The Geography of the Puranas c8.225

c8.225

Having mentioned the mountains lying north of the Oxus the Purāṇas rightly point out that the river thereafter 'irrigating thousands of lands, flows across the central part of the Pāriyātra mountain'. The only river which could discharge its waters into the Oxus is the Murghab, on which Meru is situated, keeping in mind the fact that the Oxus formerly used to flow along a more southerly course into the Caspian. The Pāriyātra is therefore equivalent to the Band-i-Baba and Band-i-Turkistan ranges or the Paropamisus of northern Afghanistan.