Book Title: Religion and Culture of the Jains
Author(s): D C Sirkar
Publisher: University of Calcutta

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Page 126
________________ A. K. CHATTERJEE 111 Since Jinasena Il was a Westerner, the names like Mālya, Kallivano pānta, Karbūka, and Kāksi, assume a special significance as they are not found in the previous lists. It is reasonable to suppose that these peoples were contemporaneous with our author. * Among the Madhyadeśa peoples mentioned by Jinasena II, we have the interesting name Moka. It is the variant of Maga, the Sun-worshippers mentioned by Varāhamihira (Ch. 59). Ptolemy's reference to Brachmanoi Magoi*7 proves that the earliest wave of the Persian Sun-worshippers had reached India by the beginning of the Christian era, if not earlier. Since our author places them in Madhyadeśa, it is reasonable to suppose that there grew up slowly a permanent settlement of Zoroastrians in the interior of India. While enumerating the peoples of the South, the author of the Harivamsa has not cared to mention peoples living in the Far South. Not a single people living to the South of the Kāveri has been mentioned. Among the northern peoples, a very significant omission is Kāśmira. This is surprising because the Kāśmira people under the Kārkoţa rulers became famous before 783 A.D., the date of the composition of the present work. Among the peoples who are described as Vindhya-prștha-nivāsanaḥ, we get the name “Kişkandha' whom we propose to identify with the people living in ancient Kişkindhā now in the Bhomat District, Rajasthan. The Kişkindhā-rāşțra of Varābamihira has been identified by Sircar 8 with this Kişkindhā, which was the capital of a branch of the Gubila dynasty which rose to power in the 7th century A. D.49 If we remember the date of Jinasena II, it will not be difficult to account for the mention of Kişkandha as a people in his work. Jinasena, however, has inadvertently included the Nepālas as living on the Vindhyas. Some of the *[As stated above, their peculiarity is due to wrong reading.-Ed.] 47 See Majumdar, The Classical Accounts of India, p. 375. (See above, p. 108, note.--Ed.) 48 See his The Guhilas of Kisk indhā, p. 34, note. 49 See also ibid., pp. 60ff. Jain Education International For Private & Personal Use Only www.jainelibrary.org

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