History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v1.c18.s1.1

v1.c18.s1.1

We now turn to the kingdoms of the east. This eastern portion of India naturally divides itself into three parts, Behar with Magadha, western Bengal and Eastern Bengal. The ancient names of eastern countries in India were Anga, Vanga and Kalinga; but Magadha and Odra are also ancient names and all these were usually subject to one and the same great power. When the name Gauda first came into use for this part cannot well be determined. That it was a new name we have not the smallest doubt. The Mahābhārata does not mention it nor even, it seems, Varāhamihira of the 5th century A D. Gauda or Guda is strangely enough mentioned by him as the name of the country round Thanesar,[*] but we had forgotten this fact so completely that it was a discovery indeed of Jackson. Gauda according to our present notions is nothing but Bengal. We must, however, recognise the fact that Gauda is a name which originally belonged to the country to the north-west of Delhi. The Brahmins of that part of the country still call themselves Ādigauda or the original Gaudas. It seems probable that some time about the 5th or 6th century A. D. many of these Brahmins, probably under the stress of the Huns, migrated eastward and settled in Western Bengal. The country thus came to be called Gauda. In the inscriptions of the seventh and eighth centuries this part is certainly called Gauda. Bāṇa for instance (620 A. D.) in the Harsha Charita calls Śaśānka king of Gauda while Hiuen Tsang calls him king of Karṇasuvarṇa. Karṇa-Suvarṇa then was certainly Gauda in about 600 A.D. And Gupta kings probably a branch of the Gupta imperial line ruled here. Śaśānka’s rule continued for a long time even after 606 A. D. i. e. after he had killed Rājyavaradhana by treachery and it seems probable that Harsha though he must have conquered Śaśānka pardoned him and married his daughter who had been offered to Rājya. When Hiuen Tsang visited it, Śaśānka was probably dead. He describes the people of Karṇasuvarṇa (modern Murshidabad) as fond of learning, with 50 monasteries and 100 Deva temples, showing that Buddhism was in a minority in western Bengal even then.