Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, or the Central and Western Rajput States of India v1.c20.10

v1.c20.10

Origin of the Rājputs.—In every age and clime we observe the same eager desire after distinguished pedigree, proceeding from a feeling which, though often derided, is extremely natural. The Rajaputras are, however, scarcely satisfied with discriminating their ancestors from the herd of mankind. Some plume themselves on a celestial origin, whilst others are content to be demi-celestial; and those who cannot advance such lofty claims, rather than acknowledge the race to have originated in the ordinary course of nature, make their primeval parent of demoniac extraction; accordingly, several of the dynasties who cannot obtain a niche amongst the children of the sun or moon, or trace their descent from some royal saint, are satisfied to be considered the offspring of some Titan (Daitya). These puerilities are of modern fabrication, in cases where family documents have been lost, or emigration has severed branches from the parent stock; who, increasing in power, but ignorant of their birth, have had recourse to fable to supply the void. Various authors, borrowing from the same source, have assigned the seat of Porus to the Rana’s family; and coincidence of name has been the cause of the family being alternately elevated and depressed. Thus the incidental circumstance of the word Rhamnae being found in Ptolemy’s geography, in countries bordering on Mewar, furnishes our ablest geographers ¹ with a reason [213] for planting the family there in the second century; while the commentators ² on the geography of the Arabian travellers of the ninth and tenth centuries ³ discover sufficient evidence in “the kingdom of Rahmi, always at war with the Balhara sovereign,” to consider him (notwithstanding Rahmi is expressly stated “not to be much considered for his birth or the antiquity of his kingdom”) as the prince of Chitor, celebrated in both these points.