Shamsuddīn Aḥmad Shāh ( bn, শামসউদ্দীন আহমদ শাহ, fa, ; r. 1433–1436) was the last

Sultan of Bengal The Sultanate of Bengal ( Middle Bengali: শাহী বাঙ্গালা ''Shahī Baṅgala'', Classical Persian: ''Saltanat-e-Bangālah'') was an empire based in Bengal for much of the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries. It was the domina ...

belonging to the House of Ganesha. He was the son and successor of Sultan

Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah ( bn, জালালউদ্দীন মুহম্মদ শাহ; born as Yadu or Jadu) was a 15th-century Sultan of Bengal and an important figure in medieval Bengali history. Born a Hindu to his aristocratic fat ...

. After his father's death, he ascended the throne at the age of 14.

Early life

Ahmad was born into the ruling family of the Bengal Sultanate, during the reign of his father

in 1419. They belonged to the

Ganesha dynasty The House of Ganesha ( bn, বনী গণেশ, Banī Gaṇesh, fa, ) was the second royal house of the late medieval Sultanate of Bengal. It is named after its founder Raja Ganesha, a wealthy Hindu nobleman, who succeeded the former Ilyas ...

, and Ahmad's grandfather was

Raja Ganesha Raja Ganesha ( bn, রাজা গণেশ) was a Hindu Brahmin zamindar ruler of Bengal, who took advantage of the weakness of the first Ilyas Shahi dynasty and seized power in Bengal. Contemporary historians of the medieval period conside ...

, a

Bengali Hindu Bengali Hindus ( bn, বাঙ্গালী হিন্দু/বাঙালি হিন্দু, translit=Bāṅgālī Hindu/Bāṅāli Hindu) are an ethnoreligious population who make up the majority in the Indian states of West Benga ...

. Ahmad's father had become a Muslim in 1415 and so Ahmad was born a

Bengali Muslim Bengali Muslims ( bn, বাঙালি মুসলমান; ) are adherents of Islam who ethnically, linguistically and genealogically identify as Bengalis. Comprising about two-thirds of the global Bengali population, they are the se ...

Reign

Ahmad's father died in Rabiʽ al-Thani 837 AH (November/December 1433 CE) and so Ahmad ascended the throne at 14 years of age. The Muazzampur Shahi Mosque, adjoining the

dargah A dargah ( fa, درگاه ''dargâh'' or ''dargah'', Turkish: ''dergâh'', Hindustani: ''dargah'' दरगाह درگاہ, bn, দরগাহ ''dorgah'') is a shrine or tomb built over the grave of a revered religious figure, often a ...

of Shah Alam Shah Langar, in Muazzampur, Sonargaon was built during the reign of Ahmad Shah. The Persian inscription mentions officers by the name of Firuz Khan and Ali Musa Sultan. According to

Firishta Firishta or Ferešte ( fa, ), full name Muhammad Qasim Hindu Shah Astarabadi ( fa, مُحَمَّد قاسِم هِندو شاہ), was a Persian historian, who later settled in India and served the Deccan Sultans as their court historian. He wa ...

, he followed the liberal policy of his father and was known for justice and charity. His father had good ties with

Barsbay Al-Ashraf Sayf ad-Dīn Bārsbay ( Circassian: Барасбий ал-Ашрэф Сэфудин) ( ar, الأشرف سيف الدين برسباي) was the ninth Burji Mamluk sultan of Egypt from AD 1422 to 1438. He was Circassian by birth and a ...

, a Mamluk sultan who had gifted Jalaluddin with investiture, a robe of honour and a letter of recognition. Jalaluddin had died before his own gifts could be dispatched to Barsbay, and so the job was left for Ahmad Shah to complete. Ahmad Shah had slightly delayed the dispatching but nevertheless sent the initial gifts of his father off whilst also adding more gifts of his own. In total, the package was worth over 12,000 red tankas and included clothes, cotton,

ginger Ginger (''Zingiber officinale'') is a flowering plant whose rhizome, ginger root or ginger, is widely used as a spice and a folk medicine. It is a herbaceous perennial which grows annual pseudostems (false stems made of the rolled bases of ...

myrobalan The common name myrobalan can refer to several unrelated fruit-bearing plant species: * Myrobalan plum (''Prunus cerasifera''), also called cherry plum and myrobalan plum * Emblic myrobalan (''Phyllanthus emblica''), also called Amla and Amalaki In ...

and other spices. The envoy, travelling from Bengal to Cairo via the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by ...

, sank whilst at Jeddah's coast. In 1436, the Governor of Jeddah sent some men to search the

Red Sea The Red Sea ( ar, البحر الأحمر - بحر القلزم, translit=Modern: al-Baḥr al-ʾAḥmar, Medieval: Baḥr al-Qulzum; or ; Coptic: ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϩⲁϩ ''Phiom Enhah'' or ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϣⲁⲣⲓ ''Phiom ǹšari''; ...

for the gifts and they came back with the textiles although the spices were damaged by the water. After Barsbay was informed of this by the Governor, he ordered for the arrest of all members of the Bengali embassy, the confiscation of their envoy's merchandise, and banned them from ever travelling to Cairo again.

Death

Ahmad Shah ruled for only 3 years and had no heirs. His reign was marked with chaos and anarchy including an invasion led by

Ibrahim Shah Sharqi Shams-ud-Din Ibrahim Shah Sharqi was the third sultan of the Jaunpur Sultanate, ruling from 1401 until his death in 1440.Nizamuddin Ahmad chronicles his date of death as 1436. However, numismatic evidence points to 1440. Early life and backgro ...

. He was buried in the

Eklakhi Mausoleum Eklakhi Mausoleum is a mausoleum located at Pandua in Malda district, West Bengal, India. It was built around 1425. It houses three tombs, possibly belonging to Sultan Jalaluddin Muhammad Shah, his wife, and son Shamsuddin Ahmad Shah, but the iden ...

with his mother and father. Contemporary historian

mentions that one of Ahmad Shah's attendants, "''Nasir ad-Din Ghulam''", seized the throne after his death. 18th-century historian Ghulam Husain Salim claims that Ahmad himself was killed by two of his attendants, Shadi Khan and

Nasir Khan Nasir Khan may refer to: *Nasir Khan (actor), Indian film actor * Nasir Khan (Afghan cricketer), born 1998, Afghan cricketer *Nasir Khan (Pakistani cricketer), born 1975, Pakistani cricketer * Nasir Khan (FATA politician), Pakistani politician * Na ...

, who fought amongst themselves with Nasir Khan usurping control. The nobles of Bengal managed to depose Khan within his short reign of either seven days, half a day or a few hours. The nobles subsequently installed to the throne a farmer named

Mahmud Mahmud is a transliteration of the male Arabic given name (), common in most parts of the Islamic world. It comes from the Arabic triconsonantal root Ḥ-M-D, meaning ''praise'', along with ''Muhammad''. Siam Mahmud *Mahmood (singer) (born 19 ...

, after realising that he descended from the Ilyas Shahis, the inaugural ruling dynasty of Bengal.Majumdar, R.C. (ed.) (2006). ''The Delhi Sultanate'', Mumbai: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, p.211

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ahmad Shah, Shamsuddin Sultans of Bengal 15th-century Indian Muslims Year of birth unknown 15th-century Indian monarchs 1436 deaths 15th-century Bengalis Sunni monarchs People from Dinajpur District, Bangladesh

Early life

Reign

Death

See also

References