Indian Antiquary Vol 48

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 280

AVA
AYU
Avantika-Kshetra-Avani, a sacred place in the district of Kolar in Mysore, where
Ramachandra is said to have halted on his way from Laika to Ayodhya. Avanti-Nadi The Sipra. Ujin stands on this river. Ayodhana-Påk-Pattana, five miles west of the Ravi and eight miles from Mamoke Ghat in the Montgomery district of the Panjab (Rennell's Memoir of a Map of Hindoostan (1785), p. 62; Thornton's Gazetteer of the Countries adjacent to India, JASB., vi, 190). It was formerly a renowned city referred to by the historians of Alexander the Great. The town is built on a hillock 40 or 50 feet above the surrounding plain. Its old walls and bastions are now crumbling into ruins. It is celebrated for the tomb of the
Mahomedan Saint Farid-ud-din Shaheb Shakar Ganj. Ayodhya-Oudh, the kingdom of Rama. At the time of the Ramayana (I, chs. 49, 50,) the
southern boundary of Kośala was the river Syandikå or Sai between the Gumti and the Ganges. During the Buddhist period, Ayodhyâ was divided into Uttara (Northern) Kosala and Dakshiņa (Southern ) Kosala. The river Sarayû divided the two provinces. The capital of the former was Śrâvasti on the Rapti, and that of the latter was Ayodhya on the Sarayâ. At the time of Buddha, the kingdom of Kosala under Prasenajit's father Mahakośala extended from the Himalayas to the Ganges and from the Râmganga to the Gandak. The ancient capital of the kingdom was also called Ayodhyâ, the birth-place of Râmachandra. At a place in the town called Janmasthåna he was born, at Chirodaka, called also Chirasigara, Dasaratha performed the sacrifice for obtaining a son with the help of Rishyaś ținga Rishi; at a place called Tretâ-ki-Thakur, Ramachandra performed the horse-sacrifice by setting up the image of Sitâ; at Ratnamaņdapa, he held his council (Muktikopanishad, ch. 1); at Swargadwaram in Fyzabad, his body was burned. At Lakshmaņa-kunda, Lakshmaņa disappeared in the river Sarayû. Dasaratha accidentally killed Saravana, the blind Rishi's g., at Majhaurà in the district of Fyzabad. Adinatha, a Jaina Tirthaikara, was born at Ayodhya ( Führer's MAI.). Cunningham has identified the Sugriva Parvata with the Kalakârâma or Purvârâma monastery of the Mahavamóa, the Mași Parvata with Asoka's Stûpa mentioned by Hiuen Tsiang, the Kubera
Parvata with the Stûpa containing the hair and nails of Buddha (Arch. 8. Rep., vol. i). The Mani Parvata is said to be a fragment of the Gandhamådana mountain which Hanumâna carried on his head on his way to Lenkâ. The sacred places at Ayodhya were restored by Vikramaditya (evidently a Gupta king), who was an adherent of the Brahmanical faith, in the second century A.D., or according to some, in the fifth century A.D., as the sacred places at Brindában were restored by Rapa and Sanatana in the sixteenth century A.D. Ayodhya is the Sakota of the Buddhists and
Sagada of Ptolemy (see saketa ). Ayudha-The country lying betwon the Vitestå (Jhelum ) and the Sindhu (Jadus).
Same as Yaudhoya.