Indian Antiquary Vol 08

Author(s): Jas Burgess
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 12

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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
Mekhalas, the Utkalas, the Dasarnas, the Vidarbhas, the Rishikas, the Mahisakas, the Mâtsyas, the Kâlingas, the Kasikas, the Andhras, the Pundras, the Cholas, the Pandyas, and the Keralas. As a specimen of the cities of the south of those days, the following description of Bhogavati, which probably lay in the heart of the Dakhan, may be here quoted:
"Near, Bhogavati stands, the place
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Where dwell the hosts of serpent race: A broad-wayed city, walled and barred, Which watchful legions keep and guard, The fiercest of the serpent youth, Each awful for his venomed tooth: And throned in his imperial hall Is Vasuki who rules them all. Explore the serpent city well, Search town and tower and citadel, And scan each field and wood that lies Around it, with your watchful eyes." The Puranas mention the peoples named in the above list in the Ramayana, as well as several others which they place with them amongst the southern nations. As an instance of the great antiquity attached to their conception of the time of the settlement of these peoples in the Dakhan, the Kalingas are said to be the descendants of Kalinga, one of the five putative sons of Bali,, the nineteenth in descent from Soma, the founder of the Lunar Dynasty.
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Kalidasa's Raghuvashéa has a description in its fourth book of a tour of conquest made by Raghu, the great grandfather of B&ma, through the whole of the border-nations of India; and it incidentally describes some of the prominent features of the kingdoms through which he passed.15
Starting from Ayodhya at the head of an army of veteran troops, his route lay first eastwards towards the ocean; and when he had conquered those parts he proceeded to the south along the whole of the eastern coast, through the kingdoms of Orissa, Kalinga, Chôla, and Pandya. Then turning northwards he conquered the kingdoms lying along the western coast, passing through Kêr a la and the
13 Griffith's Ramayana, IV. 205. 1 See Wilson's Vishnu Purdna, 4to ed. p. 444.
[JANUARY, 1879.
mountainous regions from Coorg northwards to Trik û ta, and then, through a kingdom of the Pârasika's and Yava nas, to the banks of the Indus and a district in its neighbourhood occupied by the Huns. Crossing the Indus he entered the kingdom of K & m boja, and when he had conquered it he passed on to the Himâlaya mountains, and subdued the Kirâ tasand the Utsavasanketas. He then descended into the valley of the Brahmaputra, and conquered the kingdom of the Prâgjyotishas; and he finally returned to his capital through the kingdom of K â marupa. In the absence of an English translation of this part of the Raghuvansa, the passages which refer to the Dakhan may be quoted here from the Rev. J. Long's Analysis of the poem in the twenty-first volume of the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, page 454:-" Having conquered the Bangalis who trusted in their ships, he erected pillars of victory on the islands of the Ganges. Having passed the Kapis & river by elephants, under theguidance of the people of Utkal (Orissa), Raghu arrived at K Aliiga. Mount Mahendra received from him a shock, as from the mahut's goad the stubborn elephant's head. Kalinga's monarch, mighty in elephants, in vain attacked Raghu, like Indra attempting to cut his wings. The soldiers, decorating the place with betel leaves, toasted their success in wine of Nalikera; but Raghu, desiring victory only for the sake of justice, took possession of no land. Then to Agastya's land he marched, skirting the shore fringed with fruitful betel palms. The soldiers occupied the plain to the foot of the Malay a hills, where doves flit in spicy groves.. The elephants had their temples fragrant from the dust of sandalwood which they had raised in their march. The Pandya kings rendered homage to Raghu by gems collected from the ocean's bed where Tamrapariâ rolls its waves. Having refreshed himself near the shore on the Malaya and Dardura sandal-covered hills, the paps of earth, he lined with troops the Sahy a hills, from which ocean had retired far and left earth's bosom bare; the soldiers then marched on to subdue the western people. The dust from the ketaka tree raised by the winds from the Mural river served to polish the soldiers"
See Stenzler's edition, p. 30 of text, p. 25 of Latin translation; or Bombay Sanskrit Series, No. V. p. 111; or Calcutta edition of 1871, p. 159.