The Ancient Geography of India. I. The Buddhist Period, including the Campaigns of Alexander, and the Travels of Hwen-Thsang c6.s3.12

c6.s3.12

In my account of the province of *Gurjjara* I have already noticed an old inscription of the kings of the Gurjjara tribe. From this record we learn that in s. 380, or A.D. 458 the Gujars had pushed their conquests as far south as the banks of the Narbadâ. In that year, and subsequently in A.D. 463, their king Sri Datta Kusali* made several grants of land to certain Brahmans in the district of *Akrúreswara*, near Jambusara, which I take to be *Ahlesar*, on the south bank of the Narbadâ, opposite Bhâroch. But before s. 391, or A.D. 472, the Gujars must have been driven back to the north, as far at least as Khambay, as the Châlukya prince Vijaya made several grants of land to the same Brahmans in the town of Jambusara, which lies between Bhâroch and Khambay. It is certain, therefore, that the Gujars had occupied the country to the north of the peninsula as early as the fifth century of the Christian era. But two centuries later they had already lost their power, as Hwen Thsang found a *Kshatriya* prince on the throne of *Gurjjara*. They must still, however, have continued to form the bulk of the population of the countries to the west and south of Mount Abu; and as Alaf Khan, the first Muhammadan conqueror, under Ala-ud-din Khilji, fixed his head-quarters at *Nahrwâra*, or *Analwâra*, in the very heart of the Gujar country, I think it probable that the name of Gujarât was then first applied to this new province of the Delhi empire; and as the peninsula of Saurashtra formed a part of the province, it was also included under the same general appellation. I therefore look upon the extension of the name of Gujarât to the peninsula as a political convenience rather than an ethnographical application. Hamilton† notes that the greater part of Malwa and Khandes was formerly called Gujarât; and this is borne out by Marco Polo, who distinguishes between the peninsula, which he calls *Sumenat* (Somnâth) and the kingdom of *Gozurat*, which he places on the coast to the north of Tana; that is, about Bhâroch and Surat. Even at the present day the name of Gujarât is not known to the natives of the peninsula itself, who continue to call their country *Surath* and *Kathiáwar*;* the latter name having been a recent adoption of the Mahrattas.