838 Memoir of Sylhet, Kachar, ^ adjacent Districts. [No. 104. 



of Raja : it is fast going to ruin under the joint influence of the laws 

 of inheritance and improvident habits. 



It is impossible (and if possible would be tedious) to trace the steps 

 by which the progressive conquest of this part of Kamrup was effected, 

 but some of the principal may, I think, be satisfactorily established, and 

 will be found worthy of attention. The earliest Mahomedan invasion is 

 that of Mahomed Bukhtiyar, who is said to have penetrated through 

 Kamrup into Thibet in a. d. 1205-6; and as I think his expedition, 

 though unsuccessful, called forth a display of energy and talent calcu- 

 lated to excite our admiration of these early adventurers, I shall offer 

 no apology for attempting to elucidate it. 



Mahomed Bukhtiyar was the Governor of Behar, and in 1203 a. d. 

 entered Bengal, and having rapidly overcome that country, he imme- 

 diately turned his forces against Kamrup, which appears to have been 

 then a powerful kingdom, and worthy of his arms. The accounts of his 

 expedition, left us by Mahomedan writers, state that he proceeded from 

 Dacca, opening for himself a road along the banks of the Luckia ; 

 that he marched under the guidance of a hill chief, of the tribe called 

 Koonch, whom he had converted to Islamism ; that they reached a 

 mighty river "three times as wide as the Ganges" called the Bang- 

 muttee, on which stood a city called Burdehund, which he captured ; that 

 after marching ten days along the banks of this river, they entered the 

 defiles of the mountains, having passed which, they crossed the river 

 (Brahmaputra ?) by a stone bridge of twenty-two arches, after which 

 the Raja of Kamrup submitted. He then moved into the Butan 

 mountains, and reached the plains of Thibet, where his army was so 

 roughly handled in a battle with the people of the country, and 

 alarmed by an expected attack from the chief of a city called Kerrim- 

 patan, which was governed by a Christian, having under him a Butia 

 population with Brahman officers, that they retreated, and finding 

 the bridge broken down by the Kamrup Raja, who now harassed them 

 in every way, they returned, utterly discomforted with the loss of 

 the greater part of their number, to Bengal, where Mahomed Bukhtiyar 

 died of grief and vexation. I must own the latter part of this 

 narrative is quite inexplicable on any hypothesis, except that of 

 the fancy of the writers, or their desire to account for a defeat which 

 was most likely the consequence of disease and privation. But the 



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