Jain Journal 1997 10

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 11

JAIN JOURNAL: Vol-XXXII, No. 2 October 1997
that after crossing the Singdhu or the Indus Sahis or the Shahis entered into Surashtra (the widest possible geographical limits of which included, as the cumulative evidence of certain sources should indicate, the whole of the Kathiawad peninsula and the adjacent lands to its north as well as a part of the littoral lower Indus area to the east of the Indus34). Hence it can be assumed that within the land of the Sāhis or Shāhis, called Sagakula, was incorporated the coastal portions of modern sind to the west to the Indus. Again, since these Shāhis crossed the Indus only once, they should have forded its main easters arm flowing near the Saurashtra area. In other words, the Indus delta, known to the classical writers as patalene,35 was included in Sagakūla. This interpretaion compels us to reject the theories of Konow and Jayaswal, who placed Sagakūla respectively in Sauvira36 and Seistan.37
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34. The Junagadh inscription of c. A.D, 150 refers to Rudradaman I as the lord of inter alia Anartta and Surashtra (Epigraphia Indica, Vol. VIII, p. 44) and speaks of Suvisakha as ruling on his behalf the whole of these territories (ibid. p. 45). Since this epigrah also states that Suvisakha repaired the dam of the Lake Sudarshana (ibid.), apparently in the vicinity of Junagadh (JBBRAS, os, vol. XVIII, pp. 47-55; IA, vol. VII, p. 257), this lake must have been either in Anartta or in Surashtra. It also appears from the same source that they were contigeous territories.
The term Surashtra seems to have survived in Sorath, the name of an area in Southern Kathiawad (Bombay Gazetteer, Vol. I, pt. 1, p. 6). This may indicate that at least South Kathiawad was known in some earlier ages as Surashtra (ibid). Anarttapura, referred to in the records of the Maitrakas of Valabhi and identified Vadnagar in the Mehsana district, is considered to be connected with Anartta (Ibid,). So the latter may have included in some earlier periods certain regions to the east of the Little Runn of Cutch and immediately above Kahtiawad (Ibid). It has also been suggested that Anartta may have also incorporated Northern Kathiawad. (Ibid, Bhagwanlal Indraji observed that certain Puranic passages should indicate the inclusion of the whole of Kathiawad within Anartta).
Surastra or Saurashtra seems to have been referred to in classical sources as Syrastrene (Ptolemy, Op. cit. VII, 1, 55-61; McCrindle, Ptolemy, p. 140). It appears from a section of the Periplus Maris Erythraei (sec 41) that Syrastrene included the territory now covered by the whole of the Kathiawad peninsula and the adjacent lands to its north as well as a part of the littoral Lower Indus Country to the east of the Indus. Syrastrene, the name of a province of Ptolemy's Indo-Scythia, may also have the wider connotation (Ptolemy, op. cit. VII, 1, 35-61).
35. Strabo, Op. cit., XV, 1 33; Ptolemy, Op. cit. VII, 1, 35.
36. Journal of the Asiatic Society, Vol XII, p. 18.
37. Journal of the Behar & Orissa Research Society, Vol. XVIII. p. 233. Brown's equation of Hindukadesa with the Lower Indus Country (Op cit. p. 57) is