India As Described In Early Texts Of Buddhism and Jainism

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

Page 37

GEOGRAPHY
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giri extends southward and westward ultimately to form the western entrance of Rajgir with the Soņagiri.' 1
A list of seven hills may be made out from the Pali texts with the addition of Kālašilā, a black rock on a side of Isigili, and that of Patibhānakūța, an echoing peak with a fearful precipice (subhayānako papāto) in the neighbourhood of, Gijjhakūta, to the traditional list of five. These very texts speak of Indakūța noar Gijjhakūta and Vediyaka hil, identified by Cunningham with the Giriyak, the latter containing the famous cavo, called Indasāla-guhā 6 (wrongly Sanskritised as Indrasaila-guhā). It may safely be maintained that the group of five Rajgir hills formed, as it now forms, the head, and the Vediyaka the tail of one and the same short range running from west to east over a distance of nine miles from Rajgir to the village of Giriyak or Giryek.
Among the five hills of Rājagaha all but the Isigili bore different names in different ages. The Vepulla mountain, for instance, was known in a very remote age by the name of Pācīnavamsa and the people of the locality were then
1 Law, op. cit., p. 3. 2 Digha, ü, pp. 116-7. a Samyutta, v, p. 448. 4 Ibid., i, p. 206. 6 Digha, ii, p. 263; Sumangalavilāsint, iii, p. 697. 8 Majjhima, iii, p. 68F.