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Tribes in Ancient India c33: Chapter XXIX. The Vatsas

Tribes in Ancient India c33

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Chapter XXIX. The Vatsas

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The Vaśas or Vatsas were one of the peoples of Vedic Aryandom from the earliest period. A certain Vaśa Aśvya is mentioned in several hymns of the first and eighth maṇḍalas of the *Ṛgveda*, and also once in the tenth, as a protégé of the Aśvins.¹ He is also mentioned in the *Śāṅkhāyana Śrauta Sūtra*.² It would seem that this Vaśa Aśvya was a Brahmin Ṛṣi and not a Kṣatriya. He is said to have been the author of the Vaśa hymn in the *Brāhmaṇas* and the *Āraṇyakas*.³ It is possible to take Vaśa as a personal name, but it is equally likely that Vaśa here is a tribal designation and Aśvya the personal proper name.

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¹ *R.V.*, I. 112, 10; 116, 21; VIII, 8, 20; 24, 14; 46, 21, 23; 50, 9; X, 40, 7.

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² XVI, 11, 13.

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³ *Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa*, VIII, 6, 2, 3; IX, 3, 3, 19; *Aitareya Āraṇyaka*, I, 5, 1, 2; *Śāṅkhāyana* A., II, 10, 11.

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Vaśa is mentioned as the name of a people in the *Aitareya Brāhmaṇa*⁴ which says, ‘. . .Therefore, in this firm middle established quarter (Dhruva-madhyamā), whatever kings there are of the Kuru-Pañcālas with the Vaśas and Uśīnaras, they are anointed for kingship. . .’ Here we observe that the Vaśas are spoken of as one of the Vedic tribes living in the *Dhruva-madhyamā* dik or the Madhya-deśa of Manu, along with the Kurus, Pañcālas and Uśīnaras. Their connection with this tribe appears also to be proved by the *Gopatha Brāhmaṇa* (I, 2, 9) where Oldenberg reads *Sa-vaśa-Uśīnareṣu* instead of *Śavasa* in the printed edition. In the *Kauśitaki Upaniṣad*, too,⁵ we have mention of the Vaśas together with the Uśīnaras, Matsyas, Kurus and Pañcālas. The Pāli *Aṅguttara Nikāya* mentions the land of the Vamśas (identified by Oldenberg with the Vaśas) as one of the sixteen *Mahājanapadas*, along with the Cedis, Kurus, Pañcālas, Matsyas, Śūrasenas, etc., who appear to have been their close neighbours. The *Janavasabha-Suttanta* associates the Vamśas rather with the Cedis than with the Uśīnaras, and mentions the powerful ruling peoples of the time in such groups as Kāśi-Kośala, Vajji-Mallā, Cedi-Vamśa, Kuru-Pañcālā and Maccha-Sūrasenā.

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⁴ VIII, 14, 3.

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⁵ IV, 1.

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In the Pāli Buddhist canon, King Udena of the Vamśas is said to have been a contemporary of the Buddha, and to have survived him. Both in Pāli Buddhist and in Brahmanic Sanskrit literature, stories are recited about this King Udena of the Vamsas (Pāli) or Udayana of the Vatsas (Sanskrit). His capital is mentioned as Kosambī or Kauśāmbī respectively, so evidently the Vamśas and Vatsas are identical. In the Jaina books the same people are spoken of as Vacchas.¹

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¹ Uvāsagadasāo, Hoernle, Vol. II, Appendix I, p. 7.

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The country of the Vamśas or Vatsas must therefore have been located round about Kauśāmbī, the position of which has been identified by Cunningham with Kosām, not very far from Allahabad. According to the Bṛhatsaṃhitā, the land of the Vatsas was in the middle region. It probably lay to the north-east of Avanti along the bank of the Jumna, southwards from Kośala² and to the west of Allahabad.³ The Chinese pilgrim Hsüan Tsang, who speaks of the land of the Vatsas as the Kauśāmbī country, says that it was about 6,000 li in circuit.⁴

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² Buddhist India, p. 3.

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³ N. L. Dey, Geographical Dictionary, p. 100.

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⁴ Watters, On Yuan Chwang, Vol. I, p. 365.

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The Mahābhārata contains certain items of traditional information regarding the Vatsa-bhūmi or land of the Vatsas. In one passage,⁵ we are told that, prior to the Rājasūya sacrifice performed by Yudhiṣṭhira, Bhīmasena led an expedition towards the east and conquered the Vatsa-bhūmi; while in the Vanaparvan,⁶ it is stated that Vatsa was conquered by Karṇa. Elsewhere⁷ we read that the Haihayas of the Cedi country seized the capital of the Vatsas after killing Haryaśva who must have been a king of Vatsa. In the Bhīṣmaparvan,⁸ it is said that in the Kurukṣetra war, the Vatsa army took the side of the Pāṇḍavas. Nakula and Sahadeva along with the Vatsas and others guarded the left side of the Pāṇḍava army.

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⁵ Chap. 30, pp. 241-2.

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⁶ Chap. 253, pp. 513-14.

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⁷ Anuśāsanaparvan, Chap. 30, p. 1899.

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⁸ Chap. 50, p. 924.

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According to the tradition in the Harivaṃśa, the Vatsa-bhūmi was founded by a royal prince of Kāśī, while, according to the Mahābhārata proper, its capital Kauśāmbī was founded by the Cedi prince Kusāmba. The Pāli tradition in the Mahāvaṃsa Commentary⁹ suggests that fourteen pre-Ikṣvāku kings of the Solar dynasty, headed by Baladatta, ruled the Vatsa kingdom with their capital at Kauśāmbī.

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⁹ Vamsatthappakāsinī, I, pp. 128, 130.

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The Purāṇas tell us that after Hastināpura was carried away by the Ganges, Nicakṣu who was the fifth in descent from the Puru prince Parikṣit, grandson of Arjuna, transferred his capital to Kauśāmbī where altogether twenty-five Puru kings,¹⁰ from Nicakṣu to Kṣemaka, reigned.¹ In this genealogy we are given the succession of the kings of Vatsa from Nicakṣu to Kṣemaka without the length of their reigns. Udayana, who was a contemporary of the Buddha, is represented as the son and successor of Śatānīka; and the four successors of Udayana as Vahīnara, Daṇḍapāṇi, Nirāmitra and Kṣemaka. The evidence of Buddhist literature in general, and of the Pāli canon in particular, clearly proves the contemporaneity of Udayana, the king of Vatsa, with Caṇḍa Pradyota (Pāli Caṇḍa Pajjota) of Avanti, Prasenajit (Pasenadi) of Kośala, and Bimbisāra and Ajātaśatru of Magadha. It is interesting to find that the Purāṇas mention just four kings who succeeded to the throne of Avanti after Caṇḍa Pradyota, and four kings who succeeded to the throne of Kośala after Prasenajit.² The total length of the reigns of the five kings of Avanti from Pradyota to Nandivardhana is given as 138 years, Pradyota’s four successors having reigned altogether for 115 years.³ Among the kings of N. India who were contemporaries of the Buddha, Bimbisāra pre-deceased him by about 8 years, and Ajātaśatru survived the Buddha by 16 years; Prasenajit, who was of the same age as the Buddha, died almost in the same year; and though both Pradyota and Udayana survived the Buddha, they could not have lived or reigned for more than 10 or 15 years after the Buddha’s demise. Thus, on the whole, it may be surmised that Avanti, Kośala and Vatsa retained their independence for about a century after the Buddha’s death, and lost it only during the period of the Nandas. We know that when King Aśoka Maurya ascended the throne of Magadha, the three ancient kingdoms of Kośala, Vatsa and Avanti were already included in the Maurya empire. Ujjenī or Avanti was placed under a Viceroy of Aśoka, while Kauśāmbī or Vatsa was governed by a Mahāmātra.⁴

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¹⁰ Rhys Davids (Camb. Hist., I, p. 308) says: 'The later list contains the names of 29 Puru kings who lived after the war. They reigned first at Hastināpura, the

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¹ For the genealogy in full, see Pargiter, Dynasties of the Kali Age, pp. 65-6.

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² Ibid., pp. 67-8.

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³ Ibid., p. 68.

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⁴ Aśoka’s Kauśāmbī Schism Pillar Edict.

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The Lalitavistara contains a tradition according to which King Udayana was born on the same day as the Buddha.⁵ He appears to have strengthened his political position by matrimonial alliances

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⁵ Vide Foucaux, Tr. of the Tibetan version of the Lalitavistara; cf. Rockhill, The Life of the Buddha, pp. 16-17.

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ancient capital of the Kuru princes, which is usually identified with a ruined site in the Meerut district on the old bed of the Ganges, lat. 29° 9' N., long 78° 3' E. (Pargiter, Mārk. Pur., p. 355); but when this city was destroyed by an inundation of the Ganges in the reign of Nichakshu, they removed the seat of their rule to Kauśāmbī.... Another of their capitals was Indraprastha in the Kuru plain, the ancient city of the Pāṇḍu princes . . .

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with the neighbouring kings, particularly with King Caṇḍa Pradyota of Avanti. Stories of Udayana and his queens abound in Sanskrit and Pāli literature, and provide the themes for no less than four dramas.¹ The Pāli legends tell us that Udayana ascended the throne of Vatsa by the assertion and establishment of his rightful claim as the son and successor of his father Parantapa.² In the *Udenavatthu*, Vatsa is described as a *paveṇirajja*, i.e. a kingdom in which succession to the throne was determined by the law of primogeniture.³ In most of the other references, whether Brahmanical, Jaina, or Buddhist, Śatānīka (better, Śatānīka II) is represented as Udayana’s father.⁴ In the *Skandapurāṇa* alone, Sahasrānīka is represented as the father and Śatānīka as the grandfather of Udayana.⁵ The *Skandapurāṇa* speaks of Śatānīka as a king of Kauśāmbī who belonged to the family of Arjuna, was powerful and intelligent, beloved by his subjects, and who was killed in a war between the Devas and the Asuras.⁶ According to the Jaina tradition, Udayana’s father Śatānīka II invaded Campā, the capital of Aṅga, during the reign of King Dadhivāhana.⁷ According to the *Skandapurāṇa* and *Vividhatīrthakalpa*, Udayana’s mother was Queen Mṛgāvatī, granddaughter of Kṛtavarmā, king of Ayodhyā.⁸ In the plays of Bhāsa, Udayana is described as Vaidehīputra, which indicates that his mother was princess of Videha.⁹

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¹ Bhāsa’s *Svapnavāsavadattā* and *Pratijñāyaugandharāyaṇa*; Harṣa’s *Ratnāvalī* and *Priyadarśikā*. The legends of Udayana are also to be found in the *Brahmakhaṇḍa* of the *Skandapurāṇa*, the Jaina *Vividhatīrthakalpa*, the *Lalitavistara*, Tibetan Buddhist literature, Pāli *Udenavatthu*, Sanskrit *Mākandika Avadāna*, and the *Si-yu-ki* of Hsüan Tsang.

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² *Dhammapada Comm.*, I, pp. 165 foll.

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³ *Ibid.*, I, p. 169.

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⁴ *Vividhatīrthakalpa*, ed. Jina Vijaya Sūri, p. 23.

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⁵ Cf. *The Romantic Legend of Śākya Buddha*, p. 28, in which King Pih-Shing or ‘Hundred Excellences’, i.e. Śatānīka, is represented as the son of Tsien-Shing (‘Thousand Excellences’ or *Sahasrānīka*). It should be noted that ‘anika’ can also mean ‘army, host’; it would appear that Parantapa, Śatānīka and Sahasrānīka may all be taken to refer to the valour and martial strength of the king of Vatsa.

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⁶ Chap. 5, *Brahmakhaṇḍa*.

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⁷ *J.A.S.B.*, 1914, p. 321.

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⁸ *Skandapurāṇa*, Chap. V, *Brahmakhaṇḍa*.

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⁹ *Vividhatīrthakalpa*, p. 23; Bhandarkar, *Carmichael Lectures*, 1918, p. 59.

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Udayana was a warlike king who kept a strong army noted for its elephants. Envious of his fellow-monarch’s wealth and prosperity, Caṇḍa Pradyota of Avanti laid a trap for Udayana when he was visiting the frontier of his kingdom, and succeeded in taking him captive. He made his escape from captivity with the help of Vāsuladattā or Vāsavadattā, daughter of Caṇḍa Pradyota, who eloped with Udayana and became his chief queen.¹⁰

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¹⁰ *Dhammapada Comm.*, I, pp. 191-9, and *Svapnavāsavadattā*.

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According to the Pāli legend, Udayana was born and brought up in the Himalayan region, in the hermitage of a sage who was previously a native of Allakappa. He was named Udena or Udayana because of his birth, just at sunrise, on the top of a hill, and under a clear sky.¹ According to another Buddhist legend in the Tibetan Dulva, ‘as the world was illuminated at his birth, as with the sun, he was called Udayana’.²

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¹ Dhammapada Comm., I, p. 165.

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² Rockhill, Life of the Buddha, p. 17. Cf. Watters, On Yuan Chwang, I, p. 368.

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Udayana is said to have married Sāmāvatī (Śyāmāvatī), daughter of a banker of Bhaddavatī, who was brought up in the family of the banker Ghosita of Kauśāmbī. Another of his wives was Māgandiyā or Mākandikā, an exquisitely beautiful Brahmin girl from the Kuru country,³ and yet another was Padmāvatī, daughter of King Ajātaśatru of Magadha.⁴ The Ratnāvalī represents Udayana as having also married Sāgarikā, a princess from Ceylon. In the Udenavatthu, each of his three queens Vāsuladattā, Sāmāvatī and Māgandiyā, is said to have been attended by 500 dancing girls. The Priyadarśikā also speaks of a matrimonial alliance made by Udayana with Dṛḍhavarman, king of Aṅga. We are told that Udayana once helped Dṛḍhavarman to regain his throne.

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³ Udenavatthu, pp. 161 foll.

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⁴ Svapnavāsavadattā, Pratijñāyaugandharāyaṇa.

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In the Jaina Vividhatīrthakalpa (p. 23), Udayana is praised as an expert in the science of music (gandhabbaveya-niuṇo). He ruled despotically and sometimes recklessly. When his queen Māgandiyā was found guilty of putting her co-wife Sāmāvatī to death, Udayana ordered her to be buried alive. According to one Buddhist tradition, a hermit fled to Śrāvastī when his life was threatened by Udayana.⁵ On one occasion, in a fit of drunken jealousy, Udayana tortured the Buddhist Thera Piṇḍola Bhāradvāja by causing a nest of brown ants to be tied to his body. Later, however, he consulted this same Piṇḍola about various spiritual matters,⁶ and ended by professing himself his disciple. We have no evidence that he proceeded very far along the path, but his fame has lasted in a curious way in Buddhist legends. Udayana is said to have made a golden image of the Buddha,⁷ and Hsüan Tsang brought back from India many things including a statue of the Buddha carved out of sandal-wood on a transparent pedestal. This figure is described as a copy of the statue which Udayana, king of Kauśāmbī, had made.¹ It is said in the *Si-yu-ki* that in the city of Kauśāmbī, within an old palace, there was a large vihāra about 60 feet high, containing a figure of the Buddha carved out of sandal wood above which was a stone canopy. It was the work of the King U-to-yen-na (Udayana). By its spiritual qualities it produced a divine light, which from time to time shone forth. The princes of various countries had used their power to try to carry off this statue, but although many men tried, none could move it. They therefore worshipped copies of it, and pretended that their likeness was a true one, the original of all such figures.² The *Petavatthu* records the erection of a vihāra by one Uttara, a wood-carver, in the service of King Udayana.³ The figure was known to have been made for King Udayana by a distinguished artist of the time.⁴ But nowhere in the earlier tradition is Udayana mentioned as the builder of any such temple or statue.

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⁵ Watters, On Yuan Chwang, I, p. 368.

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⁶ Saṃyutta Nikāya, IV, pp. 110-2.

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⁷ Edkins, Chinese Buddhism, p. 49, 2nd Ed.

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¹ *Beal, Records of the Western World*, Vol. I, Intro., p. xx.

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² *Ibid.*, Vol. I, p. 235.

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³ This Uttara had friendly relations with Mahākaccāyana and various Buddhist Theras, but his mother was a believer in false doctrines, see *Paramatthadīpanī* on the *Petavatthu*, pp. 140-4; cf. also B. C. Law, *The Buddhist Conception of Spirits*, 2nd Ed., pp. 89-90.

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⁴ *Watters, On Yuan Chwang*, I, p. 368.

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Immediately prior to the rise of Buddhism, there were four powerful monarchies in N. India, each of which was enlarged by the annexation of a neighbouring territory. Thus Aṅga was annexed to Magadha, Kāśī to Kośala, Bharga to Vatsa, and Śūrasena to Avanti. The kingdom of Vatsa must have served as a buffer State between Magadha and Avanti on the one hand, and Kośala and Avanti on the other. Bhāsa in his *Svapnavāsavadattā* tells us that an upstart named Aruṇi ousted Udayana and seized the throne of Vatsa.⁵

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⁵ *Svapnavāsavadattā*, Sukthankar’s trsl., p. 64.

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As in earlier days, so during the reign of Aśoka in the third century B.C., Kauśāmbī stood on the high road connecting Vidiśā and Ujjayinī with Benares and Pāṭaliputra. Aśoka appears to have been an overlord of Vatsa, and to have placed its administration in charge of Mahāmātras with their headquarters at Kauśāmbī. Kauśāmbī was probably the place of residence of Aśoka’s second queen Kāluvākī, and her son Prince Tīvala; the edict on her donations was promulgated only at Kauśāmbī.

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However that may be, Vatsa was finally absorbed into the Magadhan empire,⁶ probably during the reign of Śiśunāga. We may infer from the inscriptions at Pabhosā that in the second century B.C., Vatsa (Kauśāmbī) and Pañcāla (Ahicchatra) were governed by branches of the same royal family, and that both kingdoms acknowledged the suzerainty of the Śuṅgas.¹ Dhanabhūti, a Śuṅga feudatory, is called Vacchiputa, son of a princess of Vatsa.² It may be that King Dhanabhūti, the donor of Bharhut gateways, his father Āgaraju and grandfather Viśvadeva were all local chiefs of Vatsa under the Śuṅgas.³ However that may be, the stūpa of Bharhut was erected in the Vatsa country not earlier than the second century B.C., the first pillar of its main railing being donated by Chāpādevī, wife of Revatīmitra, of Vidiśā.⁴ Revatīmitra was in all probability a member of the Śuṅga-Mitra family, stationed at Vidiśā. If this is so, we can say that when the Bharhut railing was erected, the Śuṅga dominions extended as far west as Vatsa and Avanti. As clearly proved by the inscriptions, when the Bharhut gateways were erected by King Dhanabhūti not earlier than the first century B.C., the Vatsa country was included in the Śuṅga empire (Sugaṇaṃ raje).⁵

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⁶ Bhandarkar, *Carmichael Lectures*, 1918, pp. 81 and 84.

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¹ Cambridge History of India, Vol. I, pp. 525-6.

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² Ibid., Vol. I, p. 523.

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³ Barua, Barhut, Bk. I, pp. 41-2, inclines tentatively to connect King Dhanabhūti and his predecessors with Mathurā or a nearby locality. Rapson, in Camb. Hist., loc. cit., observes: ‘We may conclude that this family ruled at Bharhut, and that it was connected in some way with the royal family at Mathurā, more than 250 miles to the north-west.’

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⁴ Barua and Sinha, Barhut Inscriptions, p. 3.

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⁵ Ibid., No. I, p. 1. See B. C. Law, Kauśāmbī in Ancient Literature, M.A.S.I., No. 60, pp. 12-13, for a further discussion on the subject.

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An inscription on the gateway on the fort of Kara, dated Saṃvat 1093 (1036 A.D.), records the grant of the village of Payalāsa (modern Prās) ‘in the Kauśāmbī-maṇḍala to one Māthura-vikaṭa of Pabhosā together with its customary duties, royalties, taxes, gold and tithes in perpetuity to his descendants by Mahārājādhirāja Yaśaḥpāla’,⁶ who was the last Pratihāra king of Kanauj. The history of Vatsa or the country of Kauśāmbī as a political unit ended with the rule of Yaśaḥpāla of Kanauj.

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⁶ J.R.A.S., 1927, p. 694.

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As we have seen, the Bhagga or Bharga State was a dependency of the Vatsa kingdom. We learn from the preface to the Dhonasākha Jātaka, No. 353, that Prince Bodhi, the son of Udayana, king of the Vatsas (by his queen Vāsuladattā or Vāsavadattā), dwelt on the Sumsumāragiri and built a palace called Kokanada. Sumsumāragiri, according to Buddhist tradition, was the capital of the Bharga kingdom; so evidently in the sixth century B.C. the territory of the Bhargas was a dependency of the Vatsa kingdom, governed by a Viceroy of the royal family of Kauśāmbī. Bhikṣu Rāhula Saṃ- krityāyana proposes to identify the Bharga country with the present Mirzapur district, and its capital Sumsumāragiri with the present Chunar hill.¹ Buddhaghoṣa suggests, however, that Sumsumāragira (not Sumsumāragiri) was the name of the principal town in the Bhagga country. Originally the Vatsas and Bhārgavas (or Bhaggas) were two ruling clans that settled down and founded kingdoms side by side. Vatsa and Bhṛgu, from whom the Vatsas and Bhārgavas respectively claimed their descent, are said to have been sons of King Pratardana of Kāśī.²

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¹ Buddhacaryā, pp. 75, 175; Ghosh, Early History of Kauśāmbī, p. 32.

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² Ray Chaudhuri, Political History of Ancient India, 4th Ed., pp. 112-13 and 159. The Mahābhārata and the Harivaṃśa testify to the close connection between the Vatsas and the Bhargas.

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The country of Kauśāmbī (i.e. Vatsa) is described as follows by the Chinese pilgrim Hsüan Tsang: ‘This country is about 6,000 li in circuit, and the capital about 30 li. The land is famous for its productiveness; the increase is very wonderful. Rice and sugarcane are plentiful. The climate is very hot, the manners of the people hard and rough. They cultivate learning and are very earnest in their religious life and in virtue’.³

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³ Beal, Records of the Western World, I, p. 235. See also Watters, On Yuan Chwang, I, p. 366.

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The Aṅguttara Nikāya⁴ speaks of the land of the Vamsas as a country which abounded in seven kinds of gems and was consequently regarded as very rich and prosperous. Kauṭilya’s Arthaśāstra mentions Vatsa as one of the countries of which the cotton fabrics were of the very best quality.⁵

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⁴ IV, pp. 252, 256, 260.

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⁵ Arthaśāstra, Shāma Śāstri’s trsl., p. 94.

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From the earliest times, the Vatsas, as the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa clearly attests, established a monarchical form of government in their land. They formally anointed their kings in accordance with the prescribed Vedic rites, and they are not known to have deviated from this practice at any period of their history. Ordeal by walking through fire was applied as a test of purity of descent of the kings.⁶ Capital punishment by impaling on a stake was inflicted on a culprit even for a light offence, as illustrated by the Jātaka story of ‘Maṇḍavya with the Peg’. When King Kosambika ruled over Kosambī in the kingdom of Vatsa, a robber committed a theft and, being chased, left the stolen goods near the door of an ascetic named Maṇḍavya, and himself escaped. When the owner of the property came there, he took the ascetic to be the robber, and brought him before the king. The king without enquiry said, ‘Off with him, impale him upon a stake’. Stakes of acacia and nimb wood did not pierce him, so concluding that the ascetic was innocent, the king ordered the stake to be drawn out. This was found to be impossible, however, so at Maṇḍavya’s suggestion the stake was cut off with the skin. Thenceforward he was called Maṇḍavya with the Peg. The king asked his pardon and settled him in the royal park.¹

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⁶ Cambridge History of India, I, p. 134.

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¹ Jātaka (Fausböll), Vol. IV, pp. 28 foll.

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According to the Buddhist legendary tradition, the Vatsa country was among those considered by the Devaputras in the Tuṣita heaven when a suitable birthplace for the Buddha was under discussion. The defects of the Vatsas and their royal family were then pointed out. For instance, it was said that the Vamsas were rude and rough, and their king an ‘Uccedavādin’; and, finally, it was decided that the royal family of Vatsa was unsuited for the honour of the Buddha’s birth.² However, when the Buddha was about to pass away, Ānanda mentioned Kauśāmbī of the Vatsas as one of six great cities suitable for the Buddha’s parinibbāna.³

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² See the Romantic Legend of Śākya Buddha, p. 28; and Lalitavistara, ed. Lefmann, p. 21.

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³ Dīgha Nikāya, pp. 146, 169.

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Kauśāmbī, the capital of the Vatsas, is identified by Cunningham with Kosām on the Jumna, about 30 miles south-west of Allahabad.⁴ The Cambridge History, following Cunningham, says that Kauśāmbī seems to have been on the south bank of the Jumna, at a point about 400 miles by road from Ujjain, and about 230 miles upstream from Benares.⁵ The Chinese pilgrims, Fā-Hien and Hsüan Tsang, give discrepant accounts of the situation of Kauśāmbī. Fā-Hien arrived there from the Deer Park to the north of Benares, after walking north-west for 13 yojanas (about 91 miles), as he says. This would make Kauśāmbī lie to the north or north-west of Prayāga, as St. Martin thinks⁶; but Hsüan Tsang, who visited Kauśāmbī twice, arrived there by going from Prayāga ‘south-west through a forest infested by wild elephants and other fierce animals, and after a journey of above 500 li (about 100 miles).’⁷

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⁴ Ancient Geography of India, p. 454. See also Rapson, Ancient India, p. 170.

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⁵ Cambridge History, Vol. I, pp. 187-8.

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⁶ Watters, On Yuan Chwang, Vol. I, pp. 366-7.

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⁷ Ibid., p. 365.

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The question of the site of Kauśāmbī has been much debated, chiefly because of the impossibility of reconciling Cunningham’s identification with the descriptions of the Chinese pilgrims. But such descriptions may either have been incorrect originally or may have been subsequently misinterpreted. For instance, there is nothing in the actual records of Hsüan Tsang to suggest that the distance given was the actual distance between Prayāga and the city of Kauśāmbī. It is likely that the pilgrim went to Kauśāmbī by a roundabout route from Prayāga. The distance and direction of Kauśāmbī from Sārnāth as given by Fā-Hien may be taken as fairly correct. The distance of 13 yojanas (about 90 or 104 miles) is almost the present distance by road from Benares to Kosam. The fact that Fā-Hien placed Kauśāmbī to the north-west of Benares may perhaps be due to his having walked along a road following a north-west direction for some distance.

c33.89

Vincent Smith considers that the site of Kauśāmbī is to be looked for near the Sutnā railway station in the valley of the Tons river.¹ As for earlier evidence, the Brāhmaṇas generally assert that Kauśāmbī stood either on the Ganges or close to it, and the discovery of the name ‘Kosambimaṇḍala’ in an inscription over the gateway of the fort of Khara seems to confirm this, although the south-west bearing from Prayāga or Allahabad as recorded by Hsüan Tsang points unmistakably to the line of the Jumna.²

c33.90

¹ J.R.A.S., 1898, p. 503.

c33.91

² For a fuller discussion of the problem, see B. C. Law, Kauśāmbī in Ancient Literature (Memoirs of the Archaeological Survey of India, No. 60).

c33.92

The Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa (XII, 2, 2, 13) mentions Proti Kausurubindi as a pupil undergoing brahmacarya under Uddālaka Āruṇi (of Upaniṣadic fame) and bearing the local epithet of Kauśāmbeya which the commentator Harisvāmin explains as meaning ‘a native of Kauśāmbī.’³ The Gopatha Brāhmaṇa (I, 4, 24) contains the same reference, but the name of Uddālaka’s pupil is here given as Predi Kausurubindu. Kosambeyaka, a Prākṛit form of Kauśāmbeya, occurs in one of the Bārhut Inscriptions, being employed to mean ‘a person from Kauśāmbī.’⁴

c33.93

³ Ray Chaudhuri, Political History of Ancient India (4th Ed.), p. 58.

c33.94

⁴ Barua and Sinha, Barhut Inscriptions, p. 12.

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Thus, from the employment of Kauśāmbeya as a local epithet of a person in the Brāhmaṇas, it may be safely inferred that the name Kauśāmbī was current as early as the Brāhmaṇa age. The Pāli canon abounds in references to Kauśāmbī as a well-known city in N. India, the capital of the Vatsa country of King Udayana. The high antiquity of Kauśāmbī as a royal city is equally proved by traditions not only in the two great Sanskrit Epics and the Purāṇas, but also in the Vamsatthappakāsinī (commentary on the Mahāvaṃsa). The Mahābhārata⁵ attributes the foundation of the city of Kauśāmbī to Prince Kuśāmba, third son of the Cedi king Uparicara Vasu. In the Rāmāyaṇa story, however, Prince Kuśāmba is described as the eldest son of an ancient king named Kuśa, who had four sons by his queen Vaidarbhī, the youngest of them being Vasu.¹ According to the *Matsyapurāṇa*, when Hastināpura was swept away by a Ganges flood, the Kuru or Bhārata king Nicakṣu, who was fifth in descent from Parikṣit, the grandson of Arjuna, abandoned Hastināpura and dwelt in Kauśāmbī.² There is, however, no suggestion made in the Purāṇa that Nicakṣu was himself the founder of the city. We are told in McCrindle’s *Ptolemy*³ that Kauśāmbī was a famous city on the river Jumna, which became the Pāṇḍu capital after Hastināpura had been swept away by the Ganges, and which was noted as the shrine of the most sacred of all the statues of the Buddha. Its fame began only with the reign of Cakra, the eighth in descent from Arjuna the Pāṇḍava.⁴ It is stated in the Purāṇas that the three sons of Adhisāmakṛṣṇa, named Nirvakta, Nemicakra and Vivakṣu, lived in Kauśāmbī after the destruction of Hastināpura by the inundation of the Ganges.⁵

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⁵ Ādiparvan (Vaṅgavāsī Ed.), Chap. 63, pp. 69-71.

c33.97

¹ *Rāmāyaṇa* (Bombay Ed.), I, 32, 1-6.

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² Ray Chaudhuri, *Political History of Ancient India* (4th Ed.), p. 58.

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³ McCrindle, *Ancient India as described by Ptolemy*, p. 72.

c33.100

⁴ Cunningham, *Ancient Geography*, p. 391.

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⁵ *Matsyapurāṇa*, Chap. 50; cf. *Vāyu* and *Bhāgavata Purāṇas*.

c33.102

Several explanations have been suggested to account for the name Kauśāmbī or Kosambī. Different traditions suggest (1) that the city was named after Prince Kuśāmba⁶; (2) that it was originally the dwelling place of the sage Kosamba⁷; (3) that the city came to be called Kosambī because when it was founded, numerous Kosamba trees were uprooted on the site,⁸ or because the town abounded in shady Kosamba trees.⁹

c33.103

⁶ See B. C. Law, *Kauśāmbī in Ancient Literature*, p. 2.

c33.104

⁷ *Paramatthajotikā*, Vol. II, p. 300. Aśvaghoṣa in his *Saundarananda Kāvya* (B. C. Law’s trsl., p. 9) refers to the hermitage (*āśrama*) of Kuśāmba, where the city of Kauśāmbī was built.

c33.105

⁸ *Papañcasūdanī*, Pt. II, pp. 389-90.

c33.106

⁹ *Vividhatīrthakalpa*, p. 23.

c33.107

Indian literature consistently refers to Kauśāmbī as a royal city, i.e. the capital of a kingdom; but in the *Si-yu-ki* of Hsüan Tsang, Kauśāmbī (Kiao-shang-mi) is represented rather as a country with its capital, which was ‘evidently named Kauśāmbī.’¹⁰ The Chinese pilgrim must have followed the later usage which represented Kauśāmbī as a political unit instead of as a mere city.¹¹

c33.108

¹⁰ Watters, *On Yuan Chwang*, I, pp. 365-6.

c33.109

¹¹ E.g., Inscription of Yaśapāla, dated Saṃvat 1093 (A.D. 1037)—Kauśāmbī is mentioned as *Kosambamaṇḍala*.

c33.110

Kauśāmbī is described in the *Trikāṇḍaśesa* (2, 1, 14) as Vatsapaṭṭana, ‘the capital of Vatsa.’¹² In the Buddhist literature, too, Kauśāmbī is described as the capital of the Vatsa country, as also in the *Kathāsaritsāgara*.¹ The *Vividhatīrthakalpa* (p. 23) definitely states that the forests of Kauśāmbī were reached along the course of the Kālimdī (i.e. Yamunā or Jumna).²

c33.111

¹² Ghosh, *Early History of Kauśāmbī*, Introd., p. xvii.

c33.112

¹ II, I.

c33.113

² Spence Hardy, *Manual of Buddhism*, p. 501. Cf. *Manorathapūraṇī*, I, pp. 306-7.

c33.114

According to the description in the *Suttanipāta* of a journey of Bāvarī’s disciples from Patiṭṭhāna to Rājagaha, Kauśāmbī was one of the halting places on the same high road which led to Sāketa and Śrāvastī. The *Vinaya Mahāvagga*³ gives a description of a somewhat different route that lay between Kauśāmbī and Śrāvastī. Kauśāmbī was the most important entrepôt for both goods and passengers coming to Kośala and Magadha from the south and west. The route from Kauśāmbī to Rājagṛha was down the river,⁴ and Kauśāmbī was also one of the chief stopping places on the way from Śrāvastī to Patiṭṭhāna.⁵

c33.115

³ Vol. I, p. 352 foll.

c33.116

⁴ Rhys Davids, *Buddhist India*, p. 36.

c33.117

⁵ *Ibid.*, p. 103.

c33.118

Kauśāmbī had great military strength. The remains at Kosam include those of a vast fortress with eastern ramparts and bastions, four miles in circuit, with an average height of 30 to 35 feet above the general level of the country. The fact that the city was an important commercial centre, is indicated by the extraordinary variety of the coins found there.⁶ Cast coins were issued at the close of the third century by the kingdoms of Kauśāmbī, Ayodhyā and Mathurā, some of which bear the names of local kings in the Brāhmī script.⁷ There is little foreign influence traceable in the die-struck coins, all closely connected in point of style, which were issued during the first and second centuries B.C. from Pañcāla, Ayodhyā, Kauśāmbī and Mathurā. A number of these bear Brāhmī Inscriptions. The coins of Kauśāmbī have a tree within a railing on the obverse.⁸ The coinage of the kings of Kauśāmbī seems to begin in the third century B.C., and to extend over a period of about 300 years.⁹

c33.119

⁶ *Cambridge History of India*, Vol. I, p. 524.

c33.120

⁷ Brown, *Coins of India*, p. 19.

c33.121

⁸ *Ibid.*, p. 20. See also *Prācīna Mudrā*, p. 105.

c33.122

⁹ *Cambridge History of India*, Vol. I, p. 525.

c33.123

In the Buddha’s time, there were four establishments or settlements of the Order in or near Kauśāmbī, each of them having a group of huts under trees. Buddhaghosa informs us that the three banker friends, Ghosita, Kukkuṭa and Pāvārika, were the great business magnates of Kauśāmbī in the Buddha’s time. All of them went on elephant-back from Kauśāmbī to Śrāvastī to wait upon the Buddha at Jetavana, and it was at their invitation that the Buddha agreed to visit Kauśāmbī. Each of the bankers built a suitable retreat for the Buddha in the neighbourhood of the city. Regarding Ghositārāma, Hsüan Tsang tells us that it was situated ‘outside the city on the south-east side with an Aśoka tope over 200 feet high’.¹ Within the city, at the south-east angle of it, there were the ruins of an old habitation, the house of Ghosita (Ghosira) the nobleman. In the middle there was a vihāra of the Buddha and a stūpa containing hair and nail relics. There were also ruins of the Tathāgata’s bathing-house.² The pilgrim has also left hints as to the location of the remaining two ārāmas. Kukkuṭārāma was situated to the south-east of Ghositārāma. At the time of his visit, it was ‘a two-storeyed building with an old brick upper chamber’.³ Pāvārika’s mango-grove was situated to the east of Ghositārāma, where the old foundations of a building were visible.⁴

c33.124

¹ Watters, On Yuan Chwang, I, p. 369. The Aśoka pillar on which Samudragupta recorded the history of his reign is supposed to have been erected originally at Kauśāmbī, which was no doubt honoured at times by the residence of the monarch (see Smith, Early History of India, p. 310, 4th Ed.).

c33.125

² Beal, Buddhist Records of the Western World, Vol. I, p. 236.

c33.126

³ Watters, On Yuan Chwang, I, p. 370.

c33.127

⁴ Ibid., p. 371.

c33.128

Besides the three retreats built by the three bankers, we read of another Buddhist retreat in or near Kauśāmbī, which was known as Badarikārāma.⁵ The Deer Park in Bhesakaḷāvana or Kesakaḷāvana⁶ in the neighbourhood of Sumsumāragira, the principal town in the Bhagga province, then ruled by Prince Bodhi as Viceroy, was the other important Buddhist retreat and early centre of Buddhist activity in the Vatsa dominion. The Park evidently belonged to Prince Bodhi, who became an ardent lay supporter of Buddhism. The story of a cordial entertainment of the Buddha and his disciples in the famous ‘Lotus Palace’ then built by Prince Bodhi is narrated in the Majjhima Nikāya.⁷

c33.129

⁵ Tipallatthamiga Jātaka (Fausböll, No. 16).

c33.130

⁶ Bodhirājakumāra Sutta, Majjhima Nikāya, II, 91; Jātaka (Fausböll), III, 157.

c33.131

⁷ Vol. II, pp. 91 foll.

c33.132

In the time of Hsüan Tsang, there were more than ten Buddhist monasteries (in or near Kauśāmbī), but all in utter ruins. The brethren, who were above 300 in number, were adherents of the Hīnayāna system. There were more than fifty deva-temples, and the non-Buddhists were very numerous.⁸

c33.133

⁸ Watters, On Yuan Chwang, Vol. I, p. 366. See also Legge, Fā-Hien, p. 96.

c33.134

The Buddha’s favourite retreat at Kauśāmbī was undoubtedly the Ghositārāma where he stayed on several occasions.¹ For instance, we read in the *Majjhima Nikāya*² that once while the Buddha was staying at the Ghositārāma, he tried to prevent the Kauśāmbian monks, who were divided into two parties, from quarrelling. From the *Surāpāna Jātaka* we learn that the Buddha, after staying for a long time at Bhaddavatika, went to Kauśāmbī where he was cordially received by the townsfolk, some of whom invited him to a meal. On this occasion the Buddha condemned the drinking of intoxicants.³ While dwelling at the Badarika monastery in Kauśāmbī, the Buddha related the *Tipallatthamiga Jātaka* about the elder Rahula.⁴

c33.135

¹ See, e.g. *Vinaya Texts*, Pt. II, p. 285; *Ibid.*, Pt. III, p. 233; *Majjhima Nikāya*, I, pp. 513ff.; *Saṃyutta Nikāya*, III, pp. 94-5; V, pp. 224, 229-30; *Sumaṅgalavilāsinī*, Pt. I, pp. 317-19; *Cullavagga (Vinaya Texts*, Pt. II, pp. 370ff).

c33.136

² *Majjhima Nikāya*, I, pp. 320 foll; Vol. III, p. 153.

c33.137

³ *Jātaka* (Fausböll), Vol. I, pp. 360 foll.

c33.138

⁴ *Ibid.*, Vol. I, pp. 160 foll.; Vol. III, pp. 64 foll.

c33.139

In the *Dhammapadatthakathā*,⁵ we read that there lived at Kauśāmbī a householder’s son, Kosambivāsī Tissathera, who took ordination from the Buddha. One of the Buddha’s chief disciples, Ānanda, also delivered several sermons at Kauśāmbī.⁶ Among famous followers of the Buddha who stayed at Ghositārāma were Sāriputta and Upavāṇa.⁷ After the passing away of the Master, and when the First Great Council was over, Mahākaccāyana lived near Kauśāmbī in a forest hermitage with twelve bhikkhus.⁸

c33.140

⁵ Vol. II, pp. 182-5.

c33.141

⁶ *Saṃyutta Nikāya*, III, pp. 133 foll.; II, pp. 115 foll.; IV, pp. 113-14.

c33.142

⁷ *Ibid.*, V, pp. 76-7.

c33.143

⁸ See *Paramatthadīpanī* on the *Petavatthu*, pp. 140-144.

c33.144

Some of the Kosambians entertained a great respect for the Buddha and the Buddhist faith, and were converted; while we are told that others went so far as to enter the Order and attain arahatship,—e.g. Gavaccha the Less.⁹ At the time of the Buddha, Sāmāvatī Therī was born in a rich householder’s family at Kauśāmbī. She was the favourite friend of Queen Sāmāvatī, wife of King Udayana. After the death of the queen, she was very much grieved, and became a bhikkhunī. Her grief was so bitter that she was unable to attain the *ariyamagga*. Afterwards listening to the instruction of Ānanda, she became free from sorrow by developing insight, and became an arahat.¹⁰

c33.145

⁹ *Psalms of the Brethren*, p. 16.

c33.146

¹⁰ *Therīgāthā Comm.*, P.T.S., pp. 44-5.

c33.147

When the Vajjian monks carried out the act of excommunication against Yasa, he is said to have risen up into the sky and descended at Kauśāmbī.¹ The *Mahāvaṃsa* tells us, however, that the venerable Yasa is said to have fled from Vaiśālī to Kauśāmbī just before the assembly of the second Buddhist Council.²

c33.148

¹ Kern, *Indian Buddhism*, p. 104.

c33.149

² Geiger, *Mahāvaṃsa*, p. 22. See also *Vinaya Texts*, Pt. III, p. 394.

c33.150

The Pārileyyaka forest, where the Buddha is said to have spent one rainy season, and the location of which is unknown, was probably not very far from Kauśāmbī.³ The town of Bhaddavatika which lay on the way from the Pārileyyaka forest to Śrāvastī was another place in the Vatsa kingdom which became associated with the life of the Buddha.⁴ Somewhere in the neighbourhood of Kauśāmbī and Ghositārāma was a cave called Pilakkhaguhā, where a Parivrājaka or wandering ascetic named Sandaka used to live with his 500 followers during the summer season. The venerable Ānanda is said to have converted Sandaka to the Buddhist faith, with all his following.⁵ In the *Dīgha Nikāya*⁶ we read that the city of Kauśāmbī was visited by two wanderers named Maṇḍissa and Jāliya, who interviewed the Buddha at Ghositārāma.

c33.151

³ *Samyutta Nikāya*, III, pp. 94-5.

c33.152

⁴ *Jātaka* (Fausböll), I, p. 360.

c33.153

⁵ *Majjhima Nikāya*, I, pp. 513 foll.

c33.154

⁶ *Dīgha Nikāya*, I, pp. 157, 159-60.

c33.155

The *Mahāvaṃsa* attests that some 30,000 bhikkhus of the Ghositārāma, headed by Thera Urudhammarakkhita, visited Ceylon in about the first century B.C., during the reign of King Duṭṭhagāmaṇi.⁷

c33.156

⁷ P.T.S., p. 228.

c33.157

In the second year of the reign of King Kaniṣka, the Buddhist nun Buddhamitrā or Buddhamitrā installed a Bodhisattva image in Kauśāmbī, which was then known to have been ‘sanctified by the Buddha’s several visits’.

c33.158

The records of the influence of religion over Vatsa and Kauśāmbī prior to the introduction of Buddhism and Jainism are few and far between. The people were supposed to have been preoccupied with worldly thoughts, but we read even in the *Brāhmaṇas* of hermits such as Proti Kausurubindi who had considerable influence. The main supporters of such hermits were the bankers of Kauśāmbī, all of whom were members of the Vaiśya caste.⁸ The introduction of Buddhism, too, was due to the religious tendencies of persons belonging to this caste, as we have seen from the story of the bankers Ghosita, Kukkuṭa, and Pāvārika. According to the Buddhist tradition in the Tibetan *Dulva*, the Buddha visited Kauśāmbī when King Udayana was busy planning a military expedition to the city of Kanakavati. The appearance of the messenger of peace was naturally looked upon and dreaded as the appearance of a bad omen.¹ It was evidently not easy to convert Udayana and members of the royal family to the new faith. There seems to be some truth in the Buddhist legends that the devotion of Queen Sāmāvatī and her attendants, and the martyrdom suffered by them, were greatly instrumental in bringing about a change of heart in Udayana and making him a supporter of Buddhism.² Here again the banker Ghosita is indirectly concerned, for Sāmāvatī was brought up with his family.

c33.159

⁸ *Dhammapada Comm.*, I, p. 203.

c33.160

¹ Rockhill, *Life of the Buddha*, p. 74.

c33.161

² *Dhammapada Comm.*, I, pp. 208ff.

c33.162

The influence of Jainism over Kauśāmbī does not appear to have been extensive. However, Kauśāmbī is known to the Jainas as the sacred place where Vardhamāna Mahāvīra was worshipped even by the Sun and Moon; and where Chandanā attained to Kaivalya. Kauśāmbī is also known to the Jainas as the place hallowed by the birth, career and death of Jina Prabha Sūri. The Pabhosā rock cave was excavated in about the first century B.C. for the residence of the Kāśyapīya arahats.

c33.163

In the inscription of the goldsmiths of Kauśāmbī, dated Saṃvat 1621 (1565 A.D.) we find that six of them call themselves Vaiṣṇavas, although the record itself contains only the prayers of five leading goldsmiths and of thirteen of their employees to Gaṇeśa and the god Bhairava ‘for favour’.

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