India As Described In Early Texts Of Buddhism and Jainism

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

Page 66

58 INDIA AS DESCRIBED IN HARLY TEXTS
townships, without telling us where these were actually situated. The Kesaputtas may remind one of the Kesins, a people connected in Põnini (VI, 4.165) with the Pancālas and Dälbhyas.
Alavi: This is the name of both the country and its principal town. The Ardhamāgadhi spelling of the name is Āļabhi. The town was thirty yojanas from Sāvatthí and twelve from Benares, and it lay between Săvatthi and Rājagaha. The way from Sāvatthi to Aļavi and thence to Rājagaha lay through Kītāgiri.“ Mrs. Rhys Davids inclines to think that Alavi was on the bank of the Gangos, evidently basing her suggestion on the fury of tho Yakkha Alavaka who would throw the Buddha over to the other side of the Ganges (pāra-Gangāya), which, however, is treated by Dr. Malalasekera as merely a rhetorical expression without any geographical significance. Aļaví as a principality was undoubtedly included in the Kosalan empire.
II Pubbanta or Prācya (Eastern India): The Pubbanta or Prācya may be defined as the extreme eastern part of India which lay to the
1 Manorathapurani: Kälāmānam nigamari Kalāma nama Khattiya tesam nigamo. Kesaputtiya t Resaputtinigamaväsino.
Paramathajotikā, II, p. 220. 8 Watters, Yuan Chwang, ii, p. 61. 4 Vinaya, ii, p. 170f. 6 Psalms of the Brethren, p. 408, f.n. 6. & Malalasekera, op. cit., i, p. 296,