The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c31.s5.1

v1.c31.s5.1

The boundaries of Kaliṅga, the territory under the Eastern Ghāts lying along the coast of the Bay of Bengal on the north of Teliṅgāna, seem to have been uncertain. On the north it may at one time have reached up to the delta of the Ganges, if reliance can be placed on the statements of Pliny, *H.N.* vi, 17–18 (21–22)², and thus included Oḍra-deça, now Orissa; but usually its northern limit was somewhat lower. South of this it comprised Utkala (Ganjām) and the Northern Circārs down to the basin of the Godāvari, or thereabouts³. Early literature however distinguishes the Kaliṅgas from the Oḍras or natives of Orissa. A somewhat unedifying epic legend (*Mbh.* I, 104) makes the races of Aṅga, Vaṅga, Kaliṅga, Puṇḍra, and Suhma (*v. sup.* p. 317) to be descendants of the saint Dīrghatamas by Sudeshṇā, wife of king Bali; and similarly the grammar of Pāṇini (iv, 1, 170; cf. ii, 4, 62, schol.) groups together Aṅga, Vaṅga, Kaliṅga, Puṇḍra, etc. The Oḍras also appear very early in Sanskrit literature (*Taittirīya Āraṇyaka*, ii, 1, 11, and the epics); and the law-book of ‘Manu’ wrongly classes them, with the natives of Puṇḍra and the Draviḍas, as degraded Kshatriyas (x, 44). How far Kaliṅga is to be regarded as a Dravidian province is not clear. The name *Pertalis*, which is given by Pliny, *H.N.* vi, 18 (22), as that of the capital of Kaliṅga, has a Dravidian sound, and Dravidian etymologies for it readily suggest themselves¹. At the present day the Circārs and southern Ganjām are mainly Telugu in speech, and 'Dravidian' physical features are found in their populations, as well as in Orissa.