The Ancient Geography of India. I. The Buddhist Period, including the Campaigns of Alexander, and the Travels of Hwen-Thsang c5.s4.t18.7

c5.s4.t18.7

Pliny places the limit of Alexander’s career in the territory of the Sudrakas, “in Sudracis expeditio Alexandri termino,”* and the altars on the opposite bank of the Hyphasis, or Biâs river. From this point to the river Sydrus, that is the Hesidrus, or Satlej, he makes the distance 168 Roman, or 154 British miles; and from the Sydrus to the Jomanes, or Jumna, exactly the same. But as the whole distance from the Biâs to the Jumna varies from 150 to 160 miles, from the foot of the hills down to Kasûr on the former river, and down to Karnâl on the latter river, I presume that only one distance, namely, that from the Biâs to the Jumna, was stated in Pliny’s original authority. The famous spot on the eastern bank of the Hyphasis, where “Alexander halted and wept,”† must have been somewhere in the low ground between the Satlej and the Biâs, at a short distance above the old junction opposite Kasûr and Bazidpur. For 20 miles above this point the courses of the two rivers ran almost parallel, and within a few miles of each other, from the earliest times down to A.D. 1796, when the Satlej suddenly changed its course, and joined the Biâs above Hari-ki-patan. Within this range of 20 miles the space between the two rivers was so small that it might easily have been overlooked in stating the distance from Alexander’s camp to the Jumna. I believe, however, that it was actually noted by Alexander’s contemporaries, for Pliny, after stating the distance to the Jumna, says, “some copies add five miles more.”‡