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DECEMBER, 1884.]
PTOLEMY'S GEOG. BK. VII. CH. 2, & 2.
371
Airrhadai, however, are undoubtedly meant the A confirmation of this view is offered by the Kiráta. With regard to the position here assigned circumstance that the Bunzu, who must have been to them Lassen thus writes (Ind. Alt., vol. III, pp. descendants of a branch of the Tamerai, live in 235-237):-"By the name Kirradia Ptolemy de. villages under headships. We must further state signates the land on the coast of further India from that according to the treatises used by Ptolemy the city of Pentapolis, perhaps the present Mirkan. the best Malabathrum was got from Kirradia. I serai in the north, as far as the mouth, of the see no reason to doubt the correctness of this stateTokosanna or Arakan river. The name of this ment, although the trees from which this precious land indicates that it was inhabited by the Kir&ta, oil and spice were prepared and which are different a people which we find in the great Epic settled in kinds of the laurel, do not appear at the present the neighbourhood of the Lauhitya, or Brahma- day to be found in this country, since, according putra, consequently somewhat further to the north to the testimony of the most recent writers the than where Ptolemy locates them. Hence arises botanical productions of Arakan at least have the question whether the Kirata who, as we know, not as yet been sufficiently investigated. It can, belong to the Bhota, and are still found in Nepal, however, be asserted that in Silhet, which is not had spread themselves to such a distance in earlier very remote from Chaturgråma, Malabathrum is times, or whether their name has been erroneously produced at this very day." Saint-Martin ex. applied to a different people. The last assump- presses similar views. He writes (Étude, pp. 343, tion is favoured by the account in the Peri. 34+). "The Kirrhadia of Ptolemy, a country men. plús, according to which ships sailing northward | tioned also in the Periplús as lying west from from DÔearêné, or the country on both sides of the mouths of the Ganges and the Skyritai of the Vaitarani, arrived at the land of the wild flat- Megasthenes are cantons of Kiráta, one of the nosed Kirradai, who like the other savage tribes branches of the aboriginal race the widest spread were men-eaters. Since the author of that work in Gangetic India, and the most anciently known. did not proceed beyond Cape Comorin, and applied In different passages of the Purdnas and of the the name of Kirkta to a people which lived on the epics their name is applied in a general manner coast to the S. W. of the Ganges, it is certain that to the barbarous tribes of the eastern frontiera he had erroneously used this name to denote the of Aryavarta, and it has preserved itself in several wild and fabulous races. Ptolemy must have fol quarters, notably in the eastern districts of Nepal. lowed him or other writers of the kind, and to the There is a still surviving tradition in Tripuri name Kirkta has given a signification which did (Tipperah), precisely where Ptolemy places his not originate with himself. Although the Kiráta, Kirrhadia, that the first name of the country was long before the time in which he lived, had wander- Kirat (J. 4. S. Ben., Vol. XIX., Long, Chronicles ed from their northern Fatherland to the Hima- of Tripurd, p. 536.) The Tamerai were a tribe laya and thence spread themselves to the regions of the same family." on the Brahmaputra, still it is not to be believed Mouth of the River Kata bêda :- This may that they should have possessed themselves of be the river of Chittagong called the Karmaterritory so far south as Chaturgrama (Chittagong) phuli. The northern point of land at its mouth and a part of Arakan. We can therefore scarcely is, according to Wilford (Asiat. Research. vol. be mistaken if we consider the inhabitants of this XIV, p. 445) called Pattana, and hence he thinks territory at that time as a people belonging to that Chatgram or Chaturgrâm (Chittagong) is further India, and in fact as tribal relatives of the the Pentapolis of Ptolemy for Pattanphulli, Tamerai, who possessed the mountain region that which means flourishing seat.' The same aulay back in the interior, as I shall hereafter show. thor has proposed a different identification for I here remark that between the name of the city the Katabêda River. “In the district of SanPentapolis, i.e. five cities, and the name of the dowÔ," he says, "is a river and a town called in most northern part of Kirradia, Chaturgrama, modern maps Sedoa for Saindwa (for Sandwipa)" i.e. four cities, there is a connexion that can and in Ptolemy Sad us and Sa da. Between this scarcely be mistaken, since Chaturgrama could river and Arakan there is another large one not originally have denoted a country, but only a concealed behind the island of Cheduba, and the place which later on became the capital, though it name of which is Kåtåbaidd or Kåtåbaiza. This was originally only the capital of four village is the river Katabêda of Ptolemy, which, it is true, communities over which a common headship was he has placed erroneously to the north of Arakan, possessed, while Pentapolis was the seat of a but as it retains its name to this day among the headship over five towns or rather villages, as it natives, and as it is an uncommon one in that can scarcely be believed that the rude tribes of country, we can hardly be mistaken. As that part of Kirradia were civilized enough to possess towns. the country is very little frequented by seafaring
