Discovery
Wari and Bateshwar are neighbouring villages in the Narsingdi district of Bangladesh, in ancient India, on an old course of the Brahmaputra. A hoard of punch-marked silver coins was found there in 1933 and surface finds accumulated over the following decades, but systematic excavation did not begin until 2000, under Sufi Mostafizur Rahman of Jahangirnagar University.
What has been found
The settlement is enclosed by an earthen rampart with an associated ditch, and a wide metalled road has been traced. The material includes punch-marked silver coins, iron tools and slag, and very large quantities of beads — carnelian, agate, jasper and glass — with unfinished pieces and drills showing manufacture on the site rather than import alone.
Rouletted ware and knobbed pottery connect the site to the coastal networks of the Bay of Bengal and, through them, to the Indian Ocean trade that also reached Arikamedu in the south. This is the clearest evidence that the eastern delta belonged to that system in the early historic period.
Dating and identification
Radiocarbon determinations have been used to argue for occupation from about the fifth century BCE, which would make Wari-Bateshwar broadly contemporary with the early cities of the Ganges plain. The dates have been questioned on the ground that the samples are not securely tied to the fortification, and some prefer a later position within the early historic period. The matter is unresolved.
The identification of the site with Sounagoura, an emporium placed in this region in Ptolemy's Geography, has been proposed and is likewise contested.
Further reading
- Allchin, F. R. The Archaeology of Early Historic South Asia. Cambridge University Press, 1995
- Chakrabarti, Dilip K. The Archaeology of Ancient Indian Cities. Oxford University Press, 1995
- Ray, Himanshu Prabha. The Archaeology of Seafaring in Ancient South Asia. Cambridge University Press, 2003
- Kulke, Hermann. A History of India. Routledge, 2004
See also
This entry was last revised on 1 August 2026.