India As Described In Early Texts Of Buddhism and Jainism

Author(s): Bimla Charn Law
Publisher: Bimlacharan Law

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IKDIA AS DESCRIBED IN EARLY TEXTS
according to another, like that of a peninsula with the Himalayan range stretching along on its north, like the string of a bow.l According to Hiuen Tsang, the north part is broad, the southern part narrow. As in the Jambudīvapannatti, he describes its shape as one like that of a half-moon. All these images are suggestive, though only approximately accurate. . In agreement with the Great Epic S and the „Purāņas, the. Jambudīva-pannatti derives the name of Bhāratavarşa from king Bharata whose sovereignty was established over it. It speaks of six divisions (bhedā; khandā) in Northern India, and of three divisions in Southern, Eastern, Western and Middle. Those are all internal divisions of India proper. The vine bhedas or parts of Varāhamihira conforming, as . they do, to the centre and eight of the ten points of the compass: eastern, southern, Western, northern, south-eastern, south-western, north-western and north eastern (also suggested by the Jainas), are all internal. The nine bhedas or khandas mentioned in the Mārkandeya Purana and the Siddhāntaširomaņi (iii, 41),n and somewhat differently enumerated in the Vāmana and Garuda Pürānas go as to count Kaţāha and
1 Mārkandega Puranai, Chap: 57: Dalīsiņo parato hyasya pūrvena : che mahodadhi) Himavån uttaršņāsya kērmūkasya yatha gunah. S. Beal, Buddhist Records of this Western World; i, pi :70. :.
a Mahabharata, Bhiemaparva, üür, 41.