What happened in Bengal was related to contemporary world events. I try to cover some of these events in these threads:
Nomad vs Sedentary and spread of Islam
Turks, Mongols and a Persian Secretarial Class in Early Delhi Sultanate
Birth of Muhammad (SAWS) and Chinggis Khaan unleashed forces that shaped much of the world and also in a remote corner of South Asia, far away from Mecca and Mongolia, resulted in events that eventually led to the creation of Bangladesh.
After death of Muhammad (SAWS) in 7th century, Arab nomads from Arabian peninsula conquered two major settled civilizations/empires, Byzantine in the North West (present Jordan, Syria, Lebanon), Byzantine North Africa in the West, Roman West Europe (Spain, parts of Italy etc.) and Sassanian Iran to the North East. Arab Khilafa then started recruiting another group of nomadic warriors, Turkic people from the Central Asian steppes and employ them as slave soldiers (Mamluks). Mamluks eventually started taking over many of these Islamic empires and created new ones such as Delhi Sultanate, Bengal Sultanate etc. But these nomads had no settled civilization skills of their own so they started using the existing culture, language and bureaucratic organizational skills of these conquered settled civilizations. Sassanian in the East, and Byzantine and Roman in the West.
Around 1200 AD, Chinggis Khaan united tribes in Gobi desert and surrounding steppe areas, declares himself Khan of Khans of all nomadic felt tent people (nomads living in yurt/ger from Manchu steppes North of Korean peninsula to Hungarian steppes in east Europe) and started taking over settled and nomad empires one by one. First China, then Central Asia and Iran and then Russia. In two places they lose, one in battle of Ain Jalut near present day Palestine against Mamluks and converted Mongols from the Russian Khanate and the 2nd against Delhi Sultanate, which became a refuge for Muslim Turkic people from Central Asia and who were able to lure and recruit many Mongols in their ranks as well.
Soon the Mongol Khanates started falling within a century, the first to fall was Chagatai and it was taken over by the son-in-law (Gurkani) empire of Emir Timur. He unites Central Asian Chagatai Khanate, Russian Altyn Orda or Golden Hordes and Il-khanid Iran. He sacks Osmanli in Anatolia and Delhi Sultanate. After fall of Yuan Mongol rule of China at the hand of Ming, Timur was on his way to attack Ming China to restore Mongol Yuan, but died on the way near Syr Daria in present day Kazakhstan. After the Khanates the Timurid empire also faded away giving rise to other empires. Babur one of the last Timurid prince got ousted from his state in Ferghana valley and tried his fortune in South Asia and succeeds. So finally Yassa makes it way into South Asia and makes profound changes in one of its fringe frontier called Bangalah (Bengal).
Yassa - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- He [Chingis-Khan] ordered that all religions were to be respected and that no preference was to be shown to any of them. All this he commanded in order that it might be agreeable to Heaven. {al-Makrizi}
- Leaders of a religion, lawyers, physicians, scholars, preachers, monks, persons who are dedicated to religious practice, the Muezzin (this latter appearing to be from the later period of Khubilai Khan unless this was further translated there had been no specific reference made to any Muezzin and cities including mosques were levelled), physicians and those who bathe the bodies of the dead are to be freed from public charges. {Al-Makrizi}
Verkhovensky reports that the Yassa begins with an exhortation to honor men of all nations based upon their virtues. This pragmatic admonition is borne out by the ethnic mixture created by Genghis Khan in the Mongolian medieval army for purpose of unity (Ezent Gueligen Mongolyn), the United Mongol Warriors. The origin of the word Mongol, "mong", means "brave". Thus at the time it may have meant as much an army of "the brave", as an army from or made up of people from Mongolia.
- Genghis Khan consulted teachers of religions, such as imáms and probably rabbis and Christian priests, in compiling his law codex.
Chingiz Khan: The Life and Legacy of an Empire Builder - Anwarul Haque Haqqi - Google Books
Medieval India: From Sultanat to the Mughals Part - II - Satish Chandra - Google Books
Indegenization process: Fortune seeking warriors come to a new area in military campaigns, most often do not bring their wife. So they marry from local chieftains families to create first Muslim Ashraf. Subsequent warrior migrants who come to settle down, most probably marry from this existing pool of Ashraf families. When Ashraf fall to poverty, the rich converts can absorb them into their own family to gain Ashraf blood, which is treasured and rare commodity. Overtime population becomes more homogeneous, but just like South America, there remains a few percentage unmixed Ashraf (mixed themselves but not after the first settlement move), rest 40-70% are Mestizo with varying degree of foreign blood and then there are 50-20% unmixed natives (the percentages are wild guesses on my part, without a comprehensive genetic test of a broad cross section of people from various strata, it is premature to make conjectures, but I use this only as a speculative example).
Islam came to Bengal in 3 waves. First was through the coastal areas by Arab maritime traders. 2nd was the Turkic invasions that created Delhi Sultanate and Bengal Sultanate soon after. Turkic Bengal Sultanate spread Muslim rule to distant eastern hinterland of Bengal, but Muslim settlements remained limited to urban garrison towns and mint towns. The 3rd final push came after Mughal conquest of Bengal, that transformed the rural “Bhati” areas of eastern Bengal, with a mega project of clear cutting of forested land and creating mostly Muslim communities geared towards Wet Rice Cultivation. This way Bengal could become the granary and cash generator of Mughal empire, that would then finance imperial expansion in other parts of South Asia.
I would like to thank Richard M. Eaton for making available online the book he wrote on this subject:
The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204–1760
Richard Eaton | The Department of History
I will present material mostly from this book that will shed light on the topic mentioned in the title.
