Tribes in Ancient India c77.95

c77.95

**Anūpas** The Anūpas are mentioned as a tribe in the *Vāyupurāṇa* (XIV, 134); the *Matsyapurāṇa* reads Anipa (CXIII, 54) while the *Mārkaṇḍeya Purāṇa* (LVII, 55) reads Annajas. Anūpa literally means any marshy tract or country lying not very far from the seas. In this sense the word ‘*sāgarānūpa*’ is used in several places in the *Mahābhārata*. Thus we find tracts known as Anūpa in Bengal¹ in the far south² on the western coast³ in or near about Kathiawar.⁴ From the *Harivaṃśa* we learn that the country of the Anūpa tribe lay near Surāṣṭra and Ānartta. The *Harivaṃśa* further informs us that it was to the south of Surāṣṭra (XCIV, 5142-80). In the *Mahābhārata* king Kārtavīrya and Nala are styled ‘lords of Anūpa’.⁵ It seems likely, therefore, that the Anūpas occupied the tract of country south of Surāṣṭra, around Māhiṣmatī on the Narmadā. Epigraphic evidence also lends support to such a view. The Nāsik Cave Inscription of Queen Gautamī Balaśrī records that her son conquered Anūpa along with other countries, namely, Mahārāṣṭra, Mūlaka (country round Paiṭhān), Suratha (Surāṣṭra or Kathiawar), Kukura (country near the Pāriyātra or the Western Vindhyas), Aparānta (northern Konkan), Vidarbha (Berar) and Ākarāvanti (eastern and western Malwa). Most of these tracts seem to have been reconquered from Gautamīputra by Śaka Mahākṣatrapa Rudradāman whose Junāgaḍh Rock Inscription states that his sway extended over Pūrv-āpar-ākar-āvanti (east and west Malwa), Anūpanivrit or the Māhiṣmatī (Māndhātā ?) region, Ānartta (tract round Dvārkā according to some; district round Vaḍanagara according to others),⁶ Surāṣṭra (district round Junāgaḍh), Svabhra (the country on the banks of the Sābarmatī), Maru (Marwar), Kaccha (Cutch), Sindhu-Sauvīra (the lower Indus valley), Kukura (part of Central India, probably near the Pāriyātra Mt. according to the *Bṛhatsaṃhitā*, XIV, 4), Aparānta (north Konkan), and Niṣāda (in the region of the Sarasvatī and the western Vindhyas).⁷