Tribes in Ancient India c32.27

c32.27

In the *Ādiparvan* of the *Mahābhārata*³ we read that Janamejaya, one of the earliest kings of the Paurava family, was the son of Puru and Kauśalyā. Most probably this Kauśalyā was the daughter of a king of Kośala. When Yudhiṣṭhira was about to perform his Rājasūya sacrifice, setting himself up as paramount sovereign over the whole of N. India, and his brothers went out on their expeditions of conquest, it is said that Arjuna, Kṛṣṇa and Bhīma started from the Kuru kingdom and reached Mithilā after crossing pūrva (eastern) Kośala.⁴ Afterwards, the second Pāṇḍava brother, Bhīmasena, conquered Bṛhadbala, king of Kośala,⁵ and this Bṛhadbala attended the Rājasūya sacrifice.¹ Karṇa, too, conquered Kośala and proceeded southwards after exacting tribute from the country.² Evidently the conquest of Kośala by Karṇa was later than that by Bhīmasena, for we find the Kośala king Bṛhadbala, led by Duryodhana, marching against the Pāṇḍavas.³ Perhaps it was because the Kośalas were smarting under the defeat inflicted on them by Bhīmasena that they embraced the Kaurava side in the Kurukṣetra war, in the course of which we find ten warriors including King Bṛhadbala of Kośala fighting in the van of the Kuru army.⁴ Bṛhadbala fought with Abhimanyu against whom the greatest leaders of the Kuru army led a united attack ⁵; and in the *Karṇaparvan* ⁶ we read that Bṛhadbala was killed by Abhimanyu. Sukṣetra, the son of the king of Kośala, also fought in the great war between the Kurus and the Pāṇḍavas.⁷ After the war was ended, Kośala was again attacked and conquered by Arjuna before the performance of the Aśvamedha by Yudhiṣṭhira.⁸