Eastern Bengal
The Khaḍgas held the deltaic country of Samataṭa and Vaṅga — roughly the Comilla and Dhaka districts of modern Bangladesh — in the period between Śaśāṅka's Gauḍa kingdom and the rise of the Pālas. They are known from the Ashrafpur copper plates and from a group of inscribed bronze images, and their rule appears to have coincided with a flourishing of Buddhist metalwork in the region.
Xuanzang describes Samataṭa in the seventh century as a country of some thirty monasteries with two thousand monks, alongside a hundred Hindu temples, which fits the mixed patronage the inscriptions show.
The dynasty's interest
Devakhaḍga's queen Prabhāvatī is recorded as the donor of a bronze image, and the family's grants are made to Buddhist establishments. Eastern Bengal remained a Buddhist stronghold for centuries longer than most of northern India, and the Khaḍgas are the first documented royal patrons of that tradition in the region.
They were succeeded by the Devas of Samataṭa and eventually absorbed into the Pāla sphere.
Further reading
- Sen, Tansen. Buddhism, Diplomacy, and Trade. University of Hawaii Press, 2003
- Kulke, Hermann. A History of India. Routledge, 2004
- Singh, Upinder. A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India. Pearson, 2008
- Ali, Daud. Courtly Culture and Political Life in Early Medieval India. Cambridge University Press, 2004
- Behrendt, Kurt A. The Art of Gandhara in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2007
See also
This entry was last revised on 1 August 2026.