Tribes in Ancient India c64.13

c64.13

Ptolemy⁴ refers to a country called Syrastrēnē, which must be identical with Surāṣṭra (= mod. Sorath in Kathiawar) on the Gulf of Kanthi (= Gulf of Kaccha or Cutch). Syrastrēnē, which extended from the mouth of the Indus to the Gulf of Cutch, was one of the three divisions of Indo-Scythia in Ptolemy’s time, —the other two being Patalene and Abiria. Syrastrēnē is also mentioned in the *Periplus of the Erythraean Sea* as the sea-board of Aberia (= Abiria = Ābhīra), which is to be identified with the region to the east of the Indus, above the insular portion formed by its bifurcation (McCrindle, p. 140). Pliny, in his enumeration of the tribes of this part of India, mentions the Horatae, —evidently a corruption of Surāṣṭra or Sorath (Lib., VI, c. XX).