The Ahom Army consisted of cavalry, infantry as well as naval units based on the

Paik system The ''Paik'' system was a type of corvee labour system on which the economy of the Ahom kingdom of medieval Assam depended. In this system, adult and able males, called ''paiks'' were obligated to render service to the state and form its militia ...

militia of the Ahom kingdom (1228 - 1824). The kingdom did not have standing army units of professional soldiers till late 18th and early 19th centuries, when Purnandan Burhagohain raised one after noticing the effectiveness of Captain Thomas Welsh's sepoys in subjugating the

Moamoria rebellion The Moamoria rebellion (1769–1805) was the 18th century uprising in Ahom kingdom of present-day Assam that began as power struggle between the Moamorias (''Mataks''), the adherents of the Moamara Sattra, and the Ahom kings. This uprising s ...

. The Ahom Army had various confrontations the most significant ones were against the west, from Bengal Sultans and the

Mughal Empire The Mughal Empire was an early-modern empire that controlled much of South Asia between the 16th and 19th centuries. Quote: "Although the first two Timurid emperors and many of their noblemen were recent migrants to the subcontinent, the d ...

; and against the south from the

Konbaung dynasty The Konbaung dynasty ( my, ကုန်းဘောင်ခေတ်, ), also known as Third Burmese Empire (တတိယမြန်မာနိုင်ငံတော်) and formerly known as the Alompra dynasty (အလောင်းဘ ...

(Burma). Its won decisive victories against the forces led by Turbak (1532), the Mughal Empire in the

Battle of Saraighat The Battle of Saraighat was a naval battle fought in 1671 between the Mughal Empire (led by the Kachwaha raja, Ram Singh I), and the Ahom Kingdom (led by Lachit Borphukan) on the Brahmaputra river at Saraighat, now in Guwahati, Assam, In ...

(1671), and the final

Battle of Itakhuli The Battle of Itakhuli was fought in 1682 between the Ahom Kingdom and the Mughal Empire. The Ahoms pushed back Mughal control to the west of the Manas river."In the Battle of Itakhuli in September 1682, the Ahom forces chased the defeated Mugh ...

"In the Battle of Itakhuli in September 1682, the Ahom forces chased the defeated Mughals nearly one hundred kilometers back to the Manas river. The Manas then became the Ahom-Mughal boundary until the British occupation." (1682) that expelled the Mughal forces from Assam. Its major failures were against the army of

Chilarai Shukladhwaja (Pron:ʃʊkləˈdwɑːdʒ) (1510-1577AD), or more popularly known as Bir Chilarai(Pron:/ʧɪləˌraɪ/), was the 3rd son of Biswa Singha, founder of the Koch Dynasty in Kamata Kingdom and younger brother of Nara Narayan, the 2nd kin ...

(1553), the forces led by Mir Jumla II (1662), and finally the

Burmese invasions of Assam Burmese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Myanmar, a country in Southeast Asia * Burmese people * Burmese language * Burmese alphabet * Burmese cuisine * Burmese culture Animals * Burmese cat * Burmese chicken * Burmese (hor ...

(1817, 1819, 1821). Though the Ahom kingdom could withstand all invasions from the west, it fell to the single significant challenge from the south and it was destroyed.

Organization

The Ahom Army was based on compulsory participation from members of its

, a corvée labor system the Ahom kingdom followed. Paiks formed groups of 4 (and later 3) called ''gots'', and at least one paik from each ''got'' was in military or public services at any given time. Each paik received state land for agriculture, and during the time of his paik services, the other members of his ''got'' tended to his land. Male subjects between the ages of fifteen and fifty are compulsory members of the Paik system. Therefore the entire population formed a trained militia on which the Ahom Army was based; and even at times of wars agricultural and other economic activities continued.

Notes

References

* {{refend Ahom kingdom Military history of India