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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA
[VOL. XXVIII Jajnagar about 1360 A.C. when it was under the rule of the Ganga king Bhanu III (circa 1352-78 A.C.). The Sultan is said to have occupied Banarasi (Varanasi-kaṭaka) when the Ganga king fled from the city. In connection with this expedition, the Ta'rikh-i-Firuz Shihi says: "It is reported that inside the Rai's fort (i.e., the Ganga king's fort at Banarasi or Väräṇasi-kaṭaka), there was a stone idol which the infidels called Jagannath and to which they paid their devotions. Sultan Firuz in emulation of Mahmud-i-Sabuktigin, having rooted up the idol, carried it away to Delhi, where he subsequently placed it in an ignominious position." From this account we come to know the fate of the god Purushottama-Jagannatha installed by Anangabhima III at Cuttack and worshipped there for about 130 years from 1230 to 1360 A.C.
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Of the geographical names mentioned in the inscription, the city of Kōlahala in Gangavāḍi is usually identified with modern Kolar in East Mysore. Gangavadi was the name of the kingdom of the Gangas of Mysore. In a wide sense Kalinga was the whole of the coast land between the Vaitarani and the Godavari, while in a narrower sense it indicated roughly the present Puri, Ganjam and Chicacole Districts. In the present record, however, the name Kalinga seems to be applied to the original Ganga kingdom round the capital city of Kalinganagara (modern Mukhalingam) in the Chicacole District, as the Puri region in the dominions of the Sōmavamsis seems to be referred to as lying within the Utkala country. There is difference of opinion as regards the location of the country called Trikalinga of which some kings are said to have been the overlords. Some writers are inclined to take it to mean the three parts (northern, central and southern) of the Kalinga country, while others prefer to take it as indicating three contiguous territories in the Kalinga region such as Kalinga, Utkala and South Kōsala. A third group of writers suggests that Trikalinga was the name of the tract of rather jungly land lying between Kalinga and South Kosala. The location of Utkala and Mandara has already been discussed. Originally Utkala was the coast country lying between the river Kapisä (modern Kansai) running through the Midnapur District and the Kalinga country in the Puri-Ganjam region. But the present inscription, as already indicated above, appears to locate the Puri temple in Utkala, probably intended to signify the dominions of the Sōmavamsis in lower Orissa, which were conquered by Anantavarman Chōdaganga. The extension of a country no doubt varied in accordance with the expansion of the dominions of its rulers. The location of Abhinava-Varanasi, Varanasi-kaṭaka or Abhinava-Varanasi-kaṭaka, which was the place of residence of the Ganga kings after they had removed their headquarters from Kalinganagara and which is no other than the modern Cuttack, has been already discussed. It has also been noticed that the Southern Ocean is referred to in the record as dakshina-tirtha-raja, i.e., the best of the Tīrthas in the south, the word tirtha here meaning either " a sacred place of pilgrimage" or "waters." That Purushottama-kshetra on the shores of this southern tirtharāja, mentioned in the inscription, is no other than modern Puri has likewise been pointed out above.
The different pieces of land granted by king Anangabhima III as recorded in the charter were situated in Pūraṇagrama and Jayanagaragrama in the Sailo vishaya (district) and Vilasapuragrāma in the Kuddiṇḍā vishaya. The Sailo vishaya, also known from other later Ganga records, is no doubt the present Sailō Pargana in the Cuttack District, and the township, covering thirty väțis of land and situated in Puranagrama and Jayanagaragrama, may actually be represented by the present village of Nagari, literally meaning 'a township,' which is about eleven miles from Cuttack and is the findspot of the charter under discussion.
1 Cf. Ray, op. cit., p. 493.
Cf. Select Inscriptions, p. 450, note 8.
