Studies in the Geography of Ancient and Medieval India c22.52

c22.52

Aṅguttaranikāya,¹ Suttanipāta,² etc. All these works are to be assigned to dates before the beginning of the Christian era. The Buddha is stated to have stayed at Gayā on several occasions. It was at Gayā-śīrṣa that the well-known Gayāsūtra was preached by him.³ The evidence of the Buddhist works of the Gupta age supports what has already been said above on the strength of Brahmanical literature. Buddhaghoṣa (5th century) applies the name Gayā both to a locality and a bathing place near it; but Dharmapāla (circa 6th century)⁴ in his Udāna commentary⁵ mentions Gayā-nadī and Gayā-puṣkariṇī as two distinct bathing places, both known as Gayā-tīrtha and supposed to possess the power to wash away sins: "People went there, offered sacrifices to the gods, recited the Vedas, and immersed themselves in the water."⁶ In Buddhist literature, Gayā is sometimes called Brahma-Gayā (cf. the name of old Brahma-saras and of modern Brahma-yoni at Gayā) to avoid its confusion with the Buddha's Gayā.