Halhalia Haoli Rajbari of Ancient Laur Kingdom | Sunamganj
Halhalia Haoli Rajbari
An archaeological site named Haoli Rajbari of ancient Laur (laud) kingdom is located in Halhalia village of Tahirpur upazila under Sunamganj district in Bangladesh. Tahirpur upazila is about forty kilometres west of Sunamganj district town by road. This archaeological site is located in a village named Halholia, about fifteen kilometres north of the Tahirpur upazila town, through Bandaghat Bazar, on a curved road. During the monsoon season, this archaeological site located adjacent to Ekta Bazar can be reached by going north by boat on the Haor waterway from the upazila town for about ten kilometres.
Halhalia Haoli Rajbari of ancient Laur kingdom is a protected archaeological site of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh Government. Haoli Rajbari, which now is under the supervision of Bangladesh Archaeology department. It is about two hundred and thirty meters in north-south length and one hundred meters in east-west width. Surrounded by a fortified boundary wall, the ruins of the site include ancient architectural structures called the so-called fort walls, lion gate, dungeon, prison, etc. At present, local people are living in small houses on top of this archaeological site. Scattered fragments of bricks and broken pieces of different potteries are visible on this site. In this archaeological site, the ruins of ancient architectural structures made of bricks come out after excavating a little earth.
Archaeology Department of Bangladesh has been continuously conducting archaeological excavations and explorations in this site. During archaeological excavation conducted in the year 2020, a room with multiple entrances in the site, the floor of the room, part of the wall and floor attached to the eastern side of the room and part of the ruins of the boundary wall of the fort are discovered. The use of thin bricks, stone boulders and lime is observed in the construction of exposed room walls. The walls of the exposed rooms are about one meter wide. Three successive layers of lime mortar, thin bricks and stone boulders from top to bottom in the floor of the rooms are used. Fragments of different terracotta artefacts are found in different layers of earth during the excavation.
It should be mentioned that the first experimental archaeological excavation was conducted in 2019. Then the ancient architectural structures of the site including boundary walls, told lion gate, prison, and death wells, etc were exposed.
He also mentions, Sylhet district area was divided into several small states during the British period. Some were ruling independently for hundreds of years. Laur is one of these states include most of the areas of present day Sunamganj and Habiganj districts of Bangladesh. The capital of this state was Baniachang and Jagannathpur.
Keshab Mishra came to this country (that means Lauda) from Kanauj (present location in Uttar Prodesh of India) to improve his fortune. King Gobindo Chandra, who descended from Keshab Chandra, is mentioned as his tenth generation. This Gobindo Chandra converted to Islam during the reign of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb and was named Raja Habib Khan.
Achyutacharan Chowdhury Tattvanidhi mentions in his book of Bengali language titled Srihattar Ittivrta Purvangsha that in ancient times Srihatta was divided into three parts namely Laur, Gaura and Jayantiya. Tattvanidhi, whereas describing the location of Haor in his book, mentions that among the Haors under Sunamganj, Shanir Haor is positioned in Lauda state, fifty miles west of Srihatta town.
Tattvanidhi, in his book, further mentions that the state of Laur was spread over west of Gaur that means the western part of Srihatta district.
The city of Srihatta in Tattvanidhi’s text refers to the present day city of Sylhet. If we review the map of the current Sylhet and Sunamganj districts based on these sources, it is noticed that Halhalia Haoli Rajbari is located in Halhalia village of Tahirpur Upazila of Sunamganj district, about forty-seven miles north-west from the current Sylhet city. And the mentioned Shanir Haor is located near the Halhalia Haoli Rajbari. Again, it is known from historical books that Kamrupa state, Tripura state and Pragjyotish state were ruled in this geographical area. So archaeological site named Haoli Rajbari can be assumed to be the ruins of an ancient settlement within the geographical area of Kamrupa state, Tripura state and Pragjyotish state or Laur state, one of the ancient townships of Srihatta.
However, it is needed to do more analysis and research on the architectural patterns and artefacts exposed through continuous archaeological [Md. Shahin Alam]
References:
- Abedin, Syed Zainal, ‘Khando Khando Swadhin Rajjo’(bengali), Sylheter Elihas (History of Sylhet), page 208-209.
- Tattvanidhi, Achutacharan Chowdhury, Srihattar Ittivrta Purvangsha (bengali), page 41 – 136.
- Department of Archaeology, Chattagram and Sylhet Division, Regional Director’s Office, Cumilla.
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