Cosmography and Geography in Early Indian Literature c5.s2.22

c5.s2.22

An interesting geographical name is Kurukṣetra or the field of the Kuru people. It is mentioned in the later Vedic texts as a particularly sacred territory.⁶⁶ It was the country watered by the Sarasvatī, Dṛṣadvatī and Āpayā and probably by another stream called Pastyā. There was in Kurukṣetra the Śaraṇyāvat which was probably a lake like the Anyataḥplakṣa known from the Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa. According to the Taittirīya Āraṇyaka, Kurukṣetra was bounded by the Khāṇḍava on the south, the Tūrghṇa on the north and the Parīṇaḥ on the west. It corresponded roughly with modern Sirhind or the Karnal-Ambala region of the Eastern Punjab.⁶⁷ Like the kṣetra of the Kurus, a plain called Varṣiṣṭhīya, on which Śibi Auśīnara performed sacrifices, is mentioned in the Baudhāyana Śrautasūtra.⁶⁸