The Antiquities of Orissa v2.c16.s2.33

v2.c16.s2.33

It is much to be regretted that the line in which *Magadha-rājani* and Nanda Rājās are named in close proximity is so corrupt that a complete translation cannot be afforded of it. Prinsep's facsimile also gives only the letter *dh* of Magadha, and the two first letters are so exceedingly faint in my cast, that they are all but perfectly illegible; but relying on them I am disposed to accept that the person indicated is one of the nine Nandas of Magadha. There can be no *a priori* objection to this identification. There is ample evidence to show that Kaliṅga was well-known from the time of the death of Śākya, and the Pāli Buddhistical annals prove that it bore close political relationship with Magadha, from one of whose sovereigns it obtained the tooth relic at a very early period. It is impossible now to say whether the boundary of the Kaliṅga rāj was conterminous with that of Magadha, but if the two kingdoms did not border upon each other, they were separated by a very narrow interval, and there is nothing improbable in the supposition of their having been politically related, or having indulged in border warfare. The inscription states that Aira went to Banares, and distributed largesses there very bountifully, and in his way he most probably passed through Magadha. Accepting under these circumstances, that the Nandarāja of the inscription was one of the nine Nandas, and knowing that the Nandas reigned for a hundred years, the last yielding his patrimony to Chandragupta, we may assume that the date of Aira ranged between 316 and 416 B.C.