was repeated at Maibong in the 'nineties of the 

 last century, when the construction of the Hill Section of the 



Assam- Bengal Railway led to wholesale removal of bricks from 



the ruins of the Kacharl capital, for surki; but numerous 

 brick-lined tanks and other signs of human habitation still 

 testify to the former importance of the place. 



The coin is evidently closely related to the two Jaintia quar- 

 ter-coins illustrated by Mr. Gait in Plate XXIV of the J.A.S.B. 

 for 1895 and referred to on p. 244 of his paper of the same year 

 (op. cit.). The type of coin with its marginal circle of dots and 

 3-lined inscription is the same, but whereas the inscription on 

 the Jaintia coin is in Bengali characters, that on the obverse of 

 the Maibong coin appears to be a debased Devanagari, while 

 the reverse is an unknown script, somewhat suggestive of the 

 cuneiform characters of Assyrian inscriptions. Nothing certain 

 has yet been made of the inscription on the obverse, though it 

 evidently begins with the usual §ti §L To the right appears the 

 matchlock, which has hitherto been regarded as the charac- 

 teristic sign of a Jaintia coin. Mr. Gait on p. 4 (para. 7) of his 

 Report on the Progress of Historical Research in Assam states 

 that it is doubtful whether the Kacharl Kings ever had a mint, 

 nor has any distinctive Kacharl character survived, but from 

 the place of discovery, there is a strong presumption that Mr. 

 Baker's coin is a specimen of the long-sought-for Kacharl 



