Studies in the Geography of Ancient and Medieval India c8.s3.115

c8.s3.115

Gauḍa is said to have extended from the Vaṅga country upto Bhuvaneśa (i.e. Bhubaneswar in Orissa). In modern times, Gauḍa implies the whole area inhabited by the Bengali-speaking people. Originally, however, the country seems to have comprised the present Murshidabad District with the exclusion of its southernmost part. The Chinese traveller Hiuen-tsang describes Karṇasuvarṇa as the name of both the kingdom and capital of Śaśāṅka who has been called ‘the lord of Gauḍa’ in the Harṣacarita. According to the Chinese pilgrim, the Raktamṛttikā-vihāra lay in the suburbs of the Karṇasuvarṇa city and the country was about 730 or 750 miles in circuit. As the monastery referred to has been located at modern Rāṅgāmāṭi (Sanskrit Rakta-mṛttikā), the identification of the Karṇasuvarṇa or Gauḍa country with the Murshidabad District is plausible. This identification is again supported by an interpolated section of the Bhaviṣya Purāṇa,¹ which says :