The Ancient Geography of India. I. The Buddhist Period, including the Campaigns of Alexander, and the Travels of Hwen-Thsang c5.s4.1

c5.s4.1

The kingdom which Hwen Thsang calls *Tse-kia*, or *Tâki*, embraced the whole of the plains of the Panjâb from the Indus to the Biâs, and from the foot of the mountains to the junction of the five rivers below Multân.[*] The Chinese syllable *tse* is used by Hwen Thsang to represent the cerebral *ṭ* of the Sanskrit in the name of *Danakaṭa*, which is found in no less than five of the western cave inscriptions at Kanhari and Kârli.[†] In Hwen Thsang’s travels this name is written *To.no.kia-tse.kia*, in which the last two syllables are transposed. It is the *Danaka* of Abu Rihân, which, as will be shown hereafter, is most probably the same as the old town of *Dhárani-koṭṭa*, on the Kistna river, adjoining the modern city of Amaravati. *Tse-kia*, therefore, represents *Tâki*, which would appear to have been the name of the capital as well as of the kingdom of the Panjâb in the seventh century, just as Lahor has since been used to describe both the kingdom and the capital of Ranjit Singh. The position of the capital will be discussed hereafter. It will be sufficient at present to note that it was within a few miles of the more ancient capital of *She-kie-lo*, which was long ago identified by Professor Lassen with the *Śakala* of the *Mahâbhârata*, and with the *Sangala* of Arrian. Now the people of *Śakala* are called Madras, *Araṭṭas*, *Jârttikas*, and *Bâhîkas*,* in the *Mahâbhârata*; and in the Lexicon of Hemachandra the *Bâhîkas* are said to be the same as the *Takkas*.† Again, in the ‘Raja Tarangini,’ the district of *Takkadesa* is mentioned as a part of the kingdom of *Gurjjara* (or Gujarât, near the Chenâb), which Raja Alakhâna was obliged to cede to Kashmir between A.D. 883 and 901.‡ From these statements it is clear that *Śakala* was the old capital of the powerful tribe of *Takkas*, whose country was named after themselves *Takka-deśa*.§ The name of the new capital is not actually stated by Hwen Thsang, but I believe it to have been *Ṭaki*, or *Ṭakká-war*, which I would identify with the *Tahora* of the Pentingerian Tables by the mere softening of the guttural *k* to the aspirate *h*. In the latter authority *Tahora* is placed at 70 Roman miles, or 64⅓ English miles from *Spatura*, opposite *Alexandria Bucefalos*.