Tribes in Ancient India c9.18

c9.18

The capital of the Śūrasenas, as we have seen, was Mathurā on the Jumna, at present included in the Agra division of the United Provinces. It lay on the upper Jumna, about 270 miles in a straight line north-west of Kauśāmbī. In the Pāli Buddhist literature, the name is Madhurā; Rhys Davids in his Buddhist India (p. 36) says that it is tempting to identify it with the site of the modern Mathurā, in spite of the difference in spelling. In the Lalitavistara,⁵ the city of Mathurā is mentioned as having been suggested as a possible locality for the birth of the Bodhisattva, when various places were being discussed by the gods in the Tuṣita heaven. From this it is evident that at the time that the Lalitavistara was composed, that is, in the early centuries of the Christian era, Mathurā was one of the most prominent cities of India.