India As Described In Early Texts Of Buddhism and Jainism

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

Page 29

GEOGRAPHY
21
of Mahāsāla; in the south-east, to the river Salaļavati (Sarāvatī); in the south, to the town of Setakannika; in the west, to the Brahman district of Thūņa; 1 and in the north, to the Usīradhvaja mountain. The Divyāvadāna (pp. 21-22) extends its eastern boundary still farther so as to include Punďavardhana which in ancient times included Varendra (roughly identical with North Bengal). It is 300 yojanas in length, 250 yojanas in breadth and 900 yojanas in circuit.8
Thus it may be shown that the definition of the Middle country was not the same at all times and with all the authorities. In Manu, ii, 19, Kuruksetra, Matsya, Pañcāla and Sūrasena, are included in Brahmarşideśa, while the Mārkandeya Purāna includes them in Madhyadesa, Manu's Middle country is a tract between Vinaśana and Prayāga, while in the above Purāņa and the Kāvya-mīmārsā it extends so far east as to include Kāśi and Kosala. The Pali list of six principal cities in the Mahāparinibbāna Suttanta (Dīgha, ii, p. 146): Campā, Rājagaha, Sāvatthī, Sāketa, Kosambi and Bārāṇasī, suggests an extension which included
i Oongult Cunningham, Ancient Geography of India, Introd. xlin, f.n.2, as to the identification of Thüng with Sthānesvara: also see Jät., vi, 62.
2 It may be said to be identical with Usiragiri, a mountain to the north of Kankhal, I.A., 1905, 179.
8 JRAS., 1904, p. 86.