Studies in the Geography of Ancient and Medieval India c11.34

c11.34

According to a copper-plate inscription³ discovered at Soro in the Balasore District, in 579 A.D. Uttara-Tosali, *i.e.* ancient Utkala, was under the rule of a *Mahārāja* named Śambhuyaśas, who belonged to the Mudgala or Maudgalya *gotra*. Another inscription⁴ of the same monarch, viz. *Paramabhaṭṭāraka* Śambhuyaśas, which was found at Patiakella in the Cuttack District, says that in 602 A.D. his feudatory, *Mahārāja* Śivarāja, was ruling in Dakṣiṇa-Tosali. This record suggests further that the king Śambhuyaśas, ruler of both Uttara and Dakṣiṇa-Tosali, *i.e.* the entire coastal region of Orissa, was born in the Māna family. The name of the present Mānbhūm or Mānabhūmi seems to have been derived from the rulers of this Māna family, also known from a few other records. The Bhauma-Kara monarch Śāntikara II (middle of the tenth century) is known to have married Hirāmahādevī who was the daughter of king Siṁhamāna probably belonging to the same family as Śambhuyaśas. The Mānas appear to have been ruling over the present Mānbhūm-Singbhūm region together with the adjacent areas of Orissa.¹