Sonargaon

Sonargaon or Șonargă (Bengali: সোনারগাঁও; Bengali pronunciation: [ˈʃonaɾɡãʋ]; lit. Golden Hamlet) is a historic city in central Bangladesh. It corresponds to the modern day subdistrict Sonargaon Upazila of Narayanganj District in Dhaka Division.

Sonargaon is one of the old capitals of the historic region of Bengal and was an administrative center of eastern Bengal. It was also a river port. Its hinterland was the center of the muslin trade in Bengal, with a large population of weavers and artisans. According to ancient Greek and Roman accounts, an emporium was located in this hinterland, which archaeologists have now identified with the Wari-Bateshwar ruins of the Gangaridai Empire. The area was a base for the Vanga, Gangaridai, Samatata, Sena, and Deva dynasties.

Sonargaon gained importance during the Delhi Sultanate. It was the capital of the Sonargaon Sultanate ruled by Fakhruddin Mubarak Shah and his son Ikhtiyaruddin Ghazi Shah. It hosted a royal court and mint of the Bengal Sultanate and was also the capital of the Bengal Sultanate under the reign of Ghiyasuddin Azam Shah. Sonargaon became one of the most important townships in Bengal and many immigrants settled in the area. The Sultans built mosques and tombs. It was later the seat of the Baro-Bhuyan confederacy that resisted Mughal expansion under the leadership of Isa Khan and his son Musa Khan. Sonargaon then became a district of Mughal Bengal. During British colonial rule, merchants built many Indo-Saracenic townhouses in the Panam neighborhood. Its importance was eventually eclipsed by the nearby Port of Narayanganj which was set up in 1862.

Sonargaon draws many tourists each year. It hosts the Bangladesh Folk Arts and Crafts Foundation, as well as various archaeological sites, Sufi shrines, Hindu temples, historic mosques and tombs.

Sonargaon is located near the old course of the Brahmaputra River. To the north of Sonargaon are the Wari-Bateshwar ruins, which archaeologists have considered to be the emporium (trading colony) of Sounagoura mentioned by Greco-Roman writers. The name Sonargaon originated with the ancient term of Suvarnagrama. Sonargaon was ruled by Vanga and Samatata Kingdoms during antiquity. The Sena dynasty used the area as a base after they lost control of the western parts of Bengal to Bakhtiar Khalji. The Deva dynasty King Dasharathadeva shifted his capital from Bikrampur to Suvarnagrama in the middle of the 13th century. Sonargaon is also one of the possible locations for the fabled land of Suvarnabhumi that is referred in cultures across the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia.

Muslim settlers first arrived in Sonargaon circa 1281. In the early 14th century, Sonargaon became part of the Delhi Sultanate when Shamsuddin Firoz Shah, Delhi's governor in Gauda, conquered central Bengal. Firoz Shah built a mint in Sonargaon from where a large number of coins were issued. Delhi's governors in Bengal often tried to assert their independence. Rebel governors often chose Sonargaon as the capital of Bengal. When Firoz Shah died in 1322, his son, Ghiyasuddin Bahadur Shah, replaced him as the ruler. In 1324, the Delhi Sultan Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq declared war against him and succeeded in capturing Bahadur Shah in battle. During the same year, Sultan Muhammad bin Tughlaq released him and appointed him as the governor of Sonargaon.

Sonargaon began to develop as a seat of Muslim learning and Persian literature. Many Persian and Persianate Turkic immigrants settled in Sonargaon. Maulana Sharfuddin Abu Tawwama of Bukhara came to Sonargaon circa 1270 and established a Sufi khanqah and madrasa, which imparted both religious and secular education. The institutions became reputed throughout the Indian subcontinent. Sharfuddin Yahya Maneri, a celebrated Sufi scholar of Bihar, was an alumnus of Sonargaon. Tawwama's book on mysticism, Maqamat, enjoyed a strong reputation. During the administration of Roknuddin Kaikaus (1291-1301 AD), son of Nasiruddin Bughra Khan, Nam-i-Haq, a book on fiqh (jurisprudence), was written in elegant Persian poetry, in Sonargaon. It is in 10 volumes and contains 180 poems. Though the authorship of this book has been ascribed to Shaikh Sharafu’d-Din Abu Tawwama, the author’s introduction testifies that the book was actually written by one of the disciples of Shaikh Sharafu’d-Din on the basis of his teachings. The Fatwa-i-Tatarkhani was compiled at the initiative Tatar Khan, the Tughluq governor of Sonargaon.

The Sultanate of Sonargaon became a short-lived independent state with control over central, northeastern and southeastern Bengal. When Bahram Khan died in 1338, his armour-bearer, Fakhruddin Mubarak Shah, declared himself the independent Sultan of Sonargaon. Fakhruddin sponsored several construction projects, including a trunk road and raised embankments, along with mosques and tombs. Sonargaon began to conquer areas held by the eastern kingdoms of Arakan and Tripura. The army of Sonargaon conquered Chittagong in southeastern Bengal in 1340. In the west, Sonargaon competed with the neighboring city-states of Lakhnauti and Satgaon for military supremacy in Bengal. Sonargaon prevailed in naval campaigns during the monsoon. Lakhnauti prevailed in land campaigns during the dry season. The fourteenth-century Moorish traveler Ibn Battuta visited the Sonargaon Sultanate. He arrived through the port of Chittagong, from where he proceeded to the Sylhet region to meet with Shah Jalal. He then proceeded to Sonargaon, the capital of the sultanate. He described Fakhruddin as "a distinguished sovereign who loved strangers, particularly the fakirs and sufis". In Sonargaon's river port, Ibn Battuta boarded a Chinese junk which took him to Java. After the death of Fakhruddin in 1349, his son Ikhtiyaruddin Ghazi Shah became the next independent ruler of Sonargaon. The ruler of Satgaon Shamsuddin Ilyas Shah eventually defeated Sonargaon in 1352 and established the Bengal Sultanate.