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The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c6.s3.t4: Rivers

The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c6.s3.t4

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English

Rivers

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As the Deccan plateau slopes down eastwards to the Madras seaboard from the long flanking wall of the Western Ghāṭs, all the drainage is from the west to the east. The two main lines of drainage are represented by two great river systems, namely the Godāvarī with its sister streams, and the Kṛṣṇā with its confluents.

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The word Godāvarī literally means ‘granting water or kine’. Crooke thinks that the name is probably a sanskritized form of the original Dravidian term ‘goda’ (Telugu gode), ‘limit’, ‘boundary’, in the sense that it divided two regions of Dakṣiṇāpatha,⁵ apparently the region of trap in the north and the granitic and calcareous country in the south.

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⁵ Hastings, Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics, vi, 306.

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The river ranks high among the sacred streams of India. The people of the south call it Gaṅgā or Gautamī Gaṅgā and regard it as equal in holiness to the Bhāgīrathī Gaṅgā that flows through Āryāvarta. A Gautamī-māhātmya forms part of the *Brahma-purāṇa* and testifies to its great sanctity. One of its sources springs from a hill behind the holy spot of Trimbak, Skt. *Tryambaka*, named after the god Śiva. It lies in the Nāsik District about fifty miles from the shore of the Arabian Sea. Here is shown the *Gomukha*, ‘cow’s mouth’, where the water drips from a lofty cliff through a stone cow’s mouth. A larger branch takes its rise in the ridge that joins the Trimbak and Brahma mountains. After passing the holy precincts of Trimbak the river cuts a deep rocky bed through the Ghāṭmātha (hill-top) country and leaps into the famous falls of Gaṅgāpur. It then flows past the sacred city of Nāsik—identified with the Pañchavaṭī of epic tradition—through a succession of masonry pools, styled *kuṇḍs*, much used in ceremonial ablutions. It receives several affluents such as the Kādravā (Kadwā) and the Pravarā before it reaches Paiṭhaṇ, ‘the royal seat’ of Pulumāyi in the second century A.D. It then runs right across the state of Hyderabad receiving on its left bank the Pūrṇā, and on the right the Māñjrā, the Vañjarā of the *Brahma* and Vañjulā of the *Matsya* and *Vāyu Purāṇas*, which forms part of the boundary line between the Marāṭha country and the land of the Telugus. Farther on it is joined by the Prānhitā which conveys the united waters of the Peṅgaṅgā, the Wardhā (Varadā), and the Waingaṅgā (Veṇvā). From this point the river takes a marked south-easterly bend dividing the ancient realm of Chakrakūṭa (Bastar) from Andhra or Teliṅgāna of which Anmakoṇḍa (Hanamkoṇḍa) was the ornament (*Andhrāvanimaṇḍana*). About thirty miles below the confluence of the Prānhitā the Godāvarī receives the Indravatī from the Bastar State. It then passes by Bhadrāchalam, sacred to the memory of the hero of the *Rāmāyaṇa*, and is next joined by the Śabarī, which probably takes its name from one of the primitive tribes mentioned as early as the *Aitareya Brāhmaṇa*. The river now forces its way through the Eastern Ghāṭs and, flowing past Rājahmundry (Rājamahendrapaṭṭaṇa), opens out and forms a series of broad reaches studded with low alluvial islands styled *laṅkās*. The sea is reached by seven branches¹ (*sapta-Godāvarī*) styled the Vāsisṭhī (on the west), Vaiśvāmitrī, Vāmadevī, Gautamī, Bhāradvājī, Ātreyī, and Jāmadagnī. The chief sanctity attaches to the Gautamī branch on the east.

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¹ *Brahma Purāṇa*, ch. 173. 3-4; *Ep. Ind.*, xii, 216, ‘he reverenced the holy Bhīmeśvara, passing close to whom the Godāvarī, with dancing waves as her eye-brows, sings (his praises) with the seven notes of her (seven) streams’. The reference is to the famous shrine of Bhīmeśvara (Śiva) at Drākshārāma which now stands on a canal fourteen miles away from the river.

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The Kṛishṇā, literally ‘of black hue’, probably derives its name from the black soil, *kṛishṇabhūmi*, *kare-nāḍu*, which it moistens with its water. It takes its rise about forty miles from the Arabian Sea on the eastern brow of the Mahābaleshwar plateau. The source is situated nearly thirty-three miles north-west of Sātāra on a spur of the Sahyādri. Hence it is often referred to in epigraphic records as Sahyajā or Sahyaputrī. The stream pours out of a stone cow’s mouth into a small reservoir inside an ancient shrine of Śiva.

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The Kṛṣṇā is in length less than the Godāvarī, being about 800 miles, as compared with about 900 miles of the Godāvarī. But the area of its catchment basin, including that of its great tributaries the Bhīmā and the Tuṅgabhadrā, is almost as large as that of the more famous stream, being about 95,000 square miles as compared with 112,000 square miles of the Godāvarī.

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The river runs east and south and then curves to the south-east. It receives the Veṇā or Yenna at Māhuli, about three miles to the east of Sātāra. It next flows past Karāḍ, the heretical Karahāṭaka of the Mahābhārata, where it receives the Koinā on its right bank. About three miles south of Sānglī it is joined by the Varṇā (Varṇā). From its confluence with the Veṇā and apparently also with the Varṇā it derives the different forms of its name, Kaṇhabemṇā, Kṛṣṇaveṇṇā, Kṛṣṇabeṇṇā, Kṛṣṇaveṇā, Kṛṣṇaveṇī, Kṛṣṇaverṇā, and Kṛṣṇavarṇā. Sometimes the full appellation is replaced by Veṇā and Veṇī. In the Purāṇas we meet with the forms Veṇikā and Kṛṣṇaveṇikā.

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In the Bījāpur District two streams from the Western Ghāṭs, the Ghāṭ-prabhā and the Malprabhā, famous in history, join the Kṛṣṇā whose water rushes from rock to rock shooting columns of spray high into the air and leaping into wild pools at the feet of gorges. On reaching the state of Hyderabad the river drops from the tableland through which it had forced its way down to the celebrated doābs of Shorāpur and Raichūr. The first of these is formed by its junction with the Bhīmā which rises in the Sahyādri near the temple of Bhīmāśaṅkar in the Poona District, and flows past the holy city of Paṇḍharpur. Among its feeders are the Indrāyani which runs past Dehū, sacred to Tukārām, and Ālandi, home of Jñāneśvara, the Mulā-muthā on which stands Poona, the Nira which laves the spur crowned by Torna in the Bhor State, the Sinā which passes by Ahmadnagar, and the Kāgnā which once flowed past the famous metropolis of Mānyakheṭa. The Raichūr Doāb is formed by the confluence of the Kṛṣṇā with the Tuṅgabhadrā, ‘the Gaṅgā of the South’.¹ The junction takes place not far from Ālampur, possibly identical with Halampura of an early Prakrit inscription found at Gurzāla. The Tuṅgabhadrā is formed by the union of the twin streams, the Tuṅga and the Bhadrā which rise at Gaṅgāmūla in the Varāhaparvata near the frontier of the Kaḍūr District, Mysore. The Tuṅga passes by Śṛingeri (Rishyaśṛiṅga-giri), and after junction with the Bhadrā flows past Harihar, Hampi (which represents the ancient Pampā-kshetra and marks the site of Vijayanagar), Anegundi (Kuñjarakoṇa, the elephant corner of ancient geographers), and Ālampur, and unites with the Kṛṣṇā a little distance from the last-mentioned city. With its water swollen by the Tuṅgabhadrā, the Kṛṣṇā runs past the famous Śrīsailam where it seems to be known as Pātāla-gaṅgā,² and receives on the way the Musī, the river of Hyderabad, and the Muner (Maudgalya) which comes from the Pākhāl Lake. Flowing through the classic land between the cities of Dhānyakaṭaka-Amarāvatī and Vijayavāṭikā (Bezwāḍa) it enters the sea by two principal mouths, forming a wide delta.

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¹ Indian Antiquary, v, 319.

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² Ep. Ind., iv, 319.

Cites (15)