Part 1 of 2
Fragm. LVI.
Plin. Hist. Nat. VI. 21. 8—23. 11.
List of the Indian Races.* [
*This list Pliny has borrowed for the most part from Megasthenes. Cf. Schwanbeck, pp. 16 seq., 57 seq.]
The other journeys made thence (from the Hyphasis) for
Seleukos Nikator are as follows: — 168 miles to the Hesidrus, and to the river Jomanes as many (some copies add 5 miles); from thence to the Ganges 112 miles. 119 miles to Rhodopha (others give 325 miles for this distance). To the town Kalinipaxa 167— 500. Others give 265 miles. Thence to the confluence of the Jomanes and Ganges 625 miles (many add 13 miles), and to the town Palimbothra 425. To the mouth of the Ganges 738 miles.*
[
*According to the MSS. 638 or 637 miles. The places mentioned in this famous itinerary all lay on the Royal Road, which ran from the Indus to Palibothra. They have been thus identified. The Hesidras is now the Satlej, and the point of departure lay immediately below its junction with the Hyphasis (now the Bias). The direct route thence (via Ludhiana, Sirhind, and Ambala) conducted the traveller to the ferry of the Jomanes, now the Jamna, in the neighbourhood of the present Bureah, whence the road led to the Ganges at a point which, to judge from the distance given (112 miles), must have been near the site of the far-famed Hastinapura. The next stage to be reached wad Rhodopha, the position of which, both its name and its distance from the Ganges (119 miles) combine to fix at Dabhai, a small town about 12 miles to the south of Anupshahr. Kalinipaxa, the next stage, Mannert and Lassen would identify with Kanauj (the Kanyakubja of Sanskrit); but M. de St.-Martin, objecting to this that Pliny was not likely to have designated so important andsno celebrated a city by so obscure an appellation, finds a site for it in the neighbourhood on the banks of the Ikshumati, a river of Panchala mentioned in the great Indian poems. This river, he remarks, must, also have been called the Kalinadi, as the names of it still in current use, Kalini and Kalindri, prove. Now, as 'paxa' transliterates the Sanskrit ' paksha,' a side, Kalinipaxa, to judge from its name, must designate a town lying near the Kalinadi.
The figures which represent the distances have given rise to much dispute, some of them being inconsistent either with others, or with the real distances. The text, accordingly, has generally been supposed to be corrupt, so far at least as the figures are concerned. M. de St. Martin, however, accepting the figures nearly as they, stand, shows them to be fairly correct. The first difficulty presents itself in the words, "Others give 325 miles for this distance." By 'this distance' cannot be meant the distance between the Ganges and Rhodophn, but between the Uesidrus and Rhodopha, which the addition of the figures shows to be 399 miles. The shorter estimate of others (325 miles) measures the length of a more direct route by way of Patiala, Thanesvara, Panipat, and Delhi. The next difficulty has probably been occasioned by a corruption of the text. It lies in the words "Ad Calinipaxa oppidum CLXVII. D. Alii CCLXV. mill." The numeral D has generally been taken to mean 500 paces, or half a Roman mile, making the translation run thus: — "To Kalinipaxa 167-1/2 miles. Others give 265 miles." But M. de St. Martin prefers to think that the D has, by some mangling of the text, been detached from the beginuing of the second number, with which it formed the number DLXV., and been appended to the first, being led to this conclusion on finding that the number 565 sums up almost to a nicety the distance from the Hesidrus to Kalinipaxa, as thus: —
From the Hesidrus to the Jomanes / 168 miles.
From the Jomanes to the Ganges / 112 miles.
From the Ganges to Rhodopha / 119 miles
From Rhodopha to Kalinipaxa / 167 miles
Total / 566 miles.
Pliny's carelessness in confounding total with partial distances has created the next difficulty, which lies in his stating that the distance from Kalinipaxa to the confluence of the Jomanes and the Ganges is 625 miles, while in reality it is only about 227. The figures may be corrupt, but it is much more probable that they represent the distance of some stage on the route remoter from the confluence of the rivers than Kalinipaxa. This must have been the passage of the Jomanes, for the distance —
From the Jomanes to the Ganges is / 112 miles.
Thence to Rhodopha / 119 miles
Thence to Kalinipaxa / 167 miles
Thence to the confluence of the rivers / 227 miles
Total / 625 miles.
This is exactly equal to 5000 stadia, the length of the Indian Mesopotamia or Doab, the Panchala of Sanskrit geography, and the Antarveda of lexicographers.
The foregoing conclusions M. de St. Martin had summed up in the table annexed:—
-- / Roman miles / Stadia.
From the Hesidrus to the Jomanes / 168 / 1344
From the Jomanes to the Ganges / 112 / 896
Thence to Rhodopha / 119 / 952
From the Hesidrus to Rhodopha by a more direct route / 325 / 2600
From Rhodopha to Kalinipaxa / 167 / 1336
Total distance from the Hesidrus to Kalinipaxa / 565 / 4520
From Kalinipaxa to the confluence of the Jomanes and Ganges / (227) / (1816)
Total distance from the passage of the Jomanes in its confluence with the Ganges / 625 / 5000
Pliny assigns 425 miles as the distance from the confluence of the rivers to Palibothra, but, as it is in reality only 248, the figures have probably been altered. He gives, lastly, 638 miles as the distance from Palibothra to the mouth of the Ganges, which agrees closely with the estimate of Megasthenes, who makes it 5000 stadia— if that indeed was his estimate, and not 6000 stadia as Strabo in one passage alleges it was. The distance by land from Patna to Tamluk (Tamralipta, the old port of the Ganges' mouth) is 445 English or 480 Roman miles. The distance by the river, which is sinuous, is of course much greater. See E'tude sur le Geographie Grecque et Latine de l'Inde, par P. V. de Saint-Martin, pp. 271-278.]
The races which we may enumerate without being tedious, from the chain of Emodus, of which a spur is called Imaus (meaning in the native language snowy),*...
[
*By Emodus was generally designated that part of the Himalayan range which extended along Nepal and Bhutan and onward toward the ocean. Other forms of the name are Emoda, Emodon, Hemodes. Lassen derives the word from the Sauskrit haimavata, in Prakrit haimota, 'snowy.' If this be so, Hemodus is the more correct form. Another derivation refers the word to 'Hemadri' (hema, 'gold,' and adri, 'mountain'), the 'golden mountains,' — so called either because they wore thought to contain gold mines, or because of the aspect they presented when their snowy peaks reflected the golden effulgence of sunset. Imaus represents the Sanskrit himawata, 'snowy.' The name was applied at first by the Greeks to the Hindu Kush and the Himalayas, but was in course of time transferred to the Bolor range. This chain, which runs north and south, was regarded by the ancients as dividing Northern Asia into 'Skythia intra Imaum' and 'Skythia extra Imaum,' and it has formed for ages the boundary between China and Turkestan.]
... are the Isari, Cosyri, Izgi, and on the hills the Chisiotosagi,*...
[
*These four tribes were located somewhere in Kasmir or its immediate neighbourhood. The Isari are unknown, but are probably the same as the Brysari previously mentioned by Pliny. The Cosyri are easily to be identified with the Khasira mentioned in the Mahabharata as neighbours of the Daradas and Kasmiras. Their name, it has been conjectured, survives in Khschar, one of the three great divisions of the Kathis of Gujarat, who appear to have come originally from the Panjab. The Izgi are mentioned in Ptolemy, under the name of the Sizyges, as a people of Serike. This is, however, a mistake, as they inhabited the alpine region which extends above Kasmir towards the north and north-west. The Chisiotosagi or Chirotosagi are perhaps identical with the Chiconae (whom Pliny elsewhere mentions), in spite of the addition to their name of 'sagi,' which may have merely indicated them to be a branch of the Sakas, — that is, the Skythians,— by whom India was overrun before the time of its conquest by the Aryans. They are mentioned in Manu X. 44 together with the Paundrakas, Odras, Dravidas, Kambojas, Yavanas, Paradas, Pahlavas, Chinas, Kiratas, Daradas, and Khasas. If Chirotosagi be the right reading of their name, there can be little doubt of their identity with the Kiratos.— See P. V. de St. Martin's work already quoted, pp. 195-107. But for the Khachars, see Ind. Ant. vol. IV. p. 323.]
... and the Brachmanae, a name comprising many tribes, among which are the Maccocalingae.*
[
*v. 1. Bracmanae. Pliny at once transports his readers from the mountains of Kasmir to the lower part of the valley of the Ganges. Here he places the Brachmanae, whom he takes to be, not what they actually were, the leading caste of the population, but a powerful race composed of many tribes — the Maccocalingae being of the number. This tribe, as well as the Gangaridae-Kalingae, and the Madogalingae afterwards mentioned, are subdivisions of the Kalingae, a widely diffused race, which spread at one time from the delta of the Ganges all along the eastern coast of the peninsula, though afterwards they did not extend southward beyond Orissa. In the Mahabharata they are mentioned as occupying, along with the Vangas (from whom Bengal is named) and three other leading tribes, the region which lies between Magadha and the sea. The Maccocalingaea, then, are the Magha of the Kalingae. "Magha," says M. de St. Martin, "is the name of one of the non-Aryan tribes of greatest importance and widest diffusion in the lower Gangetic region, where it is broken up into several special groups extending from Arakan and Western Asam, where it is found under the name of Mogh (Anglice Mugs), as far as to the Maghars of the central valleys of Nepal, to the Maghayas, Magahis, or Maghyas of Southern Bahar (the ancient Magadha), to the ancient Magra of Bengal, and to the Magora of Orissa. These lost, by their position, may properly be taken to represent our Maccocalingae." "The Modogalingae," continues the same author, " find equally their representatives in the ancient Mada, a colony which the Book of Manu mentions in his enumeration of the impure tribes of Aryavarta, and which he names by the side of the Andhra, another people of the lower Ganges. The Monghyr inscription, which belongs to the earlier part of the 8th century of our era, also names the Meda as a low tribe of this region (As. Res. vol. I. p. 126, Calcutta, 1788), and, what is remarkable, their name is found joined to that of the Andhra (Andharaka), precisely as in the text of Manu. Pliny assigns for their habitation a large island of the Ganges; and the word Galinga (for Kalinga), to which their name is attached, necessarily places this island towards the sea-board — perhaps in the Delta." The Gangaridae' or Gungarides occupied the region corresponding roughly with that now called Lower Bengal, and consisted of various indigenous tribes, which in the course of time became more or less Aryanized. As no word is found in Sanskrit to which their name corresponds, it has been supposed of Greek invention (Lassen, Ind. Alt. vol. II. p. 201), but erroneously, for it must have been current at the period of the Makedonian invasion: since Alexander, in reply to inquiries regarding the south country, was informed that the region of the Ganges was inhabited by two principal nations, the Prasii and the Gangaridae. M. de St. Martin thinks that their name has been preserved almost identically in that of the Gonghris of South Bahar, whose traditions refer their origin to Tirhut; and he would identify their royal city Parthalis (or Portalis) with Vardhana (contraction of Varddhamana), now Bardwan. Others, however, place it, as has been elsewhere stated, on the Mahanadi. In Ptolemy their capital is Gange, which must have been situated near where Calcutta now stands. The Gangarides are mentioned by Virgil, Georg. III. 27:— "In foribus pugnam ex auro solidoque elephanto; Gangaridum facium, victorisque arma Quirini." (High o'er the gate in elephant and gold; The crowd shall Caesar's Indian war behold." (Dryden's translation.)]
The river Prinas* ...
[
*v. 1. Pumas. The Prinas is probably the Tamasa or Tonsa, which in the Puranas is called the Parnasa. The Cainas, notwithstanding the objections of Schwanbeck, must be identified with the Cane, which is a tributary of the Jamna.]
... and the Cainass (which flows into the Ganges) are both navigable.*
[
*For the identification of these and other affluents of the Ganges see Notes on Arrian, c. iv., Ind. Ant. vol. V. p. 331.]
The tribes called Calingae are nearest the sea, and higher up are the Mandei, and the Malli in whose country is Mount Mallus, the boundary of all that district being the Ganges.
(22.) This river, according to some, rises from uncertain sources, like the Nile,*...
[
*For an account of the different theories regarding the source of the Ganges see Smith's Dict. of Class. Geog.]
... and inundates similarly the countries lying along its course; others say that it rises on the Skythian mountains, and has nineteen tributaries, of which, besides those already mentioned, the Condochates, Erannoboas,*...
[
*Condochatem, Erannoboam. — v.l. Canucham (Vamam), Erranoboan.]
Cosoagus, and Sonus are navigable. Others again assert that it issues forth at once with loud roar from its fountain, and after tumbling down a steep and rocky channel is received immediately on reaching the level plains into a lake, whence it flows out with a gentle current, being at the narrowest eight miles, and on the average a hundred stadia, in breadth, and never of less depth than twenty paces (one hundred feet) in the final part of its course, which is through the country of the Gangarides. The royal* ...
[
*regia. — v. 1. regio. The common reading, however— "Gangaridum Calingarum. Regia," &c., makes the Gangarides a branch of the Kalingae. This is probably the correct reading, for, as General Cunningham states (Anc. Geog. of Ind. pp. 518-519), certain inscriptions speak of 'Tri-Ka- linga,' or 'the Three Kalingas.' "The name of Tri-Ka- linga," he adds, "is probably old, as Pliny mentions the Macco-Calingae and the Gangarides-Calingae as separate peoples from the Calingae, while the Mahabharata names the Kalingas three separate times, and each time in conjunction with different peoples." (H. H. Wilson in Vishnu Purana, 1st ed. pp.185, 187 note, and 188.) Ah Tri-Kalinga thus corresponds with the great province of Telingana, it seems probable that the name of Telingana may be only a slightly contracted form of Tri-Kalingana, or ' the Three Kalingas.' ]
... city of the Calingae is called Parthalis. Over their king 60,000 foot-soldiers, 1000* ...
[
*LX. mill.—v. 1. LXX. mill.]
... horsemen, 700 elephants keep watch and ward in "precinct of war."
For among the more civilized Indian communities life is spent in a great variety of separate occupations. Some till the soil, some are soldiers, some traders; the noblest and richest take part in the direction of state affairs, administer justice, and sit in council with the kings. A fifth class devotes itself to the philosophy prevalent in the country, which almost assumes the form of a religion, and the members always put an end to their life by a voluntary death on a burning funeral pile.*
[
*Lucian, in his satirical piece on the death of Peregrinos (cap. 25), refers to this practice: — "But what is the motive which prompts this man (Peregrinos) to fling himself into the flames? God knows it is simply that he may show off how he can endure pain as do the Brachmans, to whom it pleased Theagenes to liken him, just as if India had not her own crop of fools and vain-glorious persons. But let him by all means imitate the Brachmans, for, as Onesikritos informs ns, who was the pilot of Alexander's fleet and saw Kalanos burned, they do not immolate themselves by leaping into the flames, but when the pyre is made they stand close beside it perfectly motionless, and suffer themselves to be gently broiled; then decorously ascending the pile they are burned to death, and never swerve, even ever so little, from their recumbent position."]
In addition to these classes there is one half-wild, which is constantly engaged in a task of immense labour, beyond the power of words to describe — that of hunting and taming elephants. They employ these animals in ploughing and for riding on, and regard them as forming the main part of their stock in cattle. They employ them in war and in fighting for their country. In choosing them for war, regard is had to their age, strength, and size.
There is a very large island in the Ganges which is inhabited by a single tribe called Modogalingae.*
[
*vv. II. modo Galingam, Modogalicam.]
Beyond are situated the Modubae, Molindae, the Uberae with a handsome town of the same name, the Galmodroesi, Preti, Calissae,*...
[
*Calissae. — v. 1. Aclissae.]
... Sasuri, Passalae, Colubae, Orxulae, Abali, Taluctae.*
[
*These tribes were chiefIy located in the regions between the left bank of the Ganges and the Himalayas. Of the Galmodroesi, Preti, Calissae, Sasuri, and Orxulae nothing is known, nor can their names be identified with any to be found in Sanskrit literature. The Modubae represent beyond doubt the Moutiba, a people mentioned in the Aitareya Brahmana along with other non-Aryan tribes which occupied the country north of the Ganges at the time when the Brahmans established their first settlements in the country. The Molindae are mentioned as the Malada in the Puranic lists, but no further trace of them is met with. The Uberae must be referred to the Bhars, a numerous race spread over the central districts of the region spoken of, and extending as far as to Assam. The name is pronounced differently in different districts, and variously written, as Bors or Bhors, Bhowris, Barriias and Bharhiyas, Bareyas, Baoris, Bharais, &. The race, though formerly powerful, is now one of the lowest classes of the population. The Passalae are identified as the inhabitants of Panchala, which, as already stated, was the old name of the Doab. The Colubae respond to the Kauluta or Koluta— mentioned in the 4th book of the Ramayana, in the enumeration of the races of the west, also in the Varaha Sanhita in the list of the people of the north-west, and in the Indian drama called the Mudra Rakshasa, of which the hero is the well-known Chandragupta. They were settled not far from the Upper Jamna. About the middle of the 7th century they were visited by the famous Chinese traveller Hiwen-Thsang, who writes their name as Kiu- lu-to. Yule, however, places the Passalae in the south-west of Tirhut, and the Kolubae on the Kondochates (Gandaki) in the north-east of Gorakhpur and north-west of Saran. The Abali answer perhaps to the Gvallas or Halvais of South Bahar and of the hills which covered the southern parts of the ancient Magadha. The Taluctae are the people of the kingdom of Tamralipta mentioned in the Mahabharata. In the writings of the Buddhists of Ceylon the name appears as Tamalitti, corresponding to the Tamluk of the present day. Between these two forms of the name that given by Pliny is evidently the connecting link. Tamluk lies to the south-west of Calcutta, from which it is distant in a direct line about 35 miles. It was in old times the main emporium of the trade carried on between Gangetic India and Ceylon.]
The king of these keeps under arms 50,000 foot-soldiers, 4000* ...
[
*IV. M— v. 1. III. M.]
... cavalry, and 400 elephants. Next come the Andarae,* ...
[
*The Andarae are readily identified with the Andhra of Sanskrit — a great and powerful nation settled originally in the Dekhan between the middle part of the courses of the Godavari and the Krishna rivers, but which, before the time of Megasthenes, had spread their sway towards the north as far as the upper course of the Narmada (Nerbudda), and, as has been already indicated, the lower districts of the Gangetic basin. Vide Ind. Ant. vol. V. p. 176. For a notice of Andhra (the modern Telingana) see General Cunningham's Anc. Geog. of Ind. pp. 527-530. ... a still more powerful race, which possesses numerous villages, and thirty towns defended by walls and towers, and which supplies its king with an army of 100,000 infantry, 2000 cavalry, and 1000 elephants. Gold is very abundant among the Dardae, and silver among the Setae.*
[
*Pliny here reverts to where he started from in his enumeration of the tribes. The Setae are the Sata or Sataka of Sanskrit geography, which locates them in the neighbourhood of the Daradas, (According to Yule, however, they are the Sanskrit Sekas, and he places them on the Banas about Jhajpur, south-east from Ajmir. -- Ed. Ind. Ant.)]
But the Prasii surpass in power and glory every other people, not only in this quarter, but one may say in all India, their capital being Palibothra, a very large and wealthy city, after which some call the people itself the Palibothri, — nay, even the whole tract along the Ganges. Their king has in his pay a standing army of 600,000 foot-soldiers, 30,000 cavalry, and 9000 elephants: whence may be formed some conjecture as to the vastness of his resources.
After these, but more inland, are the Monedes and Suari,*...
[
*The Monedes or Mandei aro placed by Yule about Gangpur, on the upper waters of the Brahmani, S.W. of Chhutia Nagpur. Lassen places them S. of the Mahenadi about Sonpur, where Yule has the Suari or Sabarae, the Savara of Sanskrit authors, which Lassen places between Sonpur and Singhbhum. See Ind. Ant. vol. VI. note §, p. 127— ED. Ind. Ant.]
... in whose country is Mount Maleus, on which shadows fall towards the north in winter, and towards the south in summer, for six months alternately.*
[
*This, of course, can only occur at the equator, from which the southern extremity of India is about 500 miles distant.]
Baeton asserts that the north pole in these parts is seen but once in the year, and only for fifteen days; while Megasthenes says that the same thing happens in many parts of India. The south pole is called by the Indians Dramasa. The river Jomanes flows through the Palibothri into the Ganges between the towns Methora and Carisobora.*
[
*Palibothri must denote here the subjects of the realm of which Palibothra was the capital, and not merely the inhabitants of that city, as Rennel and others supposed, and so fixed its site at the confluence of the Ganges and Jamuna. Methora is easily identified with Mathura. Carisobora is read otherwise as Chrysobon, Cyrisoborca, Cleisoboras. "This city," says General Cunningham, "has not yet been identified, but I feel satisfied that it must be Vrindavana, 16 miles to the north of Mathura. Vrindavana means 'the grove of the basil-trees,' which is famed all over India as the scene of Krishna's sports with the milkmaids. But the earlier name of the place was Kalikavartta, or 'Kalika's whirlpool.' . . . Now the Latin name of Clisobora is also written Carisobora and Cyrisoborka in different MSS., from which I infer that the original spelling was Kalisoborka, or, by a slight change of two letters, Kalikoborta or Kalikabarta." Anc. Geog. of Ind. p 375. (Carisobora -- vv. II. Chrysoban, Cyrisoborca. This is the Kleisobora of Arrian (ante, vol. V. p. 89), which Yule places at Batesar, and Lassen at Agra, which ho makes the Sanskrit Krishnapura. Wilkins (As. Res. vol. V. p. 270) says Clisobora is now called "Mugu-Nagar by the Musulmans, and Kalisapura by the Hindus." Vide Ind. Ant. vol. VI. p. 249, note.— Ed. Ind. Ant.]]
In the parts which lie southward from the Ganges the inhabitants, already swarthy, are deeply coloured by the sun, though not scorched black like the Ethiopians. The nearer they approach the Indus the more plainly does their complexion betray the influence of the sun.
The Indus skirts the frontiers of the Prasii, whose mountain tracts are said to be inhabited by the Pygmies.*
[
*Vide Ind. Ant. vol. VI. p. 133, note — Ed. Ind. Ant.]
Artemidorus* ...
[
*A Greek geographer of Ephesus, whose date is about 100 B.C. His valuable work on geography, called a Periplus, was much quoted by the ancient writers, but with the exception of some fragments is now lost.]
... sets down the distance between the two rivers at 121 miles.
(23.) The Indus, called by the inhabitants Sindus, rising on that spur of Mount Caucasus which is called Paropamisus, from sources fronting the sunrise,*...
[
*The real sources of the Indus were unknown to the Greeks. The principal stream rises to the north of the Kailasa mountain (which figures in Hindu mythology as the mansion of the gods and (Siva's paradise) in lat. 32°, long. 81° 30', at an elevation of about 20,000 feet.]
... receives also itself nineteen rivers, of which the most famous are the Hydaspes, which has four tributaries; the Cantabra,*...
[
*The Chandrabhaga or Akesines, now the Chenab.]
... which has three; the Acesines and the Hypasis which are both navigable; but nevertheless, having no very grat supply of water, it is nowhere broader than fifty stadia, or deeper than fifteen paces,*...
[
*For remarks on the tributaries of the Indus see Notes on Arrian, chap, iv.,— Ind. Ant. vol. V. p. 331-333.]
It forms an extremely large island, which is called Prasiane, and a smaller one called Patale.*
[
*See Ind. Ant vol. V. p. 330. Yule identities the former of these with the area enclosed by the Nara from above Rohri to Haidarabad, and the delta of the Indus.— Ed. Ind. Ant.]
Its stream, which is navigable, by the lowest estimates, for 1240 miles, turns westward as if following more or less closely the course of the sun, and then falls into the ocean. The measure of the coast line from the mouth of the Ganges to this river I shall set down as it is generally given, though none of the computations agree with each other. From the mouth of the Ganges to Cape Calingon and the town of Daudagula* ...
[
*v. 1. Dandaguda. Cape Kalingon is identified by Yule as Point Godavari.— Ed. Ind. Ant.]
... 625 miles;*...
[
*"Both the distance and the name point, to the great port town of Coringa, as the promontory of Coringon, which is situated on a projecting point of land at the mouth of the Godavari river. The town of Dandaguda or Dandagula I take to be the Dantapura of the Buddhist Chronicles, which as the capital of Kalinga may with much probability be identified with Raja Mahendri, which is only 30 miles to the north-east of Coringa. From the great similarity of the Greek I' and II, I think it not improbable that the Greek name may have been Dandapula, which is almost this same as Dantapura. But in this case the Danta or 'tooth-relic' of Buddha must have been enshrined in Kalinga as early as the time of Pliny, which is confirmed by this statement of the Buddhist chronicles that the 'left canine tooth' of Buddha was brought to Kalinga immediately after his death, where it was enshrined by the reigning sovereign, Brahmadatta." — Cunningham, Geog. p. 518.]
... to Tropina 1225;* ...
[
*(Tropina answers to Tripontari or Tirupanatara, opposite Kochin. — Ed. Ind. Ant.) The distance given is measured from the mouth of the Ganges, and not from Cape Calingon.]
... to the cape of Perimula,*...
[
*This cape is a projecting point of the island of Perimula or Perimuda, now called the island of Salsette, near Bombay.]
... where there is the greatest emporium of trade in India, 750 miles; to the town in the island of Patala mentioned above, 620 miles.
The hill-tribes between the Indus and the Iomanes are the Cesi; the Cetriboni, who live in the woods; then the Megallae, whose king is master of five hundred elephants and an army of horse and foot of unknown strength; the Chrysei, the Parasangae, and the Asangae,*...
[
*v. 1. Asmagi. The Asangae, as placed doubtfully by Lassen about Jodhpur. — Ed. Ind. Ant.]
... where tigers abound, noted for their ferocity. The force under arms consists of 30,000 foot, 300 elephants, and 800 horse. These are shut in by the Indus, and are surrounded by a circle of mountains and deserts over a space of 625 miles.*
[
*DCXXV.—v. 1. DCXXXV. Pliny, having given a general account of the basins of the Indus and the Ganges, proceeds to enumerate here the tribes which peopled the north of India. The names are obscure, but Lassen has identified one or two of them, and de Saint-Martin a considerable number more. The tribes first mentioned in the list occupied the country extending from the Jamuna to the western coast about the mouth of the Narmada. The Cesi probably answer to the Khosas or Khasyas, a great tribe which from time immemorial has led a wandering life between Gujarat, the lower Indus, and the Jamuna. The name of the Cetriboni would seem to be a transcript of Ketrivani (for Kshatrivaneya). They may therefore have been a branch of the Kshatri (Khstri), one of the impure tribes of the list of Manu (l. x. 12). The Megallae must be identified with the Mavelas of Sanskrit books, a great tribe described as settled to the west of the Jamuna. The Chrysei probably correspond lo the Karoncha of the Puranic lists (Vishnu Pur. pp. 177, 186, note 13, and 351, &c.). The locality occupied by these, and the two tribes mentioned after them must have lain to the north of the Ran, between the lower Indus and the chain of the Aravali mountains.]
Below the deserts are the Dari, the Surae, then deserts again for 187 miles,*...
[
*CLXXXVII.—v. 1. CLXXXVIII. ]
... these deserts encircling the fertile tracts just as the sea encircles islands.*
[
*The Dhars inhabit still the banks of this lower Ghara and the parts contiguous to the valley of the Indus. Hiwen Thsang mentions, however, a land of Dara at the lower end of the gulf of Kachh, in a position which quite accords with that which Pliny assigns to them. The Surae, Sansk. Sura, have their name preserved in "Saur," which designates a tribe settled along the Lower Indus— the modern representatives of the Saurabhira of the Harivamsa. They are placed with doubt by Lassen on the Loni about Sindri, but Yule places the Bolingae— Sanskrit, Bhaulingas — there.— Ed. Ind. Ant.]
Below these deserts we find the Maltceorae, Singhae, Marohae, Rarungae, Moruni.*
[
*Moruni, &.c. -- v. 1. Moruntes, Masuae Pagungae, Lalii.]
These inhabit the hills which in an unbroken chain run parallel to the shores of the ocean. They are free and have no kings, and occupy the mountain heights, whereon they have built many cities.*
[
*These tribes must have been located in Kachh, a mountainous tongue of land between the gulf of that name, and the Ran, where, and where only, in this region of India, a range of mountains is to be found running along the coast. The name of the Maltecorae has attracted particular attention because of its resemblance to the name of the Martikhora (i.e. man-eater), a fabulous animal mentioned by Ktesias (Cetesiae Indica, VII.) as found in India and subsisting upon human flesh. The Maltecorae were consequently supposed to have been a race of cannibals. The identification is, however, rejected by M. de St. Martin. The Singhae are represented at the present day by the Sanghis of Omarkot (called the Song by Mac- Murdo), descendants of an ancient Rajput tribe called the Singhars. The Marohae are probably the Maruhas of the list of the Varaha Sanhita, which was later than Pliny's time by four and a half centuries. In the interval they were displaced, but the displacement of tribes was nothing unusual in those days. So the Rarungae may perhaps be the ancestors of the Ronghi or Rhanga now found on the banks of the Satlej and in the neighbourhood of Dihli.]
Next follow the Nareae, enclosed by the loftiest of Indian mountains, Capitalia.*
[
*Capitalia is beyond doubt the sacred Arbuda, or Mount Abu, which, attaining an elevation of 6500 feet, rises far above any other summit of the Aravali range. The name of the Nareae recalls that of the Nair, which the Rajput chroniclers apply to the northern belt of the desert (Tod, Rajasthan, II. 211); so St. Martin; but according to General Cunningham they must be the people of Sarui, or 'the country of reeds, as nar and sar are synonymous terms for 'a reed' and the country of Sarui is still famous for its reed-arrows. The same author uses the statement that extensive gold and silver mines were worked on the other side of Mount Capitalia in support of his theory that this part of India was the Ophir of Scripture, front which the Tyrian navy in the days of Solomon carried away gold, a great plenty of almug-trees (red sandalwood), and precious stones (1 Kings xii.). His argument runs thus: — "The last name in Pliny's list is Varetatae, which I would change to Vataretae by the transposition of two letters. This spelling is countenanced by the termination of the various reading of Svarataratae, which is found in some editions. It is quite possible, however, that the Svarataratae maybhe intended for the Surashtras. The famous Varaha Mihira mentions the Surashtras and Badaras together, amongst the people of the south-west of India (Dr. Kern's Brihat Sanhita, XIV. 19.) These Badaras must therefore be the people of Badari, or Vadari. I understand the name of Vadari to denote a district abounding in the Badari, or Ber-tree (Jujube), which is very common in Southern Rajputana. For the same reason I should look to this neighbourhood for the ancient Sauvira, which I take to be the true form of the famous Sophir, or Ophir, as Sauvira is only another name of the Vadari or Ber-tree, as well as of its juicy fruit. Now, Sofir is the Coptic name of India at the present day; but the name must have belonged originally to that part of the Indian coast which was frequented by the merchants of the West. There can be little doubt, I think, that this was in the Gulf of Khambay, which from time immemorial has been the chief seat of Indian trade with the West. During the whole period of Greek history this trade was almost monopolized by the famous city of Barygaza, or Bharoch, at the mouth of the Narmada river. About the fourth century some portion of it was diverted to the new capital of Balabhi, in the peninsula of Gujarat; in the Middle Ages it was shared with Khambay at the head of the gulf, and in modern times with Surat, at the mouth of the Tapti. If the name of Sauvira was derived, as I suppose, from the prevalence of the Ber-tree, it is probable that it was only another appellation for the province of Badari, or Edar, at the head of the Gulf of Khambay. This, indeed, is the very position in which we should expect to find it, according to the ancient inscription of Rudra Dama, which mentions Sindhu-Sauvira immediately after Surashtra and Bharukachha, and just before Kukura Aparanta, and Nishada (Jour. Bo. Br. R. As. Soc. VII. 120). According to this arrangement Sauvira must have been to the north of Surashtra and Bharoch, and to the south of Nishada, or just where I have placed it, in the neighbourhood of Mount Abu. Much the same locality is assigned to Sauvira in the Vishnu Purana." —Anc. Geog. of Ind. pp. 496-497; see also pp. 560-562 of the same work, where the subject is further discussed.]
The inhabitants on the other side of this mountain work extensive mines of gold and silver. Next are the Oraturae, whose king has only ten elephants, though he has a very strong force of infantry.*
[*
v. 1. Oratae. The Oraturai find their representatives in the Rathors, who played a great part in the history of India before the Musulman conquest, and who, though settled in the Gangetic provinces, regard Ajmir, at the eastern point of the Aravali, as their ancestral seat.
Ajmir, Aravalli Range]
Next again are the Varetatae,*...
[
*v. 1. Suarataratae. The Varetatae cannot with certainty be identified.]
... subject to a king, who keep no elephants, but trust entirely to their horse and foot. Then the Odomboerae; the Salabastrae;* ...
[
*The Odomboerae, with hardly a change in the form of their name, are mentioned in Sanskrit literature, for Panini (IV. 1, 173, quoted by Lassen, Ind. Alt. 1st ed. I. p. 614) speaks of the territory of Udumbari as that which was occupied by a tribe famous in the old legend, the Salva, who perhaps correspond to the Salabastrae of Pliny, the addition which he has made to their name being explained by the Sanskrit word vastya, which means an abode or habitation. The word udumbara means the glomerous fig-tree. The district so named lay in Kachh. (The Salabastrae are located by Lassen between the mouth of the Sarasvati and Jodhpnr, and the Horatae at the head of the gulf of Khambhat; Automela he places at Khambhat. See Ind. Alterth. 2nd ed. 1. 760. Yule has the Sandrabatis about Chandravati, in northern Gujarat, but these are placed by Lassen on the Banas about Tonk. — Ed. Ind. Ant.)]
... the Horatae,*...
[
*Horatae is an incorrect transcription of Sorath, the vulgar form of the Sanskrit Saurashtra. The Horatae were therefore the inhabitants of the region called in the Periplus, and in Ptolemy, Surastrene — that is, Gujarat. Orrhoth ([x]) is used by Kosmas as the name of a city in the west of India, which has been conjectured to be Surat, but Yule thinks it rather some place on the Purbandar coast. The capital, Automela, cannot be identified, but de St. Martin conjectures it may have been the once famous Valabhi, which was situated in the peninsular part of Gujarat at about 24 miles distance from the Gulf of Khambay.]
... who have a fine city, defended by marshes which serve as a ditch, wherein crocodiles are kept which, having a great avidity for human flesh, prevent all access to the city except by a bridge. And another city of theirs is much admired— Automela,*...
[
*v. 1. Automula. See preceding note.]
... which, being seated on the coast, at the confluence of five rivers, is a noble emporium of trade. The king is master of 1600 elephants, 150,000 foot, and 5000 cavalry. The poorer king of the Charmae has but sixty elephants, and his force otherwise is insignificant. Next come the Pandae, the only race in India ruled by women.*
[
*The Charmae have been identified with the inhabitants of Charmamandala, a district of the west mentioned in the Mahabharata, and also in the Vishnu Purana, under the form Charmakhanda. They are now represented by the Charmars or Chamars of Bundelkhand and the parts adjacent to the basin of the Ganges. The Pandae, who were their next neighbours, must have occupied a considerable portion of the basin of the river Chambal, called in Sanskrit geography the Charmanvati. They were a branch of the famous race of Pandu, which made for itself kingdoms in several different parts of India.]
They say that Hercules having but one daughter, who was on that account all the more beloved, endowed her with a noble kingdom. Her descendants rule over 300 cities, and command an army of 150,000 foot and 500 elephants. Next, with 300 cities, the Syrieni, Derangae, Posingae, Buzae, Gogiarei, Umbrae, Nereae, Brancosi, Nobudhae, Cocondae, Nesei, Pedatrirae, Solobriasae, Olostrae,*...
[
*The names in this list lead us to the desert lying between the Indus and the Aravali range. Most of the tribes enumerated are mentioned in the lists of the clans given in the Rajput chronicles, and have been identified by M. de St. Martin as follows:— The Syrieni are the Suriyanis, who under that name have at all times occupied the country near the Indus in the neighbourhood of Bakkar. Darangae is the Latin transcription of the name of the great race of the Jhadejas, a branch of the Rajputs which at the present day possesses Kachh. The Buzae represent the Buddas, an ancient branch of the same Jhadejas (Tod, Annals and Antiq, of the Raj. vol. I. p. 86). The Gogiarei (other readings Gogarasi, Gogarae) are the Kokaris, who are now settled on the banks of the Ghara or Lower Satlej. The Umbrae are represented by the Umranis, and the Nerei perhaps by the Nharonis, who, though belonging to Baluchistan, had their ancestral seats in the regions to the east of the Indus. The Nubeteh, who figure in the old local traditions of Sindh, perhaps correspond to the Nobundae, while the Cocondae certainly are the Kokonadas mentioned in the Mahabharata among the people of the north-west. (See Lassen, Zeitschrift fur die Kunde des Morgenl. t. II. 1839, p. 45.) Buchanan mentions a tribe called Kakand as belonging to Gorakhpur.]
... who adjoin the island Patale, from the furthest shore of which to the Caspian gates the distance is said to be 1925 miles.*
[
*There were two defiles, which went by the name of 'the Kaspian Gates.' One was in Albania, and was formed by the jutting out of a spur of the Kaukasos into the Kaspian Sea. The other, to which Pliny here refers, was a narrow pass leading from North-Western Asia into the north-east provinces of Persia. According to Arrian (Anab. III. 20) the Kaspian Gates lay a few days' journey distant from the Median town of Rhagai, now represented by the ruins called Rha, found a mile or two to the south of Teheran. This pass was one of the most important places in ancient geography, and from it many of the meridians were measured. Strabo, who frequently mentions it, states that its distance from the extreme promontories of India (Cape Comorin, &c.) was 14,000 stadia.]
Then next to these towards the Indus come, in an order which is easy to follow, the Amatae, Bolingae, Gallitalutae, Dimuri, Megari, Ordabae,* ...
[
*v. 1. Ardabae.]
... Mesae; after these the Uri and Sileni.*
[
*In the grammatical apophthegms of Panini, Bhaulingi is mentioned as a territory occupied by a branch of the great tribe of the Salvas (Lassen, Ind. Alt. I. p. 613, note, or 2nd ed. p. 760 n.), and from this indication M. de St. Martin has been led to place the Bolingae at the western declivity of the Aravali mountains, where Ptolemy also places his Bolingae. The Madrabhujingha of the Panjab (see Vishnu Pur. p. 187) were probably a branch of this tribe. The Gallitalutae are identified by the same author with the Gahalata or Geblots; the Dimuri with the Dumras, who, though belonging to the Gangetic valley, originally came from that of the Indus; the Megari with the Mokars of the Rajput chronicles, whose name is perhaps preserved in that of the Mehars of the lower part of Sindh, and also in that of the Megharis of Eastern Baluchistan; the Mesae with the Mazaris, a considerable tribe between Shikarpur and Mitankot on the western bank of the Indus; and the Uri with the Hauras of the same locality — the Hurairas who figure in the Rajput lists of thirty-six royal tribes. The Sulalas of the same tribes perhaps represent the Sileni, whom Pliny mentions along with the Uri.]
Immediately beyond come deserts extending for 250 miles. These being passed, we come to the Organagae, Abaortae, Sibarae, Suertae, and after these to deserts as extensive as the former. Then come the Sarophages, Sorgae, Baraomatae, and the Umbrittae,*...
[
*vv. II. Paragomatae, Umbitrae. — Baraomatae Gumbritaeque.]
... who consist of twelve tribes, each possessing two cities, and the Aseni, who possess three cities.*
[
*The tribes here enumerated must have occupied a tract of country lying above the confluence of the Indus with the stream of the combined rivers of the Panjab. They are obscure, and their names cannot with any certainty be identified if we except that of the Sibarae, who are undoubtedly the Sauviras of the Mahabharata, and who, as their name is almost invariably combined with that of the Indus, must have dwelt not far from its banks. The Afghan tribe of the Afridis may perhaps represent the Abaortae, and the Sarabhan or Sarvanis, of the same stock, the Sarophages. The Umbrittae and the Aseni take us to the east of the river. The former are perhaps identical with the Ambastae of the historians of Alexander, and the Ambasthas of Sanskrit writings, who dwelt in the neighbourhood of the lower Akesines.]
Their capital is Bucephala, built where Alexander's famous horse of that name was buried.*
[
*Alexander, after the great battle on the banks of the Hydaspes in which he defeated Poros, founded two cities — Bukephala, or Bukephalia, so named in honour of his celebrated charger, and Nikaia, so named in honour of his victory. Nikaia, it is known for certain, was built on the field of battle, and its position was therefore on the leftside of the Hydaspes — probably about where Mong now stands. The site of Bukephala it is not so easy to determine. According to Plutarch and Pliny it was near the Hydaspes, in the place where Bukephalos was buried, and if that be so it must have been on the same side of the river as the sister city; whereas Strabo and all the other ancient authorities place it on the opposite side. Strabo again places it at the point where Alexander crossed the river, whereas Arrian states that it was built on the site of his camp. General Cunningham fixes this at Jalalpur rather than at Jhelam, 30 miles higher up the river, the site which is favoured by Burnes and General Court and General Abbott. Jalalpur is about ten miles distant from Dilawar, where, according to Cunningham, the crossing of the river was most probably effected.]
Hillmen follow next, inhabiting the base of Caucasus, the Soleadae, and the Sondrae; and if we cross to the other side of the Indus and follow its course downward we meet the Samarabriae, Sambruceni, Bisambritae,*...
[
*v. 1. Bisabritae. ]
... Osii, Antixeni, and the Taxillae* ...
[
*The Soleadae and the Sondrae cannot be identified, and of the tribes which were seated to the east of the Indus only the Taxillae are known. Their capital was the famous Taxila, which was visited by Alexander the Great. "The position of this city," says Cunningham, "has hitherto remained unknown, partly owing to the erroneous distance recorded by Pliny, and partly to the want of information regarding the vast ruins which still exist in the vicinity of Shah-dheri. All the copies of Pliny agree in stating that Taxila was only 60 Roman, or 55 English, miles from Peucolaitis or Hashinagar, which would fix its site somewhere on the Haro river to the west of Hasan Abdal, or just two days' march from the Indus. But the itineraries of the Chinese pilgrims agree in placing it at three days' journey to the east of the Indus, or in the immediate neighbourhood of Kala-ka-Sarai. He therefore fixes its site near Shah-dheri (which is a mile to the north-east of that Sarai), in the extensive ruins of a fortified city abounding with stupas, monasteries, and temples. From this place to Hashtnagar the distance is 74 miles English, or 19 in excess of Pliny's estimate. Taxila represents the Sanskrit Takshasila, of which the Pali form is Takhasila, whence the Greek form was taken. The word means either 'cut rock; or 'severed head.' — Anc. Geog. of Ind. pp. 104-121.]
... with a famous city. Then succeeds a level tract of country known by the general name of Amanda,*...
[
*As the name Amanda is entirely unknown, M. de St. Martin proposes without hesitation the correction Gandhara, on the ground that the territory assigned to the Amanda corresponds exactly to Gandhara, of which the territory occupied by the Peucolitae (Poukelaotis), as we know from other writers, formed a part. The Geretae are beyond doubt no others than the Gouraei of Arrian; and the Asoi may perhaps be identical with the Aspasii, or, as Strabo gives the name, Hippasii or Pasii. The Arsagalitae are only mentioned by Pliny. Two tribes settled in the same locality are perhaps indicated by the name — the Arsa, mentioned by Ptolemy, answering to the Sanskrit Urasa; and the Ghilit or Ghilghit, the Gahalata of Sanskrit, formerly mentioned.]
... whereof the tribes are four in number— the Peucolaitae,*...
[
*v. 1. Peucolitae.]
... Arsagalitae, Gerrretae, Asoi.
Many writers, however, do not give the river Indus as the western boundary of India, but include within it four satrapies, — the Gedrosi, Arachotae, Arii, Paropamisadae,*...
[
*Gedrosia comprehended probably nearly the same district which is now known by the name of Mekran. Alexander marched through it on returning from his Indian expedition. Arachosia extended from the chain of mountains now called the Suleiman as far southward as Gedrosia. Its capital, Arachotos, was situated somewhere in the direction of Kandahar, the name of which, it has been thought, preserves that of Gandhara. According to Colonel Rawlinson the name of Arachosia is derived from Harakhwati (Sanskrit Sarasvati), and is preserved in the Arabic Rakhaj. It is, as has already been noticed, the Haranvatas of the Bisutun inscription. Aria denoted the country lying between Meshed and Herat; Arians, of which it formed a part, and of which it is sometimes used as the equivalent, was a wider district, which comprehended nearly the whole of ancient Persia. In the Persian part of the Bisutun inscription Aria appears as Hariva, in the Babylonian part as Arevan. Regarding Paropamisos and the Cophes see Ind„ Ant. vol. V. pp. 329 and 330.]
... making the river Cophes its furthest limit; though others prefer to consider all these as belonging to the Arii.
Many writers further include in India even the city Nysa and Mount Merus, sacred to Father Bacchus, whence the origin of the fable that he sprang from the thigh of Jupiter. They include also the Astacani,*...
[
*Other readings of the name are Aspagani and Aspagonae. M. de St. Martin, whose work has so often been referred to, says:-- We have seen already that in an extract from old Hekataios preserved in Stephen of Byzantium the city of Kaspapyros is called a Gandaric city, and that in Herodotus the same place is attributed to the Paktyi, and we have added that in our opinion there is only an apparent contradiction, because the district of Paktyike and Gandara may very well be but one and the same country. It is not difficult, in fact, to recognize in the designation mentioned by Herodotos the indigenous name of the Afghan people, Pakhtu (in the plural Pakhtun), the name which the greater part of the tribes use among themselves, and the only one they apply to their national dialect. We have here, then, as Lassen has noticed, historical proof of the presence of the Afghans in their actual fatherland five centuries at least before the Christian era. Now, as the seat of the Afghan or Pakht nationality is chiefly in the basin of the Kophes, to the west of the Indus, which forms its eastern boundary, this further confirms what we have already seen, that it is to the west of the great river we must seek for the site of the city of Kaspapyros or Kasyapapura, and consequently of the Gandarie of Hekataios. The employment of two different names to designate the very same country is easily explained by this double fact, that one of the names was the Indian designation of the land, whilst the other was the indigenous name applied to it by its inhabitants. There was yet another name, of Sanskrit origin, used as a territorial appellation of Gandhara— that of Asvaka. This word, derived from asva, a horse, signified merely the cavalier; it was less an ethnic, in the rigorous acceptation of the word, than a general appellation applied by the Indians of the Punjab to the tribes of the region of the Kophes, renowned from antiquity for the excellence of its horses. In the popular dialects the Sanskrit word took the usual form Assaka, which reappears scarcely modified in Assakani ([x]) or Assakieni ([x]) in the Greek historians of the expedition of Alexander and subsequent writers. It is impossible not to recognise here the name of Avghan or Afghans. . . which is very evidently nothing else than a contracted form of Assakan. . . Neither the Gandarie of Hekataios nor the Paktyi of Horodotos are known to them (Arrian and other Greek and Latin writers of the history of Alexander), but as it is the same territory (as that of the Assakani), and as in actual usage the names Afghans and Pakhtun are still synonymous, their identity is not a matter of doubt." — E'tude sur le Geographie Grecque et Latine de l'Inde, pp. 376-8. The name of the Gandhara, it may here be added, remounts to the highest antiquity; it is mentioned in one of the hymns of the Rig-Veda, as old perhaps as the 15th century B.C. — Id. p. 364.]
... in whose country the vine grows abundantly, and the laurel, and boxwood, and every kind of fruit- tree found in Greece. The remarkable and almost fabulous accounts which are current regarding the fertility of its soil, and the nature of its fruits and trees, its beasts and birds and other animals, will be set down each in its own place in other parts of this work. A little further on I shall speak of the satrapies, but the island of Taprobane* ...
[
*Vide ante, p. 62, n. *.]
... requires my immediate attention.
But before we come to this island there are others, one being Patale, which, as we have indicated, lies at the mouth of the Indus, triangular in shape, and 220* ...
[
*CCXx.-v. 1. CXXX.]
... miles in breadth. Beyond the mouth of the Indus are Chryse and Argyre,*...
[
*Burma and Arakan respectively, according to Yule.— Ed. Ind. Ant. ]
... rich, as I believe, in metals. For I cannot readily believe, what is asserted by some writers, that their soil is impregnated with gold and silver. At a distance of twenty miles from these lies Crocala,*...
[
*In the bay of Karachi, identical with the Kolaka of Ptolemy. The district in which Karachi is situated is called Karkalla to this day.]
... from which, at a distance of twelve miles, is Bibaga, which abounds with oysters and other shell-fish.*
[
*This is callel Bibakta by Arrian, Indika, cap. xxi.]
Next comes Toralliba,*...
[
*v. 1. Coralliba.]
... nine miles distant from the last-named island, beside many others unworthy of note.