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CHAPTER XVII
THE DARADAS
The Daradas were a tribe of N.W. India, well-known both to indigenous and to foreign traditions. They are referred to in the Mahābhārata as having joined the Kaurava forces, and as having been defeated by Vāsudeva, along with the Khasas, Sakas, Yavanas, Trigarttas, Mālavas and others. The Visnupurāna associates them with the Abhīras and Kāśmiras 2; while in the Matsyapurānas the country of the Daradas is linked with Gandhāra, Sivapura, Urja, Aurasa and other districts forming the basin of the Sindhu (=Indus). The Epic and Puranic traditions seem therefore to locate the Daradas in the north-west along the north-west frontier of Kashmir, and contiguously with the realm of the Khasas in the upper Punjab. They were probably a mountainous tribe, for 'mountain is the commonest meaning of the word darad from which they appear to have derived their name'.
The Greek writers knew this people by various names. Strabo mentions them as Derdai, Pliny as Dardae; while in Dionys. Periềg. (V, 1138) their name is given as Dardanoi. Ptolemy refers to the same people as Daradrai, the additional r evidently being inserted by mistake. He locates them east of the Lambatai (= Lampāk or Lamghan) and of Sonestane (= basin of the Swat river), and to the north of the uppermost course of the Indus. The mountains in the country of the Daradas, he says, are of surpassing height.
The Daradas were an important factor in the history of Kashmir, and are often referred to in the Rājataranginī.
The country once inhabited by the Daradas still retains clear traces of the ancient name, being known as Dardistan, the district of the Dardo.
1 Dronaparvan, Chap. 10, 18. 2 Wilson's Ed., II, p. 184. 8 CXXI, 45-51.
