The Geography of the Puranas c7.s4.40

c7.s4.40

(i) The word 'dvīpa' originally signified a land bounded by water (ocean, sea, river or lake or by a combination of these) on all or three or two sides. Thus it was equally applied to an island, a peninsula or a 'doab'.²⁴ The Arabs extended the corresponding word 'jezira' to a land surrounded by water bodies or sand wastes, which made that land inaccessible from almost all sides. Thus their 'jezira' could signify a land surrounded by a desert (an oasis), a land surrounded by water on one side and desert on the other (Algeria), a land between two rivers (Mesopotamia), etc. The Purāṇas appear to have further extended the meaning of the term ‘dwīpa’ to include ‘any land which was ordinarily inaccessible or detached by virtue of its being surrounded by water, sand, swamp or even high mountains or thick forests’. Thus the Purāṇic ‘dwīpa’, by accident or design, came to signify a natural region—either physiographic or climatic. It will be realised presently that if we accept this broad definition of a ‘dwīpa’, practically all the Purāṇic dwīpas satisfy these conditions to a very large extent.