The Ancient Geography of India. I. The Buddhist Period, including the Campaigns of Alexander, and the Travels of Hwen-Thsang c8.s8.2

c8.s8.2

According to Hamilton, the name of *Konkana* amongst the natives includes “much country lying to the east of the western ghâts.” This extension agrees with Abu Rihân’s description of *Danaka* as the “plains of the *Konkan*,” which can only apply to the table-land above the ghâts. Such also may have been its application in the time of Hwen Thsang, as he describes the kingdom as being 5000 *li*, or 833 miles, in circuit, which, if limited to the narrow strip of land between the ghâts and the sea, would include the whole line of coast from Bombay to Mangalûr. But in the seventh century the northern half of this tract belonged to the powerful Châlukya kingdom of Mahârâshtra; and consequently, if the pilgrim's estimate of its size is correct, the kingdom of Konkana must have extended inland far beyond the line of the western ghâts. Its actual limits are not mentioned, but as it was bounded by Drâvida on the south, by Dhanakakata on the east, by Mahârâshtra on the north, and by the sea on the west, it may be described as extending along the coast from Vingorla to Kundapûr, near Bednûr, and inland from the neighbourhood of Kulbarga to the ancient fortress of Madgiri, which would give a circuit of about 800 miles. This was the ancient kingdom of the Kádambas, which for a time rivalled that of the Châlukyas of Mahârâshtra. Hamilton states that the name of the country is pronounced Kokan by the natives, which suggests its identification with the people called Cocondæ by Pliny, who occupied a middle position in the route from the south of India towards the mouth of the Indus.