Page 115 - Art and Crafts of Bangladesh

112 ART AND CRAFTS

later periods in the appearance of buildings entirely made of bricks with stumpy
octagonal towers at the corner and curved cornices. The roofs of these buildings
somewhat imitated the curved bamboo huts of Bengal, except putting hemispherical
domes on top. The walls were not plastered, rather kept bare to display brick designs
and terracotta decorations. Eklakhi mausoleum of Pandua, in the state of W.Bengal,
India, built at the beginning of 15th century over the remains of Jalaluddin
Muhammad, the converted son of Raja Ganesh, is an epoch making monument of
Bengal, where the curved cornice of the roof, the profuse use of terracotta decoration,
began a new style for later architectural edifices. Terracotta decorates the outer surface
of the walls on all sides, lintels of doorways, spandrel above the multi-foiled arches,
pillars and corner towers with moldings and friezes etc. The motifs represent an
amalgamation of local and Muslim elements, such as chain and pendant, lotus – a
Hindu motif, local plants, shrubs etc. as well as arabesque, jali work and geometric
pattern identified with the Muslims. This monument achieved for the first time a
synthesis between the decorative technique and structural masonry. Also the principle
of surface decoration that was established here, were subsequently followed in almost
all the buildings of Bengal during this Sultani period.
fig. 2.28 This style of architecture went on throughout the Ilyas Shahi period, not only in Pandua
Chhota Sona Masjid: A and Gaur, but in the newly conquered far away regions as well. The Khalitafad area of
dilapitated side mihrab Bagerhat dist. in Khulna, has a number of monuments of this period built in the time
of Khan Jahan Ali, a general of the Ilyas Shahi rulers around 1459 AD the most famous
of which is the Shat-Gumbad masjid (sixty-domed mosque). Similar to the Gaur
buildings all these have brick fabric, thick walls, curved cornices, massive structures
and terracotta ornamentation. The Husain Shahi period,
stretching from 1493 to 1538 AD ushered in a period of
peace, prosperity and cultural activities, when together with
the extension of Muslim dominated region up to
Chittagong in the east to Kamrup (Assam) in the north,
trade and commerce, religion, literature and building
activities spread throughout Bengal. Though some of the
monuments of this period used stone, brick buildings were
much more numerous, which were coated with terracotta
ornamentation, more flamboyant than ever before. The
Tantipara mosque in Gaur, dated 1480 AD is considered the
best example of this period by scholars like Cunningham
who wrote that it ‘is the finest of the buildings at Gaur’. 37
The work of the terracotta artists, clearly indicate that they
had mastered the technique of low-relief decoration and the
finesse of execution on the Muslim monuments, compared
to those high relief large plaques of the earlier Hindu-
Buddhist period of 8th-9th centuries is truly amazing. Here