Pre-Buddhist India: A Political, Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey of Ancient India Based Mainly on the Jataka Stories c7.42

c7.42

THE traditional division of India into five regions is found throughout in Indian Literature. In the *Atharvaveda*,¹ already, we have this division of India as a familiar practice. So also in the well-known passage of the *Aitareya Brāhmaṇa*,² we find India divided into five great *diks*, viz., *Prācya* (Eastern),³ *Dakṣiṇā* (Southern),⁴ *Pratīcī* (Western), *Udīcī* (Northern),⁵ and *Dhruvā Madhyamā* (Central).⁶ In later times, these five ‘*diks*’ or directions are clearly stated to be *Deśas* or countries. The *Purāṇas*, also, know these five regions, though they, sometimes, add two more, viz., the *Vindhya* and the *Himavanta* regions, thus making the number seven.⁷ Rājaśekhara, in the beginning of the tenth century A.D., clearly gives the boundaries of these five divisions in the following manner: “To the east of Bārāṇasi (Benares) is the eastern country; to the south of Māhiṣmati is the Dakṣiṇāpatha or the Deccan; to the west of Devasabhā is the western country; to the north of Pṛthūdaka (mod, Pehoā, about 14 miles west of Thāṇeśwar) is the Uttarāpatha, and the tract lying between Vinaśana and Prayāga is called Antarvedi (or Madhyadeśa).⁸ The same division was adopted by the Chinese Travellers also.⁹