Bader Maqams or the shrines of Badr Al-Din-Auliya (Part I)

By M. Siddiq Khan Badr Maqams The visitor to Akyab, the headquarters town of Arakan which is the littoral province of Burma stretching for a distance of about 290 miles from the Naaf River and. the Waili Hills in the north to a narrow strip in the south, tapering to Cape Negrais is likely to visit the point or Scandal Point, the southernmost tip to the island of Akyab on the eastern. side of the Bay of Bengal. Here to his interest he will discover a cluster of small brick, or masonry structures known as the Badr Maqam or, as spelt more popularly in the pages of the history of South and South-East Asia at the Buddermokan. The buildings have the sanctity of a shrine as they are venerated as the chillah khanah or resting place of Pir Badr al-Din Badr-Alam. According to available information, this holy man hailed from Meerut but travelled extensively, stopping at Chatgaon or Chittagong for a considerable length of time and ultimately returning to Bihar where he died in 1440 A. D. and where he is commemorated by a shrine, viz., the Chhota Dargah of Bihar.1 The Badr Maqam in Akyab, which the writer has had an opportunity of visiting and studying in some detail, is of considerable archaeological and some architeclual significance and therefore it is felt that a full account of it may be given. The group of buildmes is centred around two main structures and are situated among picturesque looking rocks. The buildings actually are located on the tops of some of these rocks thus adding to the bizarre nature of the scene. One of the two man edifices with its manars (minarets), and gumbad (hemispberical cupola) is the prototype of the mosque built on the Indian model. The second structure is a cave carved out of stone one on the rocks below as its flooring. This is reputed to be alleged sojourn at Akyab.

An exhaustive description of the chillah khanah and the masjid by Forchammer, the celebrated archaeologist and reproduced in the Akyab District Gazetteer without quotation marks, Mr. B. Smart, an English civilian who spent years of his service life in Arakan is reproduced below in full.: There are really two caves, one on the top of the rocks; it has an entrance on the north and the south sides; the arch is vaulted and so is the inner chamber; the exterior of the

cave is 9 feet 3 inches wide, 11ft. 6 inches long and 8 feet 6 inches high; the inner chamber measures 7 feet by 5 feet 8 inches; height 6 feet 5 inches; the material is partly stone, partly brick plastered over; the whole is devoid of decorative designs. The other cave is similarly constructed, only the floor is the bare rock, slightly slanting towards

the south entrance; it is still smaller than the proceeding cave. The principal mosque stands on a platform: a flight of brick and stone stairs lead up to it; the east front of the temple measures 28 feet 6 inches; the chamber is 16 feet 9 inches long and 13 feet wide; the ceiling is a cupola; on the west side is a niche; let 1foot into the wall, with a pointed arch and pilaster (sic!) on each side; over it hangs a copy in Persian of the grant mentioned..A small prayer hall, also quadrangular, with a low cupola, is pressed in between the rocks close by; all the buildings are in good order.2 Nearly in between other rocks and under another low dome are imprints on stone of an alleged foot print of Pir Badr and the marks of his knees pressed on the stone as a result of his continued devotions. The confused thinking of a number of observers and scholars have tended to promote conceptions of this Muslim shrine as being a mosque-cum-temple-cum pagoda and even that very able and hard-headed archaealogist and scholar, Forchammer tends to be slightly bemused in his Report on the Antiquities of Arakan. Not only does he refer to the Badr Maqam at the Point as mosque, temple and pagoda but be also concludes his description of it by saying: "The

principal mosque is the most perfect type of the blending of the Indian mosque and the Burmese, turreted spire." However a careful examination of the structure high-lights irrefutably the absolutely Muslim character of the building. The gumbad and the minars are typical of Muslim architecture and the alleged Buddhist characteristics appear to be insignificant and incidental features. The niche or the mihrab let 1 foot into with a pointed arch over it in the

western wall of the chamber and with pilasters on either side identifies the main prayer hall of the mosque. Here is no temple or pagoda. The history of the Badr Maqam at Akyab may also be briefly stated here. Among the official records preserved in the archives of the Commissioner of Arakan's Office is an interesting report compiled in 1876 by Col.Nelson Davies, then Deputy Commissioner of Akyab. It says that the shrine was constructed in 1755 A. D. in honour of Pir Badr al-Din Badr-i-Alam the great preacher of Islam in Ctuttagong also variously know as

Badr 'Alam, Badr (or Badr al-Dnin) Auliya, Badr Pir, Badr Shah and Pir Badr. According to Davies's account, in theearly part of the 18 century (c. 1736), two merchant brothers from Chittagong,Chand Saudagar and Manik Saudagar, sailing back home from the Burmese part rich cargo of turmeric stopped at the
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of Bassein via Cape Negrais, and heavily laden with a

Akyab Roads off the group of rocks now housing the Badr Maqam to take in a supply of drinking water.That night Pir Badr, the patron saint of seamen, appeared to Manik in a dream and bade him build a cave on the rocks by the tank

from which they had drawn their supply of water.This was to be the Pir's resting place.In reply to Maniks plea of his poverty the saint promised him that his cargo would turn into gold. In the morning Manik gazing wide-eyed could find no turmeric but instead all gold and gems of rare price; naturally the two brothers gladly built the cave and also a well nearby. From that time the shrine began, to gather importance and attractedand attracts even nowdevotees from all the

communities of Arakan: Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus who make their offerings; offer prayers for the soul of the departed Pir and seek boons and blessings from him.

It appears that after 1824 the conquering British looked upon and used the Badr Maqam as a lucrative prize to be awarded to Arakanese Muslims of outstanding loyalty and service to the cause of their new masters.Thus it is on record that in 1834 William Dampier, Commissioner of Chittagong and T. Dickenson, Commissioner of Arakan, awarded the plum of trusteeship of

the shrine to a dedicated henchman of the British, Husain Ali, thugyi (headman) of Budamaw Circle.3 The orders in Persian which were preserved in the Akyab Deputy Commissioner's Court and copies of which are displayed in the Badr Maqam mosque gave him "charge of the Buddermokan in token of his good services rendered to the British force in 1825 and to enjoy any sums that he might collect on account of alms and offerings." After the demise of Husain Ali, his son Abduilah, and subsequently after his death, Husain Ali's daughter Me Moorrazamal, wife of a local pleader, Abdul Marein (probably Muy'in as the Arakanese pronoune all y sound by r) exercised the rights and duties of the mutawalli (trustee).In1849,Mr.R.C.Raikes, officiating Magistrate of Akyab, while confirming the charge of the Badr Maqam proper to Husain Ali, permitted a female fakir", Ma Min Aung, to construct a building. She had masonry buildings constructed and added to the existing structures and also had the tank re-excavated.4 There was another Badr Maqam at Sandoway, according to Col.Parrott, Commissioner of Arakan in 1893 "There is......a. singular group of large boulders, similar in appearance to those at Buddermakan (in Akyab) and similarly held in. reverence. It is, no doubt, due to Budder Sahib's connection with navigation and sea journeys that his fame has extended along the

whole coast line as far south as the Malayan peninsula and probably further. 5 That this was an authentic Badr Maqam is testified by Forlong, himself a virulent opponent of the theory that Pir Badr was a Muslim and that his cult was largely professed and practised by the Musulmans. He

says.....( I ) was nearly wrecked on a third (Bod-a-r or Bud )--the dread spirit as the mouth of the Sandoway riverowing to my Muslim Kalasis (Chittagongis) falling on their knees to pray,instead of standing by the rudder and halyards in a stiff breeze and seven-knot current, as we swept round his rocky headland." Another Badr Maqam on the Arakan coast was mentioned by Forlong to have existed on the island of Cheduba. He mentions a number of other Bud-a-s on the Tenasserim coast form the Tavoy River to the mouth of Kra and also includes in the list "an inland

mountain Bud-a-s.......that on the lofty, bold rocky crest of Kaiktyo (Kyaiktyo) overlooking the broad delta of the Sittang and Biling (Bilin) rivers."6 Maddra Makarn, evidently a corruption of Badr Maqam as the name popularly ascribed to Badr al-Din Auliya's shrine on the island forming the western side of Mergui harbour. Anderson, the chronicler of Auglo-Siamese relations in the 18 century, notices the shrine at Mergui at some length. He says: The Banda-Makhon of Davenport is the island that forms the western side of Mergui harbour...... In the map of the northern part of the Mergui, Archipelago published by James Hersburgh, hydrographer to the Hon. East India Company, February 1, 1830, and corrected at the Admiralty up to June 1871, this small island is called Madramacan; but I could find no native of Mergui who knew it by this name, as it is invariably called Pataw. Towards the northern part of the western shore of the island there is, however, a locality which the inhabitants of the town of Mergui call Buddha-makhan and I am disposed to think that Madramacan is a corruption of this word.It is said to have derived its name from the circumstance that a Mabomedan called Buddhar Udin resided there.
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The legened about him is that he came from the north by sea and being attracted to the northern part of Pataw by its natural beauty, he built a hut on the banks of a small stream where it enters the sea, and where lies a huge boulder on which he meditated for forty

days, receiving from God whatever he asked for in his prayers.The Mahomedans in consequence called the place Buddhar Udin's makhan. It is a curious circumstance, however, that the place is reverenced alike by Buddhists and Mohammedans, and by the Chinese of Mergui. The Buddhists, after the customs of their religion, affix gold leaf to the boulder whereas the Chinese leave small squares of brown paper ornamented with a representation in gold leaf of their deity who patronises seafaring men.7 This was the fourth known example of Badr Auliyas shrine on the Burmese coast line. It may be of interest to note that there is a place on the Cox's Bazar beach in Chittagong to which the name Badr Maqam is applied but there is no sign whatsoever of any structure of the past or the present. The brief account of the splendidly preserved and looked after Badr Maqam at Akyab which from the early 13 century was one of many similar shrines scattered along the coastline of South East Asia near seaport and harbour towns clarifies and explains the nature of these According to G.E. Harvey, the historian of Burma, the eastward advance of Islam
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shrines.

by sea which reached Achin in 1206 "dotted the coast from Assam to Malaya with curious mosques known as Buddermokan reverenced by Buddhists and Chinamen as well as Mahomedans. 8 This universality of worship has tended, at times, to confuse the identity of Pir Badr and the character of the shrines know as the Badr Maqams. Thus some writers have tried to make out that the cult of Badr al-Din Auliya is something superimposed on the animistic practices respectively of the Hindus and Buddhists. The advocates of the first school of thought who ascribed a Hindu origin to the cult of Pir Badr include Forlong. Writing in the Journal of Royal Asiatic Society in 1893, he states: "Knowing the particular works and localities of which indeed I possess sketches, I have no hesitation in saying that the rock-bound god of Akyab (Badar of the 'Buddermokan') and elsewhere is our old friend Bud-Kal or Bad-a-Kal, the Bod or 'Badstone',

common in the villages of southern and central India and not rare in Upper India and Himalayan India......" 9 Again in 1893 R. F. St. Andrew St. John, in forwarding to the Secretary of the Royal Asiatic Society, a cutting of an article published in the Rangon Gazette in October 1893 by Major (Later Sir)R.C.Temple on Pir Badar in Burma while describing the Pir as"a supposed Mahomedan Saint called Badar or Budder, reverenced by Mahomedans, Hindus

and Buddhists, in Arakan and Tenasserim, who is supposed, more especially, to exercise an influence, over maritime affairs", tried to cast some doubt on the accepted traditions relating to Badr Maqams by pointing out that in the case of the Akyab Badr Maqam, Manik and Chand who were Hindu traders -built the shrine and added that "the Chittagongian Hindus being the

chief navigators of that part, on their conversion to Mahomedanism, naturally made him ( the Hindu Samudra Devata) a Pir or Saint", This theory of St. John is, however, based on laboured logic and fallacious reasoning. Temple in his paper mentioned above, had suggested that Pir Maddra was, a name stated to be common in

Badr was a Muslim Fakir and that

Tenasserim, derived from "Baddar or Budder." Basing his conclusion on this statement, St. Andrews St. John proceeds to argue that Maddra is short for Samudra Devata or, the sea god of the Hindus.Dr. James Taylor, Civil Surgeon of Dacca referred to Pir Badr in 1839 in the following words: "A tutelary deity of the river under the name of "Bhuddur" is very generally and daily worshipped here, both by Hindoos and Mussulmans, but chiefly

by the lower classes among the latter. His favor is propitiated by the sacrifice of a fowl at the river side, and by the offering of fruits and scooped out pumkins, launched forth upon the

water. The worship of Bhuddur extends down the Megna to Chittagong, and I believe as far as Arracan.10 Yet others have opined, on the basis of worship by Buddhists or, the sea god of the Hindus at the Badar Maqam in Akyab, Sandoway on the Arakan coast and Mergui on the Tenasserim seaboard that the name of the shrine as in use among the Buddhists, viz., Buddhamaw or Buddha Makan (Buddha's abode), denotes that Pir Badr was a Muslimized version of one of the lesser Buddhas, who later became nat or spirit on his peregrinations

through

South and East Asia and that the coastal shrines are dedicated to him. Col. Parrot

however stated: "It is called by the Arakanese Buddhamaw, maw being the Burmese for a promontary and Buddha sinifying Badar."11 The reasoning appears to be acceptable, and, particularly, the corrupted pronunciation of the name Badr to Buddha, as the Bunnans (the Arakanese included), do not have a final r in any word in their language and therefore never pronounce it in the normal course. Temple tried to explain these Burmanized variation of the name Badr Maqam by stating that they arose out of a corruption of the Arabic name Badr. He says: "The name Buddha Makan (Buddha's House) for well-known Muhammadan sailors, on the Northern and Eastern Coasts or the Bay of Bengal, notably at Akyab on the Arakan Coast and at Mergui on the Tenasserim Coast, arises out of a corruption, through local Buddhist influence combined with folk-etymology of the name of the great sailors' saint Badru'ddin Aulia, whose chief shrine is at Chittagong. So 12 St. John, however,holds in his letter mentioned above that Buddhamaw, cannot be a corruption of (Urdu)"Baddar makam" though 'Buddha' may be a corruption of 'Buddar'.13 Temple in Badr Maqam became Buddha Malan.

a later article entitled Buddermokan which was an amplification and revision of his earlier article on Pir Badar in Burma mentioned above, assails and demolishes this last theory. He says: "Along the coast of Burma from Akyab to Mergui are certain shrines known to Europeans as Buddhamakam, which have no connection with Buddha or Buddhism. They are 'universal' shrines, i.e., they are accepted by the Buddhists, Hindus and Muhammadans,

Natives of India, Burmese and Chinese alike, which is a sure sign that they are symbols of the animistic faith which underlies all Indian religions. Their chief votaries are sailors, fishermen and those who obtain a livelihood on the water. The name is not Burmese, but Indian, and is Mnhammadan in origin. It is properly Badarmaqam -the shrine of Badar. This Badar is no less a personage than Pir Badar of Chittagong, known

throughout Indian Muhammadan hagiology as Badruddin Aulia. Now, Badru'ddin Aulia represents by his attributes Khwajah Khizar in Modern Bengal." 14

The animistic-cum-Hindu basis of the cult of Badr or 'Bud, Bad-a-r, and Madra is strongly emphasied by J. G. R. Forlong in his paper on the subject embodied in a letter published in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society on the above mentioned topic. His thesis appears to be that Badr, has nothing to do with The Buddha', but he assumes that Madra Mokan, the corrupted pronunciation of Badar Maqam in our opinion, denotes that the shrines are those of the old Dravidian god Siva known in Tamil as Madra. He states that human sacrifices used to be offered in these places in the past and links up Madra or Bud to bhut (or a demon), and suggests the latter term as the Hindu nature god which was transformed by usage into a demon or deva. However, with all due respect to the erudition and scholarship displayed by the learned

writer, his case peters out miserably. The very inclusion of the Kyaiktyo Pagoda, in his list of "Bud-as" which it indubitably is not, being a full-fledged Burmese Buddhist pagoda, exposes the fallacy of Forlong's arguments tending to translate Pir Badr al-Din Auliya into a deva or demon and indicates that the Bud-as mentioned by him are not all Badr Maqams but may rather have been any temples on hills, crags or boulders dedicated, to the worship of the Buddha, or a nature-god, devata or demon from the Hindu pantheon.This misapprehension also explains his allusion to the alleged practice of offering human sacrifices in the remote past at some of these "Bud-as:"15 Opinion is however definite that the cult of Pir Badr was essentially Muslim although it appealed to people of other communities who became devotees of this Muslim saint. Parrott stated: The explanation I have arrived at is as follows. Budder Aulia, or, as he is more familiarly styled, Budder Sahib, was a Mohamedan fakir, who possessed great supernatural powers which led to his being regarded almost in the light of a prophet. It is only natural that Mabomedans should

reverence the spot where be lived and died, and offer their prayers under a surer hope of their being beard, than if offered up elsewhere. Buddhists in deference to the divine character of the saint Budder, mix him up in their minds with the guardian nat, or minor deity of the place. They, therefore,worship him regularly and are profuse in their reverence and religious offerings. Hindus are said to have been the first who discovered Bidder's supernatural powers.He is by them supposed to exercise an influence over marine affairs and navigation, so that those who make offerings and invoke his aid, perform successful sea voyages,and return in safety with wealth acquired on the journey to the native homes.16 More amusing, if patently ridiculous, as recorded by Dr. Wise, was the story circulated by the Portuguese of Chittagong and Arakan that Pir Badr al-Dia was in reality a shipwrecked Portuguese mariner named Pas Gual Peeris Boteilho" who reached Chittagong coast on a floating piece of wreckage. O'Malley, the compiler of the Chittagong District Gazetteer, reported in 1908 that "an old Portuguese resident of Chittagong who died recently used to aver who that the saint was a Portuguese and sailor, a the survivor from a shipwreck,

floated

ashore

on a raft

became

Muhammadan." H. Beveridge, the

celebrated historian of India, also refers to Wises be somewhat more credulous about it and inclined Says he in this regard:

story as also John Beames who appears to to publicize the Portuguese mariner theory.

If, as is highly probable, some Badruddin or other came to Chittagong by river and sea from Dacca, almost the only practicable route in his days; and if, as is also highly probable, he was shipwrecked on the dangerous sandspit at the mouth of the Chittagong River where

so many ships have been wrecked since; and if, again most probably, he swam and waded ashore, and if (to add just one more probably if ) he came in one of

the

numerous

Portuguese

ships

which

in those days frequented the waters

of Eastern Bengalwe have all the materials necessary for building up the whole fabric of legend, which has grown around his name. One Chittagong legend, for instance, is that he was a Portuguese sailor, whose name Dr. Wise gives in the somewhat corrupt shape of "Pas Gual Peeris Boteilho", which we may without difficulty recognise as Pascual Perez Botelho.17 The Portuguese sailor theory, prima facie, cannot stand as the various dates ascribed to Badr al-Din Aullya range generally from about the middle of the 13th century to 1440 A.D. In such a case there could, be no question of a Portuguese original of Pir Badr since history says that the first Portuguese did not come to Bengal before the early 15 century and also that "presence of the numerous Portuguese ships" in Eastern Bengal waters were nothing more than a figment of imagination. Beames himself admits his fallacy immediately afterwards in his letter quoted above.He adds: "Perhaps Badru'ddin and Boteilho came ashore together, only in the case the Badru'ddin in question could not well have been the man who died in 1440 as there was no Portuguese in India till fifty years later than that date."18 In the list of Objects of Antiquarian and Archaeological interest in British Burma published in 1892, the Badr Maqam at Akyab is described as : "No. 8 ; District Akyab ; Locality; South
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side of the island of Akyab and near the Eastern shore of the Bay; Name of Object, Buddha-Makarn Cave. Any local history or tradition regarding it; a cave and mosque constructed in memory of one Buddha Auliya, whom the Mussulmans regard as

an eminent saint........." After weighing and assessing the various theories advanced that eminent scholar Temple who perhaps has studied the subject more exhaustively than any other scholar, living or dead, concludes on this point, the identity of Badr, as below:

There is a supernatural being, worshipped along the Burmese coast by seafarers from Akyab to Mergui at certain spots, specially dedicated to him. These spots, so far as yet known, are at Akyab, Sandoway and Mergui.To the Buddhists he is a nat; to the Hindus a deva or inferior god; to the Muhammadan a saint, to the Chinese a spirit. His worship is precisely that which is common all over the East to spirits or super-natural beings, believed in by the folk irrespective of their particular form of professed belief, and its points, in just the same way as do all other instances to the survival of an old animistic worship in "pre-religious" days. As in all other similar cases one of the contending local professed religions has chiefly annexed this particular being to itself, and he is pre-eminently a Muhammadan saint, legendarily that saint best known to the bulk of the Muhammadan seafaring population, namely "Pir Badar of their own chief town of Chittagong.19 The general consensus of opinion of scholars, officials and others who have studied the subject including of Badr Maqams and the accounts of Pir Badr al-Din Aullya closely,

such reputed Auderson,

archaeologists, scholars, orientalists and officials like Wise, Sladen and a host of others, agrees broadly with

Forchamner,

Temple's conclusions that Badr Maqams were basically the offshoots of the Muslim cult of Pir Badr. We may re-state the position more simply and accurately by recording that

Badr Maqams are essentially the shrines erected by the followers and devotees, mainly Mussulmans, of Pir Badr al-Din Badr-i-'Alam, popularly known as Pir Badr or Badr Pir, for the commemoration of the saint reputed primarily to be the patron of seafarers and boatmen and fisher-folk. The Badr Maqams are usually situated on the sea coast, at the mouths of rivers, on boulders or crags. They have in the course of the centuries attracted worshippers as in the case of some other Pirs, from other communities than the Muslims and the figure of the Pir and

the cult associated with him "have been overlaid by strata of animistic legends and traditions. It has been suggested that these "Buddher Makams" were built in the ninth and tenth centuries in the wake of Muslim Arab sailors who happened to touch at placces, nearly always sea-ports on the Arakan coast.20 Although no definite historical evidence is available on this point, its possibility and even probability of earlier resting places or places of worship of early seafaring Arabs by the followers of Pir Badr in later centuries cannot be gainsaid. Most of the Badr Maqams of the centuries have crumbled into dust and disappeared off the face of the earth. There are no signs of the edifices at Cheduba, Sandoway or Mergui and the name Badr Maqam has barely lingered on the sands of Coxs Bazar. Only the solitary shrine at Akyab, looked after well by members of the Muslim community which has been more or less undisturbed through the centuries, is in an excellent state of preservation. In Chittagong, which was the residence and field of activities of the Pir for long years, there is nothings

in the form of a

Badr

Maqamalthough there are several dargahs or tombs which

will be referred to later. Devotees who frequent the .Badr Maqam in Akyab and the several shrines of Pir Badr alDin Alam in the district of Chittagong in East Pakistan do not resort there for the prescribed

normal Islamic prayers. They are impelled, to visit the shrines by their deep belief in the miracles the Pir is stated to perform. Offerings of gold and silver, money and raw or cooked food are made with supplications for boons and it is said that many supplicants have been cured of grievous ailments by bathing in the water of the well. Other benefits and reliefs are said to have accrued; to them and many claim to have seen apparitions of the saint in dreams and visions. At times, goats are sacrificed at the shrine. At Mergui, wealthy Burmese used to offer gold leaf to gild the boulders of the shrine and the Chinese magical paper charms. According to Sir Edward Sladen, the "Buddha (Badar) Makan" was called so by the Arakanese "after a Mahomedan saint, Buddha Aouliah, who chose it as a

place of residence and passed are regarded as sacred

the greater part of his life there. "The place aid its surroundings by all creeds and classes of natives residing in

Arakan. Buddhists,

Mahomedans and Hindoos all come, and either, worship, or solicit powers as a means of deliverance from evil, or success in any

intercession with unseen

proposed worldly undertakings 21

Reference:

1. Vide Blochmann, H., Note No. 38, The

Firuzshohi Inscription in the Chhota Dargah, A,

H. 761. Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal Vol. 42, 1373, p. 302. 2. Forchammer, Report on the Antiquities of Arakan, 1891, p .60 f. quoted in Akyab District Gazettrer, Vol. I.A., Rangoon 1917, p. 40; also in Temple, R.C., Buddermokan, in the Journal of the Burma Research Society, Vol. xv, 1925, p.p. 7-8.

3. Budamaw or Buddhamaw is held to be a corrupted Arakanese version of the Persian term Badr Maqam. Vide infra. 4. Forcharnmer, op, cit., p. 60 f. 5. Temple. op. cit., quotes Parrott in J. B.R.S, Vol. XV, p. 5.

6. Forlong, J.G.R. Letters on "Bud, Bad-o-r, and Modra," Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1895, pp. 203-205. 7. Anderson, John, English Intercourse with Siam in the Seventeenth century, Trubner's Oriental Series, London 1890. f.n.pp. 338-.339. 8. Harvey, G. E. Hisiory of Burma, London, Longmans Green, J925. P. 137. 9. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1895, p.204- 205. 10. St. Andrew St.John, R. F.,A Burmese Saint, in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic

Society, 1894,pp. 566-567- Taylor, James, A Sketch of the Topography & Statisties of Dacca, Calcutta, 1840, 'p. 247.

11. Quoted by Temple, op. cit.. p. 4. 12. Temple, R.C, Some Discursive comments on Barbosa in The Indian Antiquary, Vol. Ill, p.132. 13. St Andrews St. John, op. cit.

14. Temple, op. cit., J,B.R, S., Vol, XV. Part I, pp. 1-34 15. Forlong, op. 16. Quoted by cit., pp. 203 -210. cit., pp. 4- 5.

Temple, op.

17. Wise, James, Notes on the Races, Castes and Trades of Eastern Bengal cited by Temple op. cit. p. 12, Beveridge, H. Letter in the Journal of Royal Asiatic Society, 1894, pp. 840-41; also Beames, John ibid, p. 839-40. 18. Beames, op. cit. 19. Temple. Op. cit. p-9. 20. Md. Enamul Haq, Purba Pakistane lslam, Dacca, 1948, p. 17. 21. Andersoa, op. cit.