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192 POLITICAL HISTORY OF ANCIENT INDIA
the Vrijikas, and through them with the other great cities of the age. The sākyas had a town called Devadaba which they appear to have shared with their eastern neighbours, the Koliyas. They acknowledged the suzerainty of the king of Kosala and, like him, claimed to belong to the solar (Aditya) race and Ikshvāku family.
The Koliyas claim to have been cadets from the royal house of Benares. Tradition connects them with the cities of Rāmagāma and Devadaha. The river Rohiņi separated their capital from tbat of the sākyas, and helped to irrigate the fields of both the clans.2 "Once upon a time in the month of Jetthamūla when the crops began to flag and droop, the labourers from amongst both the peoples assembled together.” Then followed a scramble for water. Bloodshed was averted by the mediation of the Buddha. From the mutual recriminations in which they indulged, we learn that the Śākyas had the custom of marrying their own sisters. Cunningham places the Koliya country between the Kohāna and Aumi (Anomā) rivers. The Anomā seems to have formed the dividing line between the Koliyas on the one hand and the Mallas and Moriyas on the other.
The Bhaggas (Bhargas) are known to the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa* and the Ashțādhyayi of Paņini." The former work refers to the Bhārgāyaṇa prince Kairiši Sutvan. In the latter half of the sixth century B.C., the Bhagga state wag a dependency of the Vatsa kingdom ; for we learn from the preface to the Dhonasākha Jataka, that prince Bodhi, the son of Udayana, king of the Vatsas, dwelt
1 DPPN, I. 689. The Koliya capital stood close to the eastern bank of the Rohini.
2 The Kunāla Jātaka (introductory portion). 3 DPPN, 1.690, Cunn. AGI (new) 477 ; 491 ff. 4 VIII. 28. 5 iv. i. 111, 177. 6 No. 353.
