Studies in the Geography of Ancient and Medieval India c15.12

c15.12

Ptolemy¹ refers to the five estuaries of the river Ganges as (1) the westernmost mouth called Kambyson (144° 30′, 18° 15′), (2) the second mouth called Mega(145° 45′, 18° 30′), (3) the third mouth called Kamberikon (146° 20′, 18°40′), (4) the fourth mouth called Pseudostomon (147° 40′, 18° 30′), and (5) the fifth mouth called Antebole (148° 30′, 18° 15′). Although owing to the changes in their courses, the identification of these mouths of the Ganges with her present estuaries may not be beyond doubt, Ptolemy’s estimate of the distance between the easternmost and westernmost of them to be four degrees of latitude seems to suggest that the area washed by the estuaries of the Ganges in the second century A.D. was practically the same as it is today, that is to say, the land between the Bhāgīrathī or Hooghly river in the west and the Padmā-Meghnā estuary in the east. Elsewhere in his work,² the Greek geographer says, “All the region about the mouths of the Ganges is occupied by the Gangaridae with the following city—Gange, the royal city (i.e. capital of the country)—146°, 19° 15′.” It is clear from the above account that the people called Gangian or Ganges received their name from Gange, the chief city of their country, just as the people of Attika were known as Athenian from the capital city of Athens. In India, names of cities like Puṇḍravardhana, Karṇasuvarṇa or Tāmralipta usually also indicated the districts round them and, moreover, the names of country and its people were almost always the same. Thus, according to Ptolemy, the Ganges people or Gangians inhabited the delta of Southern Bengal watered by the lower spurs of the river Ganges. In the second century A.D., they appear to have been an autonomous people with their capital at the city of Gange which, as its name indicates, was situated on the river Ganges. The latitude and longitude of the city as given by the geographer, although they can hardly be relied on, would suggest its location not far from the confluence of the Ganges and the sea. It is not improbable that the Maroundae of Ptolemy¹ whose country abutted on that of the Gangaridae and lay to the east of the Ganges, were the Puṇḍras who had their headquarters at the city of Puṇḍravardhana, modern Mahāsthān in the Bogra District.