12 Asutosh Gupta — Buins and Antiquities of Bdmpdl. [No. 1, 



Malmnid Shah II., BahmanL 

 XXXIV. M -70 146 grains. 



^! II -H^l ^HfB«.^-*l 



Buins and Antiquities of Barn-pal* — By Asutosh Gupta, Esq., C. S. 



Unlike Upper India, studded with monuments of ancient history, 

 the Delta of the Gauges presents few places of interest to the antiquarian. 

 Lower Bengal is generally as devoid of picturesque scenery as of objects 

 of antiquarian interest. We have all heard of Saptagrama and Suvarna- 

 karagr&ma and their once nourishing commerce with the "West, but what 

 remains to show their ancient greatness ? No Colossus, no Forum, not 

 even a Hindu temple. Still there are a few places here and there, such 

 as Gauy and Nadiya, which cannot fail to be of interest to the diligent 

 antiquarian or the student of history, and Rampal is one of them. It 

 is not so widely known as it deserves to be. It is now a straggling 

 hamlet, situated approximately in Lat. 23° 38' and Long. 90° 32' 10", 

 being about four miles to the west of Munshiganj, the head-quarters 

 of the subdivision of that name in the district of Dacca (Dhaka), corres- 

 ponding with the old fiscal division of Vikrampur. It was the seat of the 

 old Sen kings of Bengal, and notably of Ballal Sen, whose name has 

 been handed down to posterity as the founder of Kulinism in Bengal. 



Such is the case with Rampal and the dynasty that reigned 

 here. The ruins, as the sequel will show, are not so important and 

 interesting as in Gauy and a few other places in Bengal. But there 

 is abundant evidence to show that Ramjml was once a royal city. The 

 large Rampal Dighi or the artificial lake of Rampal, the huge mound, 

 to which tradition points as the Ban or the palace of Ballal Sen, the 

 very broad roads and the existence of innumerable bricks which can 

 be found buried under the earth wherever you dig in Rampal and 

 its environs, are unmistakeable indications of a ruined city of palaces. 

 Old bricks of small size were found in such abundance in and around 

 Rampal, that they were carried in vast quantities to Dacca for build- 



* [Compare with, this paper General Sir A. Cunningham's account of the same 

 sites and legends, in his Arch« nlmjical Survey Reports, vol. XV, pp. 132 — 135. The 

 two accounts differ in somo minor details. Ed.] 



