Charaideo Moidams

Why in news?

• Assam’s Charaideo Moidams, or royal burial mounds, are India’s only entry to UNESCO for recognition as a World Heritage site in the cultural category in 2023-24, state Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma announced recently.
• Currently, there are no World Heritage site in the category of cultural heritage in the northeast

About Charaideo Moidams:

• The Charaideo Moidams are mounds containing remains of Ahom dynasty royalty, who ruled present-day Assam from the 13th to the 19th century.
• Charaideo remained the symbolic center of Ahom Kingdom even though the capital of the kingdom moved many times.
• This place is located at the foothills of Nagaland.
• It was built by Chaolung Sukhapa the founder of the dynasty in about 1229 CE.

Features:

• It contains sacred burial grounds of Ahom kings and queens and is also the place of the ancestral Gods of the Ahoms.
• Some 42 tombs (Maidams) of Ahom kings and queens are present at Charaideo hillocks.

Architecture:

• It comprises a massive underground vault with one or more chambers having domical superstructure and covered by a heap of earthen mounds and externally it appears a hemispherical mound.

PRACTICE QUESTION:

Charaideo Moidams of Assam, recently seen in news, is associated with:

(a) Ahom kingdom

(b) Chutia Kingdom

(c) Danava dynasty

(d) Koch dynasty

Answer