Early History of Orissa

SR No.: 006922
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Amarchand Mittal
Publisher: Jain Cultural Research Society
Publication Year: 1957
Total Pages: 506
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 9 MB

Page 49

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AN EARLY HISTORY OF ORISSA
and Kongoda seem to have been dropped in popular use and the name Odra generally employed.'
KALINGA
The name Kalinga has been very often used in the widest sense. The Mahābhāratarecognized the Vaitarni river as the north-eastern boundary of Kalinga. Pliny's references3 to the Gangaridae as a Kalinga people may indicate the extension of ancient Kalinga as far as the Gangā. His Calingae perhaps means Kalinga proper, and MaccoCalingae may have a reference to the Mekala portion of Kalióga. The Purāṇas also refer to the connection of the Kalinga country with Amara kaņța ka hills. According to the Kūrma,Skanda' and Vāyu® Purāņas the Amara kaņța ka hills formed the western boundary of the country. In the Matsya Purāņa’ it is clearly stated that the Narmada drained the Amarakaņțaka which was situated in the western half of Kalinga. The boundaries of the country reached even upto the Gangetic delta in the north in the time of the eastern Ganga king Anantavarman Chodaganga. But the natural geographical limits of a country are not to be confused with the extension of its territorial frontiers due to conquests abroad. To regard Kalinga country as extending from the Gangetic valley upto the Godāvari or even Krishnā, in the
1. In the South Indian Inscription of A. D. 1336 (E. I., XXI, 263), Orissa is referred to as Voddiyåraya. Another grant of Saka era 1523 refers to Orissa by the name of Oddiya (E.I., IV, 270). In the times of Asoka it formed a part of Kalinga. Dr. R. C. Majumdar writes that Utkala and Udra were used as synonymous terms for modern Orissa (JASB, XI, 1945, No. 1, p. 7).
2. Vana parvan, Ch. 113. 3., 114, 4. 3. Nat. Hist. VI, 17-18 ; 20-21. 4. II, 39, 9. 5. V, 3, 21, 7. 6. 77, 3-14. i 7, Ch. 84, 5, 12.