Geography of Early Buddhism c10.49

c10.49

Suvarṇagiri is mentioned in Minor Rock Edict I (Brahmagiri text) of Asoka. It was a viceregal seat of Asoka’s provincial government in the Deccan and here a Kumāra was posted as Viceroy. It is difficult to identify the ancient Suvarṇagiri. Hultzsch (C.I.I., p. XXVIII), however, identifies it with Kanakagiri in the Nizam’s dominions, south of Maski, and north of the ruins of Vijayanagara. Dr. H. C. Ray Chaudhuri thinks that ‘a clue to the location of this city is probably given by the inscriptions of the later Mauryas of Konkan and Khandesh, apparently the descendants of the southern Viceroy (Ep. Ind., III, 136). As these later Maurya inscriptions have been found at Vāda in the north of the Thāṇa district and at Wāghli in Khandesh, it is not unlikely that Suvarṇagiri was situated in the neighbourhood. Curiously enough there is actually in Khandesh a place called Songir.’ (PHAI., p. 195, f.n. 3.)