Cosmography and Geography in Early Indian Literature c5.s3.5

c5.s3.5

parārdhāt pṛthivyāḥ samudra-paryantāyā Ekarāḍ=iti tam=eten=aindreṇa mahābhiṣekeṇa Kṣatriyam śāpayitv=ābhiṣiñcet, “If he, who knows thus, should desire of a Kṣatriya, ‘May he win all victories, find all the worlds, attain the superiority, pre-eminence and supremacy over all kings and overlordship, paramount rule, self-rule, sovereignty, supreme authority, kingship, great kingship and suzerainty ; may he be all-encompassing, possessed of all the earth, possessed of all life, from the one end upto the further side of the earth bounded by the ocean, sole ruler,’ he should anoint him with the great anointment of Indra, after adjuring him.” Cf. Raychaudhuri, *PHAI*, 1938, pp. 139, 178 ff. ; also Sircar, *Inscriptions of Aśoka*, p. 10. The suggestion offered above would mean that all sections of the *Śatapatha* and *Aitareya Brāhmaṇas* may not be earlier than c. 400 B.C. Although the gradation of the different types of rulers cannot be regarded as strictly historical, it is less fanciful than the Buddhist conception about the ruler of the whole earth of 4 continents, of only one continent and of a part of one of the continents.