The Geography of the Puranas c7.s4.37

c7.s4.37

Jātaka No. 463, contains a description of a voyage made by a ship from Bharukaccha. After a favourable voyage lasting seven days it was swept away by a storm. At the end of four months it reached the Khuramāla Sea (so called because it was full of great fish which stuck their sharp razor-like snouts above the water); then it passed through the seas named Agnimāla²⁰ (blazing like fire), Dahimāla (the colour of curds), Nilavaṇṇa-Kusamāla or Kusamāla (the colour of kuśa grass), Nalamāla (red like coral),²¹ and came to the Valabhamukha.²² Dadhimāla corresponds to the Purāṇic ocean of curds. Kusamāla is the same as the Purāṇic Kuśadvīpa. Nalamāla is identical with the Purāṇic red ocean of wine. Valabhamukha is the same as the Hayamukha of the Rāmāyaṇa. This Jātaka also is evidently based on travellers' narratives and contains early elements. This is much more probable than the opposite conclusion, namely, that we have here reminiscences of the Purāṇic descriptions made still more mythical. The direction of the voyage is not given, but if the comparison with the account in the Rāmāyaṇa has any validity it may well have been to the east.