BLiterature

4
Some scholars imagine that some writings of ‘Nath’ literature (which really can
be traced since the 17 th century) might have been done in the Buddhist era. But not
a single piece of writing of that genre has been discovered yet.
In this context, it is noteworthy that the languages of the whole Eastern India
(including Bengal, Kamrupa, Maghad and Kalinga) were closely similar in those
days. So it was an age of the entire Eastern Indian literature.
The Turkic Age (13 th – Mid 14 th Centuries)
The Turkic general Bakhtiyar Khilji conquered Gaur in 1203. A fear of their
invasion had haunted the rulers’ and the common people’s mind since before. After
conquering the province, the Turks ruled it for nearly one and a half century.
Bengal’s antique cultural progress was obstructed by this unexpected and shocking
invasion by barbaric foreigners. Bloodshed, torture, harassment, forced conversion,
looting and destruction of scripts, sculptures, temples and properties followed.
Bengal’s cultural world was totally submerged by frustrating darkness; the soul of the
Bengali nation was in fact wounded and paralyzed.
As a result, probably no literature was produced in that era; and even if
produced, those have not come to our hands. Literary practice in this province had to
wait for another century. Yet some hold the idea that the medieval poet Ramai
Pundit wrote Shunyopuran in the 13 th century; but their opinion is not supported by
linguistic evidence.
The Turkic rulers began to marry native girls; as a result, a new race called
Bengali-Turkic emerged. Thus the Turkic Muslims were slowly integrating in the
mainstream of Bengali society. History gave the hint that they would make effective
role in Bengali culture in the next century.
The Sultanate (Mid 14 th – 15 th Centuries)
In course of time, the alien brutes were slowly merging with the native people
of our province. The rulers even started patronizing our art and culture. Thus, since
the 14 th century, literary pursuit had a rebirth under patronage of the independent
sultans.
The historians recognize Fakruddin Mubarak Shah as the first sultan of
Bengal. He declared himself as a distinctive monarch in 1338. Thereafter many
feudal lords ruled the Bengal Sultanate until it was merged with the Mogul Empire in
the early 17 th century. But it is noteworthy that the sultans’ reign in literature lasted
only till the 15 th century; afterward it came under the influence of the Chaitanya
movement.
Poetical works of the era were quite creative, besides free translations of
Sanskrit texts. Although poets had no common trend, the age holds the features that
sultans and rajas patronized many of them, and a new language that was not more
than a dialect before, became the vehicle of literature.