Talk:Sukaphaa

Name

Is his name a common Tai name? It seems very similar to Si Ke Fa, who lived a hundred years later and was also from Mong Mao. --Yuje (talk) 22:06, 29 June 2009 (UTC)

@Yuje Yes, Sukaphaa original descendants of Dai People of Mong Mao. Now all Tai-Ahom are descendants of Dai People of Mong Mao. Sairg (talk) 14:06, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Some new edits

• The Ahom kingdom was not imperial.
• It established itself, at least during Sukaphaa's time, with minimal battle and war. It befriended the locals, and avoided conflict with the established kingdoms like the Kachari and others.

Chaipau (talk) 13:41, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I have not described the kingdom itself as imperial. rather the rule of the ahom dynasty meaning their suzeranity over the neighbouring peoples. "The invaders were dis-spirited lot, realising that "it was easy to get in but difficult to get out". The Peace Treaty signed laid down, among others: 1. Jayadhvaj was to send a daughter to the imperial Ahom Rule" Encyclopedia of North-East India - Page 187 see ref for ahom being described as imperial

— Cliniic , — (continues after insertion below.)

Sending off a daughter for marriage could hardly be a definition of imperialism. Yes, the Ahom kingdom had accepted princesses from other royal houses. But it too sent its daughters to the Mughals and the Burmese. Chaipau (talk) 14:18, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I was just showing Ahom rule being described as imperial. if you disagre fair enough its not an important point. I put it out there to describe how Ahoms came to dominate in North-East India despite not ruling over all of it directly.Cliniic (talk) 14:30, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

• are you sure? see http://books.google.co.in/books?id=Ic4UCdaxbHIC&pg=PA218&lpg=PA218&dq=Sukhrungphaa+encyclopedia&source=bl&ots=nlmI3n3p8M&sig=ugw7EImItjVIy80LH2WM1YomNDs&hl=en&sa=X&ei=k4oQULCXHMitrAerrIDYDA&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false Cliniic (talk) 13:52, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

lasty while I agree it is known as the Ahom Kingdom today back then it was established as the Kingdom of Assam. see page of constantine the great. it is written he founded the Eastern Roman Empire. while it came to be known as byzantine empire by modern scholars it shows the original name at the time of its fouding. Cliniic (talk) 13:53, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

"Kingdom of Assam" was not the name at the founding. At the founding it was just a Mueang, which was probably named Mong Dun Shun Kham. Chaipau (talk) 14:18, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

then should I just ammend it to "medieval assamese state"? that was what I first thought of inserting before thinking it would be too contrived. Cliniic (talk) 14:25, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

wait I think I gave you a wrong reference. here is "Struggling to Be Tai-Ahom in India Yasmin Saikia ... The backwardness and barbarity of the Ahom rulers justified the imperial ideology of conquest and the establishment of good government in Assam around the mid-nineteenth century." http://books.google.co.in/books?id=WfSmsuO6QugC&pg=PA79&lpg=PA79&dq=ahom+imperial&source=bl&ots=F0YeURlCtH&sig=Ta0Nitp2S-_eojoV4I9m2J3V_Iw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=O5MWUO_yC8arrAfG3oDgAw&ved=0CDsQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=ahom%20imperial&f=false here is another book describing ahom rule as imperial Cliniic (talk) 14:00, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Use this reference carefully. Here Yasmin Saikia basically discusses the "construction" of the Ahom/Sukaphaa myth. Chaipau (talk) 14:18, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I cited it to show Ahom rule being described as imperial. I never wrote the kingdom was itself imperial. surely despite not ruling over the nagas directly the relations between ahom and them were imperial? Like China and its own tributary states which is an example of imperial relationship? Cliniic (talk) 14:24, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

also reading books about relations between ahoms and nagas it was described as what I would consider to be imperialistic. see http://books.google.co.in/books?id=MiHhNkvrWvwC&pg=PA60&lpg=PA60&dq=sukapha&source=bl&ots=l4XUSCYL_B&sig=LRZ_8NpNYgU1bth9Z2zd1xCftew&hl=en&sa=X&ei=wpMWUMmxB8HMrQe_vYHoAw&ved=0CGMQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=sukapha&f=false Cliniic (talk) 14:02, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, just being cruel does not make Sukaphaa imperial. Chaipau (talk) 14:19, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

did you read all the way through? I was not referencing Sukhapaa's policy towards Nagas. see alemchiba in the book. would you not consider that an imperial relation between ahoms and nagas? Cliniic (talk) 14:22, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I did. And it further says that the Ahom came into contact with just a small portion of the Nagas. Even then, that does not make the Sukaphaa imperial. The word distracts from the unique nature of the Ahom state formation, which is best called "Ahomization" a term coined by Amalendu Guha. Ahomization gave the all those who they conquered equal place in the kingdom as Ahoms. That is how the Barahais were completely subsumed as Ahoms. Many Nagas too became Ahoms. The first Borpatrogohain was probably a Naga himself, or a half Naga. Calling the Ahom kingdom "imperial" would be completely missing the point, and denying it of the uniqueness that it displayed with great splendor. Chaipau (talk) 14:32, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

so what are the things we agree on? conquest of states by Sukaphaa?? the morans and borahis are described as being ruled by rajas. Cliniic (talk) 14:30, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

they were small chieftains. they were not kingdoms. Chaipau (talk) 14:32, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I did not describe them as kingdoms but states. so they are not successor "states" to Kamarupa in your opinion? Cliniic (talk) 14:37, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

No. there is no evidence of any state formation among the Barahis and Morans. Chaipau (talk) 14:58, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

also why are you removing he "conquered upper assam"? it says "Before his death in 1268, Sukapha had conquered a large portion of the Upper Assam Valley". do we really have to put in "most" for people to understand it? If calling the morans and borahis states is contentious fair enough i will remove it. but at least a better way to describe it surely would be "he conquered upper assam having defeated the rajas of so and so etc"? Cliniic (talk) 14:44, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

It is because at the end of the Sukapha's reign, he at most controlled the region between the Dikhou and the Burhidihing or Disang rivers in just the south bank. Though he camped near Habung for a while, it is not clear that he controlled that region when he finally settled at Charaideo. Chaipau (talk) 14:58, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

so this book Handbuch Der Orientalistik, Volume 1; Volume 10 By George van Driem is wrong? it says he had conquered most portions of upper assam. Cliniic (talk) 15:02, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I would say yes, at least on this point. I have not seen any other work that asserts that Sukaphaa's kingdom was big, or an all invading one. Sukaphaa pointedly avoided conflict with the Kachari kingdom, because that was a strong kingdom at that time. His greatness lie not in his conquests, but the establishment of a process of state formation, especially the process of Ahomization and inclusive policies. That this ethos was consciously maintained among the high Ahom officials can be evidence from Atan Burhagohain's Bahgarhiya Buranji. Chaipau (talk) 15:10, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

ohwell nevermind. I will just get on with editing the king of assam section now. thanks for your inputs! Cliniic (talk) 15:13, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

Why call it "medieval assamese state"? Why not call it Kamarupa, because after all the Ahoms aspired after the Kamarupa kingdom? Chaipau (talk) 15:22, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I have seen it being described as such in scholarly work so thought it would be more encyclopediac. if you disagree you can change it back Cliniic (talk) 15:34, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

I know in what context it has been so said. I have had to defend its mention on Wikipedia, and I have provided references. But calling the Ahom kingdom "Kingdom of Assam" now is taking things a bit too far. Chaipau (talk) 16:09, 30 July 2012 (UTC)

WP:DE WP:SYNTH and WP:NOR edits Suggestion

Some IP s doing WP:DE WP:SYNTH and WP:NOR edits , I request users to revert these edits which even doesn't rely on the ref. sources are given. Thankyou.Sairg (talk) 14:09, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

How can verifiable sources like J.P. Wade's account, Sadaramin's Buranji or K.Phukan' s Buranji be WP:DE WP:SYNTH or WP:NOR?? Stop using terms which you don't understand. On the contrary, I don't see any links to Padmeswar Gogoi's reference. May I have the verifiable link to the pages?? It is you who is doing WP:DE WP:SYNTH or WP:NOR by adding unverifiable content.

@9563rj @331dot Kindly visit Wade, J.P. An Account of Assam, 1800, p. 16., Phukan, K. Assam Buranji, 1906, p.7., Sadaramin Assam Buranji',1930, p.11.. All these are verifiable links. On the other hand, I am unable to find any verifiable links for Sairg's content, although I haven't removed it.Barbariankiller456 (talk) 12:52, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

I have no position in this dispute, as I know nothing about this subject matter. However, I will take action if there is continued edit warring. It needs to stop. If discussion here does not resolve the matter, dispute resolution needs to be utilized. 331dot (talk) 12:53, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@331dot I request you to kindly visit A review of Buranjis, p.76. There is a summary of all the facts stated by the primary sources in page 76 which I have mentioned separately one by one. It is much clear from the given links what I have stated. I don't understand how Sairg is accusing of WP:DE WP:SYNTH or WP:NOR. WP:DE is for preventing progress towards improving an article. One can clearly see that it's Sairg who is involved in WP:DE by preventing sourced content to be added. WP:NOR is meant for preventing original research. The fact that I have given ample sources itself rejects this notion. WP:SYNTH is for preventing multiple sources for implying a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources. But, that's exactly the opposite here. The sources have each different conclusions as to what the king had brought along with him. So, each source is equally essential and pushing a certain view is POV push. The user Sairg has clearly no idea how Wikipedia works. Thank you. Barbariankiller456 (talk) 13:07, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@9563rj @331dot I request you to kindly increase the protection level of the page or request an admin for the same so as to prevent the removal of sourced content or any reverts. Thank youBarbariankiller456 (talk) 13:09, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@9563rj @331dot Have a look at this recent revert edit (Revert). I am pretty sure this is a case of WP: SOCK. I request you to kindly run a Checkuser investigation for Sairg and Xishuang. Both seem to be the same person with mutiple accounts. Both have mentioned 2000 as their year of birth, have the same areas of editing i.e. Ahom kings and Ahom people. Moreover, Sairg has "Xishuangbanna" as one of his interests.Have a look here. All these hint to the fact that both are the same user. Hope you take the necessary actions. Thank youBarbariankiller456 (talk) 13:23, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@9563rj @331dot , Here the user is hiding the original research content and doing WP:SYNTH Sairg (talk) 13:49, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

In the refernce A review of Buranjis, p.76 Clearly mention - The number of men and belongings are important for the analysis of the

nature and the further developments of this journey under Sukapha. Some scholars hold that three queens,20 two sons and one daughter21 also accompanied Sukapha. Gait also has written that Sukapha was accompanied by 9000 men, women and but the user edited as - According to the Bahgharia Buragohain Buranji included in the Deodhai Buranji,Sukapha was accompanied by 360 people, 30 horses along with 2 elephants and their conductors Which is edited or unpublished manuscript according to the source itself. Kindly check yourself

In the reference Wade, J.P. An Account of Assam, 1800, p. 16 It's funny to say again that ther is no mention metch with his edits - In the book "An account of Assam", J.P. Wade states that a total of 300 men accompanied Sukapha along with 12 commanders, 30 horses, 2 elephants and 2 conductors of elephan. Kindly Check yourself again.Sairg (talk) 14:00, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@9563rj @331dot

• Kindly, check Wade, J.P. An Account of Assam, 1800, p. 16.. I quote from Page 16, Line 7, "There were 12 commanders and 300 fighting men, 2 elephants, 2 conductors of elephants.." @SairgIt seems either you are weak in English for not being able to read simple stuff, or you have a weak eyesight or you are deliberately trying to lie out of which the last one seems most probable.

• @SairgKindly stop manipulating facts which you cannot comprehend. The "Review of Buranji" has clearly mentioned 4 sources and all of them are published. Otherwise, how will there be verifiable links for these?? The mention of "edited and unpublished" is entirely for a different sense of meaning which is not just confined to these sources but include all Buranjis as a whole and even Gait's book which mentions 9000 men(as it is mentioned just before the lines). The author wants to argue the reasons so as to why the different Buranjis/historical texts might have different meanings and further advances to give examples of other completely unrelated facts which has no relation to the current topic. Mind you, the lines about 9000 men hasn't been removed.

• When I have clearly mentioned the original manuscripts along with verifiable links, I don't understand how the edits fall in WP:SYNTH as you have accused it to be. The primary sources are well verifiable along with the secondary source which is nothing but the summary of all the facts.

Thank you. Barbariankiller456 (talk) 14:25, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

• Please stop pinging me. I do not wish to referee this dispute. The page has been protected. You need to work this out amongst yourselves. I would strongly suggest going to dispute resolution procedures if you cannot work this out. 331dot (talk) 14:05, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

Please do not remove the talk page posts of others, thanks. 331dot (talk) 14:38, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@Barbariankiller456 I suggest you to read WP:SYNTH very well , Here you are doing the same thing , as stated there- Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any of the sources. Similarly, do not combine different parts of one source to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by the source..Kindly stop doing this type of activities on great Chaolung Sukaphaa page, Your edit history shows that you have great knowledge on Chutiya Kindly improve those , do not try to distract the page with WP:SYNTH, Can you proof your edits were not WP:SYNTH.Sairg (talk) 14:43, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@Barbariankiller456In the refernce A review of Buranjis, p.76 Clearly mention - The number of men and belongings are important for the analysis of the nature and the further developments of this journey under Sukapha. Some scholars hold that three queens,20 two sons and one daughter21 also accompanied Sukapha. Gait also has written that Sukapha was accompanied by 9000 men, women and. Now here is your strong English edits.Sairg (talk) 14:47, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@Sairg What are trying to prove here?? There is no fixed conclusion as to the belongings of Sukaphaa when he entered Assam. Different primary sources have different descriptions. Hence, there is a need for mentioning all the sources including the one mentioning 9000 men which I haven't removed. You say that I am involved in WP:SYNTH. But, doesn't that mean "using multiple sources to imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by the sources"?? Is it too difficult for you to understand the meaning of the above quoted simple sentence ?? The sources which I have mentioned are completely the opposite of what you are accusing. I say this because firstly, each source has explicitly mentioned several conclusions, not a single conclusion. Keeping that in mind I haven't made any fixed conclusions too. Instead I have marked all the conclusions separately as 4 separate points. Isn't that what is necessary to prevent WP:SYNTH. On the contrary, it is you who is trying to remove all the other 3 conclusions and insist to keep just one which is clearly WP:SYNTH and WP:PUSH. Hope you retrospect first. PS: Kindly, refrain from using bold text. It doesn't prove anything. Barbariankiller456 (talk) 14:57, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

@Sairg Did you see me removing the content about 9000 men?? No. As, I have said, all the sources are equally important, therefore they must be present in the article. PS: Gait isn't a primary source which you so insist to be. Barbariankiller456 (talk) 15:00, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

Social

Sukapa 223.231.189.109 (talk) 23:43, 20 October 2022 (UTC)

Legendary

We need to emphasize that in all probabilities, the subject is a legendary figure who perhaps bear some imprints of a historical past. TrangaBellam (talk) 17:12, 24 February 2024 (UTC)

You are, of course, free to believe Yasmin Saikia "in all probability". Jayeeta Sharma, reviewing her book, says: "Saikia contests these accepted wisdom" (emphasis mine) (https://www.jstor.org/stable/20203149). These are accepted by most historians today. And Sharma does not endorse these contests, on the other hand she challenges them. She writes: "Saikia's work is thought provoking, but it leaves quite a few questions unanswered." Which is academic speak for "you have not done your homework". Saikia's views are, at most, WP:FRINGE. Chaipau (talk) 03:33, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

You have long-tried to brand Sikia as FRINGE but that is your opinion.

• Sharma takes issue with aspects of Saikia's work that are rather-irrelevant to what is under dispute. Notably, she ends her review by concluding that Yasmin Saikia's work is a valuable reminder of the fascinating connections between such "invented" identities, political frontiers, popular memory, and contemporary myth making.
• Nonetheless, Sharma is, I presume, not the final arbiter of scholarship on Assam. Sanjib Baruah, reviewing her book, notes her argument(s) to be fascinating, bold, timely, and on the whole, quite persuasive notwithstanding the cryptic last line.

If you have equally reliable scholarship (see WP:HISTRS) that negates Saikia's scholarship, you are free to present them. TrangaBellam (talk) 16:56, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

Sharma is not the arbiter here, but the one who says that Saikia is FRINGE. Sharma says "Saikia contests these accepted wisdom. The standard till Saikia was that Sukapha is historical (See Guha 1983). The onus is on you to show that historians today have accepted her positions and accept Sukapha as legendary. Just a few words in "fascinating, bold, etc." is not enough to show that her claims as accepted as historical.

This is the accepted wisdom, widely accepted till now, as stated by Sharma (who is a professional historian, btw and have trained on Assam's history, unlike Saikia, who has not).

From the mid-nineteenth century, Assamese intellectuals and British officials transmuted local chronicles into printed knowledge, disseminating widely their narrative of the Ahom, the warrior followers of the hero Sukapha. He and his followers were said to have made their way from Upper Burma to Assam in the thirteenth century, finally becoming its rulers. They ruled success fully until buffeted by Burmese and British ambitions, assisted by the Ahom warrior elite, Brahmin, and caste Hindu service elites. This was the generally accepted outline of the Ahom presence in Assam.

What Saikia is claiming is that:

In deconstructing this, Saikia posits an alternative view of the precolonial Ahom as a relatively open-status group whose membership came from a diverse set of local peoples participating in a warrior ruling ethos. Rather than an inherited bodily identity, it was a prestigious rank achieved by those who had made it into the king's favor.

Unfortunately for Saikia, this was already said previously. Her claims are not new. Here is Guha in 1983 describing "Ahomisation" who connects this to a political position of the valley Shans (p12):

"The Valley Shans", says E R Leach, "have everywhere, for centuries past, been assimilating their hill neighbours ". This is observed not only in Upper Burma, but also in Upper Assam. There, the Ahoms assimilated some of their Naga, Moran and Barahi neighbours and later, also large sections of the Chutiya and Kachari tribes. This Ahomisation process went on until the expanded Ahom society itself began to be Hinduised from the mid-16th century onward."

Guha unambiguously states (p12):

Sukapha and his band of Ahom migrants entered Upper Assam in 1228 with a view to permanently settling there.

This is standard accepted history. You have a big job toppling accepted history in Wikipedia on the basis of a fringe claim.

Chaipau (talk) 18:36, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

On Saikia's qualifications:

• Saikia recieved her PhD in History (South Asia) in 1999 from University of Wisconsin-Madison on this topic; her thesis was titled A Name without a People: Searching to be Tai-Ahom in Modern India.
• Her MA Dissertation from the same university was (roughly) on the same topic and published as In the Meadows of Gold: Telling Tales of the Swargadeos in the Crossroads of Assam from Spectrum, Guwahati.

• Now, you might have your reasons to believe that Saikia "has not [been] trained on Assam's history" but I suggest taking it up with the university-administration than here.

On Saikia being a FRINGE source:

• I feel that we need to aproach RSN and check if the broader community translates "Saikia (2002) contests these accepted wisdom" as "Saikia (2002) is a fringe source." in light of the multiple adulatory reviews of Saikia's work and about a hundred and fifty approving citations.

TrangaBellam (talk) 19:03, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

The question is simply - "did Saikia overturn a hundred years of accepted history?" We are testing Saikia, not Sharma. Chaipau (talk) 20:09, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

I presume it is you who raised an issue about Saikia having no training in Assamese history unlike Sharma? I also presume that it is you who nitpicked a line from Sharma's review to argue that Saikia is FRINGE.

HISTRS advises us to privilege recent academic scholarship. Were Saikia's revisionist work too recent, you could have argued about the need to give time to scholars to reject her reading. However, a quarter of a century has passed since she got her PhD (the book was published 3 years later); so, you need to find equally reliable sources explicitly rejecting Saikia than clutching at straws. TrangaBellam (talk) 20:56, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

The issue is that you are seeking to change the status of Sukaphaa from historical to legendary. The onus is on you build WP:CONSENSUS on it. I have made my AGF arguments above. Chaipau (talk) 21:47, 25 February 2024 (UTC)

As much as the onus is on you to build consensus. Given the nature of your arguments on how Saikia is not trained in history or about Sharma branding her as WP:FRINGE, I am unsure about whether to AGF but I do, nonetheless. TrangaBellam (talk) 14:23, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

At this point, We are here: WP:TALKDONTREVERT. This is analogous to our discussion here: Talk:Tripura_Buranji#Reverts, except we are not editing

You mentioned Sukaphaa should be a legend. I said in GF that Saikia is trying to topple a well established history (Sharma) but others have not accepted it yet, beyond providing some fawning words. You disagreed.

I have already revealed my cards. If you take this elsewhere, I shall make these very arguments. Just as I did with our discussion on Tripura Buranji: Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Tripura_Buranji

Chaipau (talk) 21:16, 26 February 2024 (UTC)

"Others have not accepted it yet beyond providing some fawning cards" — how do you construe an acceptance? Maybe, they need to explicitly write something like "... for the information of Chaipau, an anonymous Wikipedian, I am letting the world know that I am in agreement with Saikia's thesis... "?

And for the umpteenth time, why did you claim that Saikia had no training in history? Can you please strike it out? Or provide some credible evidence? TrangaBellam (talk) 21:10, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Please provide citations and quotes where Saikia says Sukaphaa was a legend. Please provide citations and quotes of other reputable historians and scholars who critically accept this finding. Chaipau (talk) 10:19, 28 February 2024 (UTC)