Tribes in Ancient India c77.130

c77.130

The *Vāyupurāṇa* reads Aparitas and *Matsya* Purandharas instead; both are evidently erroneous. The *Bhīṣmaparvan* list of the *Mahābhārata* agrees with that of the Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa. Mention is often made of this tribe in the Mahābhārata as Aparānta or Aparāntas.¹ Generally the term is applied to all the tribes living in the western region of India. But the Mārkaṇḍeya and Bhīṣmaparvan list must also be taken to signify a particular tribe. According to the astronomical list of the Mārkaṇḍeya (Chap. 58) the tribe seems to have been located north of the Sindhu-Sauvīra country. The word Aparānta in the narrowest sense or connotation of the term, that is, the kingdom of Aparānta is identified with northern Konkan with its capital at Śūrpāraka (modern Sopara). It lay to the west of Mahārāṣṭra. It is mentioned in the inscriptions of Aśoka where we find that his empire included all the Aparāntas (Śūrpāraka, Nāsik, etc., according to the Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa (57, 49-52)). The author of the Periplus mentions King Mambarus (identified by some with Nahapāna) whose capital was Minnagara in Ariake. According to D. R. Bhandarkar Minnagara is Mandasor and Ariake is Aparāntika. Uśavadāta’s inscriptions show that Nahapāna’s political influence extended from Poona and Śūrpāraka (N. Konkan) to Mandasor and Puṣkara (Ajmīr). From the Nāsik record of Queen Gautamī Balaśrī we learn that her son extended his sway over Aparānta as well as over other western countries. Later on Aparānta was reconquered by the Śaka Satrap Rudradāman of Western India, as we find from his Junāgaḍh Rock Inscription of the year 72, that is, 150 A.D.