On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, 629–645 A.D. v2.c22.s4.2

v2.c22.s4.2

A note added to the text at the beginning of this passage tells us that another name for this country was "South Lo", and a note to the passage in the Life calls it "South Lo-lo". For the characters read mo-la-p'o here we must suppose on original like Mālabha or Mālava, but we cannot properly regard this name as covering the modern district of Malwa. It has not been ascertained yet what was the precise situation, and what is the modern designation, of the South Lo or Mālava country.¹ This (or as Julien translates, its capital), according to the pilgrim, lay to the south-east of the river called Mo-ha in all the texts (except D), and in the Fang-chih. In the D text we have Mo-hi which is the name of a well known river. The observation which the pilgrim makes in the above passage about the fame of Mālava and Magadha is apparently a quotation from some one who lived between those two countries, for Magadha is uniformly described as being in Mid-India, not in the north-east. The Mālava of the present passage may perhaps be the Mālava of some passages of Tāranātha, but it cannot be the Mālava in Prayāga.