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ANNALS AND ANTIQUITIES OF RAJASTHAN
COLONEL JAMES TOD.
(From the bust by Vo. Livi, 1837. By peiinission of Lt.-Col. E. W. Blunt-.Mackenzie, U.A.).
Frontispiece.
ANNALS AND ANTIQUITIES
OF
RAJASTHAN
OR THE CENTRAL AND WESTERN RAJPUT STATES OF INDIA
BY
LiEUT.-CoL. JAMES rpD
LATE POLITICAL AGENT TO THE WESTERN RAJPUT STATES
EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY
WILLIAM CROOKE, CLE.
HON. D.SC. OXON., B.A., F.R.A.l.
LATE OF THE INDIAN CIVIL SERVICE
IN THREE VOLUMES VOL. I
HUMPHREY MILFORD OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
LONDON EDINBURGH GLASGOW NEW YORK
TORONTO MELBOURNE BOMBAY
1920
[Oriyinat Dedication of the First Volume.^
TO HIS MOST GRACIOUS MAJESTY
GEORGE THE FOURTH
Sire,
The gracious permission accorded me, to lay at the foot of the Throne the fruit of my lahours, allows me to propitiate Your Majesty's con- sideration towards the object of this work, the prosecution of wliich 1 have made a paramount duty.
The Rajput princes, happily rescued, by the triumph of the British arms, from the yoke of lawless oppression, are now the most remote tributaries to Your Majesty's extensive empire ; and their admirer and annalist may, perhaps, be permitted to hope that the sighs of this ancient and interesting race for the restoration of their former independ- ence, whicli it would suit our wisest policy to grant, may be deemed not undeserving Your Majesty's regard.
With entire loyalty and devotion, I subscribe myself.
Your Majesty's
Most faithful subject and servant,
JAMES TOD.
Bird Hurst, Croydox, June 20, 1829.
[Original Dedication of the Second Volume. ]
TO HIS MOST GRACIOUS MAJESTY
WILLIAM THE FOURTH
Sire,
Your Majesty has graciously sanctioned the presentation of the Second Volume of the Annah- of Rajputana to the Public under the auspices of Your Majesty's name.
In completing this work, it has been my endeavour to draw a faithful picture of States, the ruling principle of which is the paternity of the Sovereign. That this patriarchal form is the best suited to the genius of the people may be presumed from its durability, which war, famine, and anarchy have failed to destroy. The throne has always been the watchword and rallying-point of the Rajputs. My prayer is, that it may continue so, and that neither the love of conquest, nor false views of policy, may tempt us to subvert the independence of these States, some of which have braved the storms of more than ten centuries.
It will not, I trust, be deemed presumptuous in the Annalist of these gallant and long-oppressed races thus to solicit for them a full measure of Your Majesty's gracious patronage ; in return for which, the Rajputs, making Your Majesty's enemies their own, would glory in assuming the " saifron robe," emblematic of death or victory, under the banner of that chivalry of which Your Majesty is the head.
That Your Majesty's throne may ever be surrounded by chiefs who will act up to the principles of fealty maintained at all hazards by the Rajput, is the heartfelt aspiration of.
Sire,
Your Majesty's
Devoted subject and servant,
JAMES TOD.
VOL. I
PKEFACE
No one can undertake with a light heart the preparation of a new edition of Colonel Tod's great work, The Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan. But the leading part which the Rajputs have taken in the Great War, the summoning of one of their princes to a seat at the Imperial Conference, the certainty that as the result of the present cataclysm they will be entitled to a larger share in the administration of India, have contributed to the desire that this classical account of their history and sociology should be presented in a shape adapted to the use of the modern scholar and student of Indian history and antiquities.
In the Introduction which follows I have endeavoured to estimate the merits and defects of Colonel Tod's work. Here it is necessary only to state that though the book has been several times reprinted in India and once in this country, the obvious difficulties of such an undertaking have hitherto prevented any writer better quahfled than myself from attempting to prepare an annotated edition. Irrespectively of the fact that this work was published a century ago, when the study of the history, antiquities, sociology, and geography of India had only recently started, the Author's method led him to formulate theories on a wide range of subjects not directly connected with the Rajputs. In the light of our present knowledge some of these speculations have become obsolete, and it might have been possible, without impairing the value of the work as a Chronicle of the Rajputs, to have discarded from the text and notes much which no longer possesses value. But the work is a classic, and it deserves to be treated as such, and it was decided that any mutilation of the original text and notes would be inconsistent with the object of this series of reprints of classical works on Indian subjects. The
X PREFACE
only alternative course was to correct in notes, clearly distinguished from those of the Author, such facts and theories as are no longer accepted by scholars.
It is needless to say that during the last century much advance has been made in our knowledge of Indian history, antiquities, philology, and sociology. We are now in a position to use im- proved translations of many authorities which were quoted by the Author from inadequate or incorrect versions. The translation of FerishtcCs History by A. Dow and Jonathan Scott has been superseded by that of General J. Briggs, that of the Ain-i-Akbari of F. Gladwin by the version by Professor H. Blochmann and Colonel H. S. Jarrett. For the Memoirs of Jahdnglr, the Author relied on the imperfect version by Major David Price, which has been replaced by a new translation of the text in its more complete form by Messrs. A. Rogers and H. Beveridge. For the Laws of Mann we have the translation by Dr. G. Biihler. The passages in classical literature relating to India have been collected, translated, and annotated by the late Mr. J. W. McCrindle. Much information not available for the Author's use has been provided by The History of India as told by its own Historians, by Sir H. M. Elliot and Professor J. Dowson, and by Mr. W. Irvine's translation, with elaborate notes, of N. Manueei's Storia do Magor. Among original works useful for the present edition the following may be mentioned : J. Grant Duff's History of the Mahrattas ; Dr. Vincent A. Smith's Early History of India, History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, Asoka, the Buddhist Emperor of India, and Akbar, the Great Mogul ; Professor Jadunath Sarkar's History of Aurangzib, of which only three volumes have been published ; Mr. W. Irvine's Army of the Indian Moghuls ; Sir W. Lee- Warner's Protected Princes of India.
Much historical, geographical, and ethnological information has been collected in the new edition of the Imperial Gazetteer of India the Bombay Gazetteer edited by Sir J. M. Campbell, and, more particularly, in the revised Gazetteer of Rajputana, including that of Mewar and the Western States Residency and BIkaner Agency by Lieutenant-Colonel K. D. Erskine, and that of Ajmer by Mr. C. C. Watson. Lieutenant-Colonel Erskine's work, based on the best local information, has been of special value, and it is much to be regretted that this officer, after serving as Consul-
PREFACE xi
General at Baghdad, was invalided and died in England in 1914, leaving that part of the Gazetteer dealing with the Eastern States, Jaipur, Kotah, and Bundi, unrevised. For botany, agriculture, and natural productions I have used Sir G. Watt's Dictionary of the Economic Products of India, and liis Commercial Products of India ; for architecture and antiquities, J. P'ergusson's History of Indian and Eastern Architecture, edited by Dr. J. Burgess, and The Cave Temples of India by the same writers. In ethnology I have consulted the pubUcations of the Etluiological Survey of India, of which Mr. H. A. Rose's Glossary of the Tribes and Cartes of the Punjab and North-West Frontier Province, Mr. Bhimbhai Kirparam's account of the Hindus and Ivhan Bahadur FazaluUah LutfuUah's of the Musalmans of Gujarat, published in the Bombay Gazetteer, vol. ix. Parts i. ii., have been specially valuable. Besides the general works to which reference has been made, many articles on Rajputana and the Rajputs will be found in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society and its Bombay branch, in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, and in the Indian Antiquary, and other periodicals. The Reports of the Archaeological Survey of India conducted by Sir A. Ciumingham, Dr. J. Burgess, and Sir J. H. Marshall, are of great importance.
I cannot pretend to have exhausted the great mass of new information available in the works to which I have referred, and in others named in the Bibhography ; and it was not my object to overload the notes which are already voluminous. To the general reader the system of armotation which I have attempted to carry out may appear meticulous ; but no other course seemed possible if the work was to be made more useful to the historian and to the scholar. The editor of a work of tliis class is forced to undertake the somewhat invidious duty of calUng attention to oversights or errors either in fact or theory. But this does not detract from the real value of the work. In some cases I have been content with adding a note of interroga- tion to warn the reader that certain statements must be received with caution. As regards geography, I have in many cases indicated briefly the position of the more important places, so far as they can be traced in the maps with which I was provided. The Author was so intimately acquainted with the ground, that he assumed in the general reader a degree of knowledge which he does not possess.
xii PREFACE
The text and notes, with the exception of a few obvious over- sights, have been reprinted as they stood in the first edition, and as tlie latter is often quoted in books of authority, I have added its pagination for facihty of reference. It was decided, after much consideration, to correct the transHteration of personal and place names and other vernacular terms according to the system now adopted in official gazetteers, maps, and reports. This change might have been unnecessary if the transliteration of these words, according to the system in use at the time when the book was written, had been uniformly correct. But this is not the case. At the same time I have preserved the original readings of those names which have become established in popular usage, such as " Mogul," " Mahratta," " Deccan," in place of "Mughal," "Marhata," " Dakkhin." Following the Author's example, I have not thought it necessary to overload the text by the use of accents and diacritical marks, which are useless to the scholar and only embarrass the general reader. But in the Index I have accentuated the personal and place names so far as I beheved I could do so with safety. Some of these I have been unable to trace in later authorities, and I fear that I may have failed to secure complete miiformity of method.
The scheme of the book, which attempts to give parallel accounts of each State, naturally causes difficulty to the reader. A like embarrassment is felt by any historian who endeavours to combine in a single narrative the fortvmes of the Mughal Empire with those of the kingdoms in Bengal, the Deccan, or southern India ; by the historian of Greece, where the centre of activity sliifts frona Athens to Sparta, Thebes, or Macedonia ; by the historian of Giermany before the minor kingdoms were more or less fully absorbed by the HohenzoUerns. I have endeavoured to assist the reader in dealing with these independent uimals by largely extending the original Index, and by the use of page headings and paragraph summaries.
In the dates recorded in the summaries I have generally followed LieuLenant-Colonel Erskine's guidance, so far as his work was available. In view of the inconsistencies between some dates in the text and those recorded in the sununaries, it must be remembered that it was the Author's habit in adapting the dates of the Samvat tu those of the Christian era, to deduct 56,
PREFACE xiii
not 57 from the former, contrary to the practice of modern historians.
I am indebted to many friends for assistance. Captain C. D'. M'K. Blunt has kindly given me much help in the record of Colonel Tod's life, and has suppUed a photograph of the charming miniature of the Author as a young officer and of a bust which have been reproduced in the frontispieces. Mr. R. E. Enthoven, C.I.E., has given me the photograph of the Author engaged in his studies with his Jain Guru.^ The fragments of local ballads scattered through the text were unfortunately copied from very incorrect texts. Dr. L. P. Tessitori, an Itahan scholar, who, until the outbreak of the War, was engaged in collecting the local ballads of the Rajputs, has given a correct version of these ballads ; and in improving the text of them I have been assisted by Colonel C. E. Luard, his Pandit, and Sir G. Grierson, K.C.I.E. Since the greater part of the following pages was in type, I have received copies of three reports by Dr. L. P. Tessitori, " A Scheme for the Bardic and Historical Survey of Rajputana," and two Progress Reports for the years 1915 and 1916, pubUshed in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal (New Series, vol. x. No. 10 ; xii. No. 3 ; xiii. No. 4). These contain information regarding the MSS. copies of some ballads and inscriptions, which throw Ught on the traditions and antiquities of the Rajputs. I regret that I was imable to use these papers, which, however, do not supply much information on questions connected with The Annals. Among other friends who have helped me in various ways I may name the late Sir G. Birdwood; Mr. W. Foster, CLE. ; Professor A. Keith, F.R.S. ; Lieutenant-Colonel Sir D. Prain, F.R.S. ; and Dr. Vincent A. Smith, CLE.
W. CROOKE.
1 This picture, supposed to be the work of Ghasi, the Author's artist, was recently discovered in Rajputana,
CONTENTS
PAGE
Preface by the Editor ...... ix
Introduction ry the Editor . . . . . xxv
BiRLIOGRAPHY ........ xlvii
Author's Introduction ...... Iv
BOOK I GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN OR RAJPUTANA
BOOK II HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
CHAPTER 1
Genealogies of the Rajput princes — The Puranas — Connexion of
the Rajputs with tlie Scytliic tribes . . . .23
CHAPTER 2
Genealogies continued — Fictions in the Puranas — -Union of the regal and the priestly characters — Legends of the Puranas confirmed by the Greek historians . . . .29
CHAPTER 3
Genealogies continued — Comparisons between the lists of Sir W. Jones, IMr. Bentley, Captain Wiiford, and the Author — Synchronisms . . . . . . .39
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 4
PAGE
Foundations of States and Cities by the different tribes . . 45
CHAPTER 5
The dynasties wliich succeeded Rama and Krishna — The Pandava
family — Periods of tlie different dynasties . . .55
CHAPTER 6
Genealogical history of tlie Rajput tribes subsequent to Vikrama- ditya — Foreign races wluch entered India — Analogies be- tween the Scythians, the Rajputs, and the tribes of Scan- dinavia ........ 68
CHAPTER 7
Catalogue of the Thirty-six Royal Races . . . .97
CHAPTER 8 Reflections on the present political state of the Rajput tribes . 145
BOOK III
SKETCH OF A FEUDAL SYSTEM IN RAJASTHAN
CHAPTER 1
Introduction — Existing condition of Rajasthan — General re- semblance between the ancient systems of Asia and Europe — Noble origin of the Rajput race — Rathors of Rlarwar — Kachhwahas of Amber — Sesodias of Mewar — Gradation of ranks — Revenues and rights of the Crown — Barar — Khar Lakar ........ 153
CONTENTS xvii
CHAPTER 2
PAGE
Legislative authority — Rozina — Military service — Inefficiency of
this form of government ...... 170
CHAPTER 3
Feudal incidents — Duration of grants .... 184
CHAPTER 4
Rakliwali — Servitude — Basai — Gola and Das — Private feuds and
composition — Rajput Pardhans or Premiers • . . 203
CHAPTER 5
Adoption — Reflections upon the subjects treated . . . 220
Appendix ..... . . 228
BOOK IV ANNALS OF MEWAR
CHAPTER 1
Origin of the Guhilot princes of Mewar — Authorities — Kanaksen the founder of the present dynasty — His descent from Rama — He emigrates to Saurashtra — Valabhipura — Its sack and destruction by the Huns or Parthians .... 247
CHAPTER 2
Birth of Goha — He acquires Idar — Derivation of the term " Guhilot " — Birth of Bappa — Early religion of the Guhilots — Bappa's liistory — Oghana Panarwa — Bappa's initiation into the worship of Siva — He gains possession of Chitor — Remark- !> able end of Bappa — Four epochs established, from the second i to the eleventh century . . . . . . ' 258
xviii CONTENTS
CHAPTER 3
PAOE
Alleged Persian extraction of the Ranas of Mewar — Authorities for it — Implied descent of the Ranas from a Christian princess of Byzantium — Tlie Author's reflections upon tliese points . 271
CHAPTER 4
Intervening sovereigns between Bappa and Samarsi — Bappa's descendants — Irruptions of the Arabians into India — Cata- logue of Hindu princes who defended Chitor . . 281
CHAPTER 5
Historical facts furnished by the bard Chand — Anangpal — Prithiraj — Samarsi — Overthrow of the Chauhan monarch by the Tatars — Posterity of Samarsi — Rahap — Changes in the title and the triSe of its prince — Successors of Rahap • 297
CHAPTER 6
Rana Lakhamsi — Attack on Chitor by Alau-d-din — Treachery of Ala — Ruse of the Chitor chiefs to recover Bhimsi — Devotion of the Rana and his sons — Sack of Chitor by the Tatars — Its destruction — Rana Ajaisi — Hamir — He gains possession of Cliitor — Renown and prosperity of Mewar — lihetsi — Lakha 307
CHAPTER 7
Delicacy of the Rajputs — The occasion of changing the rule of primogeniture in Mewar — Succession of the infant Mokalji, to the prejudice of Chonda, the rightful heir — Disorders in Mewar through the usurpations of the Rathors — Chonda expels them from Chitor and takes Mandor — Transactions between Mewar and Marwar — Reign of Mokalji — His assassination ....... 322
CHAPTER 8
Succession of Kumbha — He defeats and takes prisoner Mahmud of Malwa — Splendour of Kumbha's reign — Assassinated by his son — The murderer dethroned by Raemall — Mewar in- vaded by the imperial forces — RaemalFs successes — Feuds of the family — Death of Raemall .... 333
CONTENTS xix
CHAPTER 9
PAGE
Accession of Rana Sanga— State of the Muhammadan power — Grandeur of Mewar — Sanga's victories — Invasions of India — Babur's invasion — Defeats and kills the King of Dellii — Opposed by Sanga — Battle of Khanua — Defeat of Sanga — His death and character — Accession of Rana Ratna — His death — Rana Bikramajit — His character — Disgusts his nobles — Chitor invested by the King of Malwa — Storm of Chitor — - Sakha or immolation of the females — Fall and plunder of Chitor — Humayun comes to its aid — He restores Chitor to Bikramajit, who is deposed by the nobles — Election of Banbir — Bikramajit assassinated .... 348
CHAPTER 10
The bastard Banbir rules Mewar — Attempted assassination of the posthumous son of Sanga — ^Udai Singh's escape and long concealment — Acknowledged as Rana — The Dauna described — Udai Singh gains Chitor — Deposal of Banbir — Origin of the Bhonslas of Nagpur — Rana Udai Singh — His unworthi- ness — Humayun expelled the throne of India — Birth of Akbar — Humayun recovers his throne— His death — Accession of Akbar— Characters of Akbar and Udai Singh contrasted — Akbar besieges Chitor, which is abandoned by the Rana — Its defence — Jaimall and Patta — Anecdotes of Rajput females — Sakha or Johar — General assault — Chitor taken — Massacre of the inliabitants — Udai Singh founds the new capital Udaipur— His death . . . . . .367
CHAPTER 11
Accession of Partap — The Rajput princes unite with Akbar — Depressed condition of Partap — He prepares for war — Maldeo submits to Akbar — Partap denounces connexion with the Rajput princes — Raja Man of Amber — Prince Salim invades Mewar — Battle of Haldighat — Partap encounters Salim, is wounded, and saved by the Jhala chief — Assisted in liis flight by his brother Sakta — Kumbhalmer taken by Akbar — Udaipur occupied by the Moguls — Partap cuts off Farid and his army — Partap's family saved by the Bhils — The Khankhanan^ — Aggravated hardships of Partap — ^He negotiates with Akbar— Prithiraj of Bikaner — -The Khushroz described — Partap abandons Mewar — Departure for the Indus — Fidelity of his minister — Returns — Surprises the Moguls — Regains Kumbhalmer and Udaipur — His successes — His sickness and death ..... 385
XX CONTENTS
CHAPTER 12
PAGE
Amra mounts the throne — Akbar's death through an attempt to
poison Raja Man — Amra disregards the promise given to his > father — Conduct of the Salumbar chief — Amra defeats the Imperial armies — Sagarji installed as Rana in Chitor — Re- signs it to Amra — Fresh successes — Origin of the Saktawats ' — ^The Emperor sends his son Parvez against the Rana, who is defeated — Mahabat Khan defeated — Sultan Khurram in- vades Mewar — Amra's despair and submission — Embassy from England — Amra abdicates the throne to his son — Amra's seclusion — His death — Observations . • . 407
CHAPTER 13
Rana Karan fortifies and embellishes Udaipur — The Ranas of Mewar excused attendance at court — Bhim commands the contingent of Mewar — Leagues with Sultan Khurram against Parvez — Jahangir attacks the insurgents — Bhim slain — Kliurram flies t» Udaipur — His reception by the Rana — Death of Karan — Rana Jagat Singh succeeds — Death of Jahangir and accession of Khurram as Shah Jahan — Mewar enjoys profound peace — ^The island palaces erected by Jagat Singh — Repairs Chitor — His death — Rana Raj Singh — ^Deposal of Shah Jahan and accession of Aurangzeb — Causes for attachment to the Hindus of Jahangir and Shah Jahan — Aurangzeb's character ; imposes the Jizya or capitation tax on the Rajputs — Raj Singh abducts the in- tended wife of the emperor and prepares for war — Aurangzeb marches — The valley of Girwa — Prince Akbar surprised — Defeated — Blockaded in the mountains — Liberated by the heir of Mewar — Diler Khan defeated — Aurangzeb defeated by the Rana and his Rathor allies — Aurangzeb quits the field — Prince Bhim invades Gujarat — The Rana's minister ravages Malwa — United Rajputs defeat Azam and drive him from Chitor — Mewar freed from the Moguls — ^War carried into Marwar — Sesodias and Rathors defeat Sultan Akbar — Rajput stratagem — ^Design to depose Aurangzeb and elevate Akbar to the throne — Its failure— The Mogul makes over- tures to the Rana — Peace — ^Terms — The Rana dies of his wounds — His character, contrasted with that of Aurangzeb — Lake Rajsamund — Dreadful famine and pestilence . 427
CHAPTER 14
Rana Jai Singh — Anecdote regarding him and his twin brother — The Rana and Prince Azam confer — Peace — Rupture — The Rana forms the Lake Jaisamund — ^Domestic broils — Amra, the heir-apparent, rebels — The Rana dies — Accession of Amra — His treaty with the heir of Aurangzeb — Reflections on the
CONTENTS XX
PAGE
events of tliis period — Imposition of the Jizya or capitation tax — Alienation of the Rajputs from the empire — Causes — Aurangzeb's death — Contests for empire — Bahadur Shah, emperor — The Sikhs declare for independence — Triple alliance of the Rajput States of Mewar, Marwar, and Amber — They commence hostilities — Death of the JMogul Bahadur Shah — Elevation of Farrukhsiyar — He marries the daughter of the Prince of Marwar — Origin of the British power in India — The Rana treats with the emperor — The Jats declare their independence — Rana Amra dies — His character . . 45G
CHAPTER 15
Rana Sangram — Dismemberment of the Mogul Empire — Nizamu-1 Mulk establishes the Haidarabad State — Murder of the Emjieror Farrukhsiyar — Abrogation of the Jizya-*— Muhammad. Shah, Emperor of Delhi- — Saadat KJian obtains Oudh — Repeal of the Jizya confirmed — Policy of Mewar — Rana Sangram dies — Anecdotes regarding him — Rana Jagat Singh II. succeeds — Treaty of triple alliance with Marwar and Amber — The Mahrattas invade and gain footing in Malwa and Gujarat — Invasion of Nadir Sliah — Sack of Delhi — Condition of Rajputana — Limits of Mewar — Rajput alliances — Bajirao invades Mewar — Obtains a cession of annual tribute — Contest to place Madho Singh on the throne of Amber — Battle of Rajmahall — The Rana defeated — He leagues wth Malharrao Holkar — Isari Singh of Amber takes poison — The Rana dies — His character . . .472
CHAPTER 16
Rana Partap II. — Rana Raj Singh II. — Rana Arsi — Holkar in- vades Mewar, and levies contributions — Rebellion to depose the Rana — A Pretender set up by the rebel chiefs — Zalim Singh of Kotah — ^The Pretender unites vnth Sindhia — ^Their combined force attacked by the Rana, who is defeated — Sindhia invades Mewar and besieges Udaipur — Amra Chand made minister by the Rana — His noble conduct — ^Negotiates with Sindhia, who withdraws — Loss of territory to Mewar — Rebel chiefs return to their allegiance — Province of Godwar lost — Assassination of the Rana — Rana Hamir succeeds — Contentions between the Queen Regent and Amra — His noble conduct, death, and character — Diminution of the Mewar territory . . , . . . .496
CHAPTER 17
Rana Bliim — Feud of Sheogarh — The Rana redeems the alien- ated lands — Ahalya Bai attacks the Rana's army — Which is defeated — Chondawat rebellion — Assassination of the
i CONTENTS
PAciE
Minister Soniji— The rebels seize on Chitor — Mahadaji Sindhia called in by the Rana — Invests Chitor — The rebels surrender — Designs of Zalim Singh for power in Mewar — Counter- acted by Ambaji, who assumes the title of Subahdar, con- tested by Lakwa — Effects of these struggles — Zalim obtains Jahazpur — Holkar invades Mewar — Confines the priests of Nathdwara — Heroic conduct of the Chief of Kotharia — Lakwa dies — The Rana seizes the Mahratta leaders — Liberated by Zalim Singh — Holkar returns to Udaipur — Imposes a heavy contribution^Sindhia's invasion — Re- flections on their contest with the British — Ambaji projects the partition of Mewar — Frustrated — Rivalry for Krishna Kunwari, the Princess of Mewar, produces war throughout Rajasthan — Immolation of Krishna — Amir Khan and Ajit Singh — Their villainy — British Embassy to Sindhia's Court at Udaipur — Ambaji is disgraced, and attempts suicide — Airur Khan and Bapu Sindhia desolate Mewar — The Rana forms a treaty with the British . . . . .511
CHAPTER 18
Overthrow of the predatory system — Alliances with the Rajput States — Envoy appointed to Mev/ar — Arrives at Udaipur — Reception — Description of the Court^ — ^Political geography of Mewar — The Rana — His character — His ministers — Plans — Exiles recalled — Merchants invited — Bhilwara established — Assembly of the nobles — Charter ratified ; Resumptions of land ; Anecdotes of the Chiefs of Arja, Badnor, Badesar, and Amet — Landed tenures in Mewar — Village rule — Free- hold {bupota) of Mewar — Bhumia, or allodial vassals : Char- acter and privileges— Great Register of Patents— Traditions exemplifying right in the soil — The Patel ; his origin ; character — Assessment of land-rents — General results . 547
ILLUSTRATIONS
Bust of Colonel James Tod Section of Country
Fror
TO F
itispiece
ACE PAGE
10
List of Thirty-six Royal Races
98
Salumbar .
216
Sanskrit Grant
232
Palace of Udaipur
247
Palace of Rana Blilm
312
Ruins of Fortress of Bayana
362
Chitor
382
Rajmahall
428
Jagmandir
432
Maharaja BliTin Singli
512
Facsimile of Native Drawing
572
VOL. 1
INTRODUCTION
James Tod, the Author of this work, son of James Tod and Mary Heatly, was born at Islington on March 20, 1782. His father, James Tod the first, eldest son of Henry Tod of Bo'ness and Janet Monteath, was born on October 26, 1745. In 1780 he married in New York Mary, daughter of Andrew Heatly, a member of a family originally settled at Mellerston, Co. Berwick, where they had held a landed estate for some four centuries. Andrew Heatly emigrated to Rhode Island, where he died at the age of thirty-six in 1761. He had married Mary, daughter of Sueton Grant, of the family of Gartinbeg, really of Balvaddon, who left Inverness for Newport, Rhode Island, in 1725, and Temperance Talmage or Tollemache, granddaughter of one of the first and principal settlers at Easthampton, Rhode Island. He had been forced to emigrate to America during the Protectorate, owing to his loyalty to King Charles I. James Tod, the first, left America, and in partnership with his brother John, became an indigo- planter at Mirzapur, in the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh. .Tames Tod, the second, was thus through his father and his uncles Patrick and S. Heatly, both members of the Civil Service of the East India Company, closely connected with India, and in 1798, being then sixteen years old, he obtained through the influence of his imcle, Patrick Heatly, a cadetship in the service of the East India Company. On his arrival at Calcutta he was attached to the 2nd European Regiment. -In 1800 he was trans- ferred, with the rank of Lieutenant, to the 14th Native Infantry, from which he passed in 1807, with the same rank, to the 25th Native Infantry. In 1805 he was appointed to the command of the escort of his friend Mr. Graeme Mercer, then Government Agent at the Camp'of Daulat Rao Sindhia, who had been defeated
xxvi INTRODUCTION
two years before at the battle of Assaye by Sir Arthur Wellesley. In more than one passage in The Annals Tod speaks of Mr. Graeme Mercer with respect and affection, and by him he was introduced to official life and Rajput and Mahratta politics. His tastes for geographical inquiries led liim to undertake surveys in Rajputana and Central India between 1812 and 1817, and he employed several native surveyors to traverse the then little - known region between Central India and the valley of the Indus.
At this period the Government of India was engaged in a project for suppressing the Pindaris, a body of lawless free- booters, of no single race, the debris of the adventurers who gained power during the decay of the Mughal Empire, and who had not been incorporated in the armies of the local powers which rose from its ruins. In 1817, to effect their suppression, the Governor-General, the Marquess of Hastings, collected the strongest British force which up to that time had been assembled in India. Two armies, acting in co-operation from north and south, converged on the banditti, and met with rapid success. Sindhia, whose power depended on the demoralized condition of Rajputana, was overawed ; Holkar was defeated ; the Raja of Nagpur was captured ; the Mahratta Peshwa became a fugitive ; the Pindaris were dispersed. One of their leaders, Amir Khan, who is frequently mentioned in Tod's narrative, disbanded his forces, and received as his share of the spoils the Principality of Tonk, still ruled by his descendants.
In the course of this campaign Tod performed valuable services. At the beginning of the operations he supplied the British Staff with a rough map of the seat of war, and in other ways his local knowledge was utilized by the Generals in cha;-ge of the operations. In 1813 he had been promoted to the rank of Cajitain in command of the escort of the Resident, Mr. Richard Strachey, who nominated him to the post of his Second Assistant. In 1818 he was appointed Political Agent of Western Rajputana, a post which he held till his retirement in June 1822. The work which he carried out in Rajputana during this period is fully described in The Annals and in his " Personal Narrative." Owing to Mahratta oppression and the ravages of the Pindaris, the condition of the country, political, social, and economical, was deplorable. To remedy this prevailing anarchy the States were gradually brought under British control, and their relations with
INTRODUCTION xxvii
the paramount power were embodied in a series of treaties. In this work of reform, reconstruction, and conciliation, Tod played an active part, and the confidence and respect with which he was regarded by the Princes, Chiefs, and peasantry enabled him to interfere with good effect in tribal quarrels, to rearrange the fiefs of the minor Chiefs, and to act as arbitrator between the Rana of Me war and his subjects.
Tod was convinced that the miserable state of the country was chiefly due to the hesitation of the Indian Government in interfering for the re-establishment of order ; and on this ground he does not hesitate to condemn the cautious policy of Lord Cornwallis during his second term of office as Governor- General. Few people at the present day would be disposed to defend the policy of non-intervention. " This policy has been condemned by historians and commentators, as well as by statesmen, soldiers, and diplomatists ; by Mill and his editor, H. H. Wilson, and by Thornton ; by Lord Lake and Sir John Malcolm. The mischief was done and the loss of influence was not regained for a decade. It was not till the conclusion of an expensive and pro- tracted campaign, that the Indian Government was replaced in the position where it had been left by Wellesley. The blame for tliis weak and unfortmiate policy must be divided between Corn- wallis and Barlow, between the Court of Directors and the Board of Control." But it was carried out in pursuance of orders from the Home Government. " The Court of Directors for some time past had been alarmed at Lord Wellesley's vigorous foreign policy. Castlereagh at the Board of Control had taken fright, and even Pitt v/as carried away and committed himself to a hasty oi^inion that the Governor -General had acted imprudently and illegally." ^
Tod tells us little of his relations with the Supreme Government during his four years' service as Political Agent. He was notori- ously a partisan of the Rajput princes, iDarticularly those of Mewar and Marwar ; he is never tired of abusing the policy of the Emperor Aurangzeb, and, fortunately for the success of his work, Muhammadans form only a shght minority in the population of Rajputana. Tliis attitude naturally exposed him to criticism. Writing in 1824, Bishop Heber,^ while he recognizes that he was
1 W. S. Seton Carr, The Marquess Cornwallis, 180, 189 f. 2 Narrative of a Journey through the Upper Provinces, ed. 1861, ii. 54-
xxviii INTRODUCTION
held in affection and respect by "all the upper and middhng classes of society," goes on to say : " His misfortiine was that, in consequence of his favouring the native princes so much, the Government of Calcutta were led to suspect him of corruption, and consequently to narrow his powers and associate other officers with him in his trust till he was disgusted and resigned his place. They are now, I beheve, well satisfied that their suspicions were groundless. Captain Todd {sic) is strenuously vindicated from the charge by all the officers with whom I have conversed, and some of whom had abundant means of knowing what the natives themselves thought of him." The Bishop's widow, in a later issue of the Diary of her husband, adds that " she is anxious to remove any unfavourable impressions which may exist on the subject by stating, that she has now the authority of a gentleman, who at the time was a member of the Supreme Covmcil, to say, that no such imputation was ever fixed on Colonel Todd's (sic) character."
Whatever may have been the real reason for the premature termination of liis official career at the age of forty, iU-health was put forward as the ostensible cause of his retirement. He had served for about twenty-four years in the Indian plains without any leave ; he had long suffered from malaria ; and, though he hardly suspected it at the time, an attempt had been made by one of his servants to poison him with Datura ; he had met with a serious accident when, by chance or design, his elephant-driver dashed his howdah against the gate of Begun fort in eastern Mewar. In spite of all this, he retained sufficient health to make, on the eve of his departure from India, the extensive tour recorded in his Travels in Western India. Neither on his retirement, nor at any subsequent period, were liis services, official and hterary, rewarded by any distinction.
During his seventeen years' service in Central India and Kajputana he showed indefatigable industry in the collection of the materials which were partially used in liis great work. His taste for the study of liistory and antiquities, etluiology, popular religion, and superstitions was stimulated by the pioneer work of Sir W. Jones and other writers in the Asiatic Researches. He was not a trained philologist, and he gained much of liis information from liis Guru, the Jain Yati Gyanchandra, and the Brahman Pandits whom he employed to make inquiries on his
INTRODUCTION xxix
behalf. They, too, were not trained scholars in the modern sense of the term, and many of his mistakes are due to his rash- ness in following their guidance.
His hfe was prolonged for tliirteen years after he left India. In 1824, he attained the rank of Major, and in 1826 that of Lieu- tenant-Colonel. Much of his time in England was spent in arranging liis materials and compiling the works upon which his reputation depends : The Annals, pubhshed. between 1829 and 1832 ; and his Travels in Western India, published after his death, in 1839. He was in close relations with the Royal Asiatic Society, of wliich he acted for a time as Librarian. In this fine collection of books and manuscripts he gained much of that discursive learning which appears in' The Annals. He presented to the Society niunerous manuscripts, inscriptions, and coins. The fine series of drawings made to illustrate his works by Captain P. T. Waugh and a native artist named Ghasi, have recently been rearranged and catalogued in the Library of the Society. They well deserve inspection by any one interested in Indian art. He also made frequent tours on the Continent, and on one occasion visited the great soldier, Comit Benoit de Boigne, who died in 1830, leaving a fortune of twenty millions of francs.
On November 16, 1826, Tod married Juha, daughter of Dr. Henry Clutterbuck, an eminent London surgeon, by whom he had two sons and a daughter. In 1835 he settled in a house in Regent's Park, and on November 17 of the same year he died suddenly wliile transacting business at the office of his bankers, Messrs. Robarts of Lombard Street. The names of his descend- ants will appear from the pedigree appended to this Introduction.
The Annals of Rajasthan, the two volumes of which were, by permission, dedicated to Kings George IV. and WiUiam IV. respectively, was received with considerable favour. A con- temporary critic deals with it in the following terms : ^ " Colonel Tod deserves the praise of a most delightful and industrious collector of materials for history, and his own narrative style in many places displays great freedom, vigour, and perspicuity. Though not always correct, and occasionally stiff and formal, it is not seldom highly animated and picturesque. The faults of his work are inseparable from its nature ; it would have been almost impossible to mould up into one continuous history the ^ Quarterly Review, vol. xlviii. Oct.-Dec. 1832, pp. 38 f.
X5£X INTRODUCTION
distinct and separate annals of the various Rajput races. The patience of the reader is thus imavoidably put to a severe trial, in having to reascend to the origin, and again to trace downwards the parallel annals of some new tribe — sometimes interwoven Avith, sometimes entirely distinct from, those which have gone before. But, on the whole, as no one but Colonel Tod could have gathered the materials for such a work, there are not many who could have used them so well. No candid reader can arise from its perusal without a very high sense of the character of the Author — no scholar, more certainly, without respect for his attainments, and gratitude for the service which he has rendered to a branch of literature, if far from popular, by no means to be estimated, as to its real importance, by the extent to which it may command the favour of an age of duodecimos."
In estimating the value of the local authorities on which the liistory is based. Tod reposed undue confidence in the epics and ballads composed by the poet Chand and other tribal bards. It is believed that more than one of these poems have disappeared since his time, and these materials have been only in part edited and translated. The value to be placed on bardic literature is a question not free from difficulty. " On the faith of ancient songs, the uncertain but the only memorials of barbarism," says Gibbon, " they [Cassiodorus and Jornandes] deduced the first origin of the Goths." ^ The poet may occasionally record facts of value, but in his zeal for the honour of the tribe which he represents, he is tempted to exaggerate victories, to minimize defeats. This is a danger to which Indian poets are particularly exposed. Their trade is one of fulsome adulation, and in a state of society like that of the Rajputs, where tribal and personal rivalries flourish, the temptation to give a false colouring to history is great. In fact, bardic literature is often useful, not as evidence of occurrences in antiquity, but as an indication of the habits and beliefs current in the age of the writer. It exhibits the facts, not as they really occurred, but as the writer and lais contemporaries supposed that they occurred. The mind of the poet, with all its prejudices, projects itself into the distant past. Good examples of the methods of the bards will appear in the attempt to connect the Rathors with the dynasty of Kanauj, or to represent the Chauhans as the founders of an empire in the Deccan.
^ Decline and Fall, ed. W. Smith, i. 375.
INTRODUCTION xxxi
Recent investigation has thrown much new hght on the origin of the Rajputs. A wide gulf hes between the Vedic Kshatriya and the Rajput of medieval times which it is now impossible to bridge. Some clans, with the help of an accommodating bard, may be able to trace their lineage to the Kshatriyas of Buddhist times, who v.ere recognized as one of the leading elements in Hindu society, and, in their own estimation, stood even higher tlxan the Brahmans.^ But it is now certain that the origin of many clans dates from the Saka or Kushan invasion, which began about the middle of the second century B.C., or more certainly, from that of the ^Vl^lite Huns who destroyed the Gupta empire about A.D. 480. The Gurjara tribe connected with the latter people adopted Hinduism, and their leaders formed the main stock from which the higher Rajput families sprang. When these new claimants to princely honours accepted the faith and institutions of Brahmanism, the attempt would naturally be made to ainiiate themselves to the mythical heroes whose exploits are recorded in the Mahabharata and Ramayana. Hence arose the body of legend recorded in The Annals by wliich a fabulous origin from the Sun or Moon is ascribed to two great Rajput branches, a genealogy claimed by other princely families, like the Incas of Peru or the Mikado of Japan. Or, as in the case of the Rathors of Marwar, an equally fabulous story was invented to link them with the royal house of Kanauj, one of the genuine old Hindu ruling families. The same feeling lies at the root of the Aeneid of Virgil, the court poet of the new empire. The clan of the emperor Augustus, the lulii, a jiatrician family of Alban origin, was represented as the heirs of lulus, the supposed sou of Aeneas and founder of Alba Longa, thus linking the new Augustan house with the heroes of the Iliad.
One of the merits of Tod's work is that, though his knowledge of ethnology was imperfect, and he was unable to reject the local chronicles of the Rajputs, he advocated, in anticipation of the conclusions of later scholars, the so-called " Scythic " origin of the race. To make up for the lack of direct evidence of Scythian manners and sociology to support this position, he was forced to rely on certain superficial resemblances of custom and belief, not between Rajputs, Scythians and Hims, but between Rajputs,
1 V. A. Smith, Early History of India, 3rd ed. 408 ; Rhys Davids, Buddhist India, 60 f.
xxxii INTRODUCTION
Getae or Thracians, or the Germans of Tacitus. In the same way a supposed identity of name led him to identify the Jats of northern India with the Getae or with the Goths, and finally to bring them with the Jutes into Kent.
A similar process of groping in semi-darkness induced him to make constant references to serpent worship, which, as Sir E. Tylor remarked, " years ago fell into the hands of speculative writers who mixed it up with occult philosophies, druidical mysteries, and that portentous nonsense called the ' Arkite sym- bolism,' till now sober students hear the very name of ophiolatry with a shudder." ^ He repeatedly speaks of a people whom he calls the " Takshaks," apparently one of the Scytliian tribes. There is, however, no reason to beheve that serpent worship formed an important element in the beliefs of the Scythians, or to suppose that the cult, as we observe it in India, is of other than indigenous origin.
The more recent \aews of the origin of the Rajputs may be briefly illustrated in comiexion with some of the leading septs. Dr. Vincent A. Smith holds that the term Kshatriya was not an ethnical but an occupational designation. Rajaputra, ' son of a Raja,' seems to have been a name applied to the cadets of ruhng houses who, according to the ancient custom of tribal society, were in the habit of seeking their fortunes abroad, winning by some act of valour the hand of the princess whose land they visited, and with it the succession to the kingdom vested in her under the system of Mother Right. Sir James Frazer has described various forms of this mode of succession in the case of the Kings of Rome, Ashanti, Uganda, in certain Greek States, and other places.^ Dr. Smith goes on to say : " The term Kshatriya was, I beheve, always one of very vague meaning, simply denoting the Hindu ruhng classes wliich did not claim Brahnianical descent. Occasion- ally a raja might be a Brahman by caste, but the Brahman's place at court was that of a minister rather than that of king." " This ollice in Rajputana, as we learn from numerous instances in The Annals, was often taken by members of the Bania or mercantile class, because the Brahmans of the Desert, by their laxity of
1 Primitive Culture, 2nd ed. ii. 239.
* Lectures on the Early History of the Kingship, 231 £E. ; The Golden Bough, 3rd ed. ; The Magic Art, ii. 269 ff. 3 Early History oj India, 408.
INTRODUCTION xxxiii
practice, had acquired an equivocal reputation, and were gener- ally illiterate. The Rajput has always, untU recent times, favoured the Bhat or bard more than the Brahman.
The group denoted by the name Kshatriya or Rajput thus depended on status rather than on descent, and it was therefore possible for foreigners to be introduced into the tribes without any violation of the prejudices of caste, which was then only partially developed. In later times, under Brahman guidance, the rules of endogamy, exogamy, and confarreaiio have been deiinitely formulated. But as the power of the priesthood increased, it was necessary to disguise this admission of foreigners imder a convenient fiction. Hence arose the legend, told in two different forms in The Annals, wliich describes how, by a solemn act of purification or initiation, under the superintendence of one of the ancient Vedic Risiiis or inspired saints, the " fire-born " septs were created to help the Brahmans in repressing Buddhism, Jainism, or other heresies, and in estabhshing the ancient tradi- tional Hindu social pohcy, the temporary downfall of which, under the stress of foreign invasions, is carefully concealed in the Hindu sacred Uterature. This privilege was, we are told, confined to four septs, known as Agnikula, or ' fire-born ' — the Pramar, Parihar, Chalukya or Solanki, and the Chauhan. But there is good reason to beheve that the Pramar was the only sept which laid claim to this distinction before the time of the poet Chand, who flourished in the twelfth century of our era.^ The local tradition in Rajputana was so vague that in one version of the story Vasishtha, in the other Visvamitra, is said to have been the olficiating priest.
In the case of the Sesodias of Mewar, Mr. D. R. Bhandarkar has given reasons to beheve that Gehlot or Guliilot means simply ' son of Guliila,' an abbreviation of Guhadatta, the name of its founder.^ He is said to have belonged to the Gurjara stock, kinsmen or aUies of the Huns who entered India about the sixth century of our era, and founded a kingdom in Rajputana with its capital at Bhilmal or Srimal, about fifty miles from Mount Abu,
^ Journal Royal Asiatic /Society, 1905, I 11". The tradition seems to have started earlier in Southern India, y. Krishnaswami Aiyangar, Ancient India, 1911, 390 ff.
- Journal Asiatic Society Bengal, 1909, 167 ff. The criticism by Pandit Mohaulal Vishnulal Pandia [ibid., 1912, 63 ff.) is extremely feeble.
xxxiv INTRODUCTION
the scene of the regeneration of the Rajputs. This branch, which took the name of Maitrika, is said to be closely connected with the Mer tribe, which gave its name to Merwara, and is fully described in The Annals. The actual conqueror of Chitor, Bapa or Bappa, is said in inscriptions to have belonged to the branch known as Nagar, or ' City ' Brahmans which has its present headquarters at the town of Vadnagar in the Baroda State. Tliis conversion of a Brahman into a Rajput is at first sight starthng, but the fact implies that the institution of caste, as we observe it, was then only imperfectly estabfished, and there was no difficulty in believing that a Brahman could be ancestor of a princely house which now claims descent from the Sun. As will appear later on, Bapa seems to be a historical personage. These facts help us to understand the strange story in The Annals, which tells how Gohaditya received inauguration as chief by having his forehead smeared with blood drawn from the finger of a BhJl, a form of the blood covenant which appears among many savage tribes.^ In those days no definite hne was drawn between the Bhlls, now a wild forest tribe, and the Rajputs. The Bhils were the free lords of the jungle, original owners of the soil, and though they practised rites and followed customs repulsive to orthodox Hindus, they did not share in the impvu-ity which attached to foul outcastes like the Dom or the Chandala. , As the Bhils were believed to be autochthonous, and thus understood the methods of controlling or conciliating the local spirits, by this form of inauguration they passed on their knowledge to the Rajputs whom they accepted as their lords. The relations of the Minas, another jungle tribe of the same class, with the Kachhwahas of Jaipur were of the same kind.
According to the bardic legend given in The Annals, the Rathors, the second great Rajput clan, owed their origin to a migration of a body of its members to the western Desert when the territory of Kanauj was conquered by Shihabu-d-din in a.d. 1193. But it is now certain that the ruling dynasty of Kanauj belonged, not to the Rathor, but to the Gaharwar clan, and that the first Rathor settlement in Rajputana must have occurred anterior to the conquest of Kanauj by the Musalmans. An inscription, dated a.d. 997, found in the ruins of the ancient town of Hathundi or Hastikundi in the Bali Hakumat of the Jodhpur j ^ E. S. Hartland, Primitive Paternity, i. 258 ff.
INTRODUCTION xxxv
State, names four Rathor Rajas who reigned there in the tenth century.^ The local legend is an attempt to connect the line of Rathor princes with the Kanaiij dynasty. It has been suggested that the Deccan dynasty of the Rashtrakiitas which, in name at least, is identical with Rathor, reigning at Nasik or Malkhed from A.D. 753 to 973, was connected with the Reddis or Raddis, a caste of cultivators which seem to have migrated from Madras into the Deccan at an early period. But any racial connexion between the Deccan Reddis and the Rathors of Rajputana is very doubtful.* *
The Chandel clan, ranked in The Annals among the Thirty- six Royal Races, is believed to be closely connected with the Bhars and Gonds, forest tribes of Bundelkhand and the Central Provinces. Mr. R. V. Russell prefers to connect them with the Bhars alone, on the ground that the Gonds, according to the best traditions, entered the Central Provinces from the south, and made no effective settlement in Bundelkhand, the headquarters of the Chandels.^ But there was a Gond settlement in the Hainlrpur District of Bundelkhand, and the close connexion between the Gonds and the Chandels began in what is now the Chhatarpur State.
The results of recent investigations into Rajput ethnology are > thus of great importance, and enable us to correct the bardic legends on which the genealogies recorded in The Annals were founded. Much remains to be done before the question can be finally settled. The local Rajput traditions and the ballads of the bards must be collected and edited ; the ancient sites in Rajputana must be excavated ; physical measurements, now somewhat discredited as a test of racial affinities, must be made in larger numbers and by more scientific methods. But the general thesis that some of the nobler Rajput septs are descended from Gurjaras or other foreigners, while others are closely connected with the autochthonous races, may be regarded as definitely proved.
One of the most valuable parts of The Annals is the chapter
1 K. D. Eiskine, Gazetteer Western Rajput States and Bikaner Agency, A. i. 177.
2 Bombay Gazetteer,!. Part i. 385; Bombay Census Heport, 1911, i. 279; Smith, Early History, 413.
s Tribes and Castes of llie Central Provinces, iv. 441.
xxxvi INTRODUCTION
describing the popular religion of Mewar, the festival and rites in honour of Gauri, the Mother goddess. There are also many incidental notices of cults and superstitions scattered through the work. A race of warriors like the Rajputs naturally favours the worship of Siva who, as the successor of Rudra, the Vedic storm-god, was originally a terror-inspiring deity, a side of his character only imperfectly veiled by his euphemistic title of Siva, ' the blessed or auspicious One.' In his phallic manifestation his chief shrine is at Eklingji, ' the single or notable phallus,' about fourteen miles north of Udaipur city. The Ranas hold the office of priest-kings, Dlwans or prime-ministers of the god. Their association with this deity has been explained by an in- scription recently found in the temple of Natha, ' the Lord,' now used as a storeroom of Jhe Eklingji temple.^ The inscription, dated a.d. 971, is in form of a dedication to LakulTsa, a form of Siva represented as bearing a club, and refers to the Saiva sect known as Lakullsa-Pasapatas. It records the name of a king named Sri-Bappaka, ' the moon among the princes of the Guhila dynasty,' who reigned at a place called Nagahvada, identified with Nagda, an ancient town several times mentioned in The Annals, the ruins of which exist at the foot of the hill on which the temple of Eklingji stands. Sri-Bappaka is certainly Bapa or Bappa, the traditional founder of the Mewar dynasty, which had at that time its capital at Nagda. From this inscription it is clear that the Eklingji temple was in existence before a.d. 971, and, as Mr. Bhandarkar remarks, " it shows that the old tradition about Nagendra and Bappa Rawal's infancy given by Tod had some historical foundation, and it is intelligible how the Ranas of Udaipur could have come to have such an intimate connexion with the temple as that of high priests, in which capacity they still officiate." This office vested in them is a good example of one of those dynasties of priest-kings of which Sir James Frazer has given an elaborate account.^
The milder side of the Rajput character is represented in the cult of Krishna at Nathdwara. The Mahant or Abbot of the temple, situated at the old village of Siarh, twenty-two miles
^ D. R. Bhandarkar, Journal Bombay Branch Royal Asiatic Society, 1916, Art. xii.
2 The. Golden Bauqh, 3rd ed. ; The Magic Art, i. 44 flf. ; Adonis, Attis, Osiris, i. 42 f., 143 £f.
INTRODUCTION xxxvii
from the city of Udaipur, enjoys semi-royal state. In anticipation of tlie raid by Aurangzeb on Mathura, a.d. 1669-70, tlie ancient image of Kesavadeva, a form of Krishna, ' He of the flowing locks,' was removed out of reach of danger by Rana Raj Singh of Mewar. When the cart bearing the image arrived at Siarh, the god, by stopping the cart, is said to have expressed liis inten- tion of remaining there. This was the origin of the famous temple, still visited by crowds of pilgrims, and one of the leading seats of the Vallabhacharya sect, ' the Epicureans of the East,' whose practices, as disclosed in the famous Maharaja libel case, tried at Bombay in 1861, gave rise to grievous scandal.^ The ill-feeling against this sect, aroused by these revelations, was so intense that the Maharaja of Jaipur ordered that the two famous images of Krishna worshipped in his State, which originally came from Gokul, near Mathura, should be removed from his territories into those of the Bharatpur State.
Tod bears witness to the humanizing effect on the Rajputs of the worship of this god, whom he calls " the Apollo of Braj," the holy land of Krishna near Mathura. He also asserts that the Emperor Akbar favoured the worship of Krishna, a feeling shared by his successors Jahangir and Shah Jahan. Akbar, in his search for a new faith to supersede Islam, of which he was parens cultor et infrequens, dallied with Hindu Pandits, Parsi priests, and Christian missionaries, and he was doubtless well informed about the sensuous ritual of the temple of Nathdwara.^
The character of the Rajputs is discussed in many passages in The Annals. The Author expresses marked sympathy with the people among whom his official life was spent, and he expresses gratitude for the courtesy and confidence which they bestowed upon him. This applies specially to the Sesodias of Mewar and the Rathors of Marwar, with whom he lived in the closest intimacy. He sliows, on the other hand, a decided prejudice against the Kachhwahas of Jaipur, of whose diplomacy he disapproved. This feeling, we may suspect, was due in part to their hesitation in accepting the British alliance, a policy in which he was deeply interested.
1 Karsandas Mulji, History of the Sect of the Maharajas or Vallabhdcharyas, London, 1865 ; Report of the Mahdrdj Libel Case, Bombay, 1862 ; F. S. Growse, Mathura, 3rd ed. 283 f.
2 V. A. Smith, Akbar, The Great Mogul, 162 ff.
xxxviii INTRODUCTION
The virtues of the Rajput He on the surface — their loyalty, devotion, and gallantry ; their chivalry towards women ; their regard for their national customs. Their weaknesses — though Tod does not enumerate them in detail — are obvious from a study of their history — their instability of character, their liability to sudden outbreaks of passion, their tendency to yield to panic on the battlefield, their inability, as a result of their tribal system, to form a permanent combination against a public enemy, their occasional faithlessness to their chiefs and allies, their excessiv-e use of opium. These defects they share with most orientals, but, on the whole, they compare favourably with other races in the Indian Empire. There is much in their character and institutions which reminds us of the Gauls as pictured by Mommsen in a striking passage.^ Rajput women are described as virtuous, affectionate, and devoted, taking part in the control of the family, sharing with their husbands the dangers of war and sport, con- temptuous of the coward, and exercising a salutary influence in public and domestic affairs.
Strangely enough, Tod omits to give us a detailed account of their marriage regulations and ceremonies. According to Mr. E. H. Kealy,^ while male children under one year old exceed the females, " the excess is not sufficiently great to justify the con- clusion that female babies are murdered, nor is the theory that female infants lost their lives by neglect supported by the statistics. Unhappily the returns show that a high proportion of married women is combined with a very low percentage of females as compared with males between the ages of ten and fourteen, the early stage of married life, and this defect is largely due to premature cohabitation, lack of medical attendance, and of sanitary precautions." No one can read without horror the many narratives of the Johar, the final sacrifice by which womei\ in the hour of defeat gave their lives to save their honour, and of the numerous cases of Sati. Both these customs are now only a matter of history, but so late as 1879 General Hervey was able to count at the Bikaner palace the handmarks of at least thirty- seven widows who ascended the pyre with their lords.*
Much space in The Annals is occupied by a review of the
1 History of Rome, ed. 1866, iv. 209 if. '
* Censufs Report, Rajpittana, 1911, i. 132.
* Some Rerorch of Crime, ii, 217 f.
INTRODUCTION xxxix
so-called ' Feudal ' system in Rajputana. Tod was naturally attracted in the course of his discursive reading by Henry Hallam's View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages, which first appeared in 1818, four years before Tod resigned his Indian appointment. Hallam himself was careful to point out that " it is of great importance to be on our guard against seeming analogies which vanish away when they are closely observed." ^ This warning Tod unguardedly overlooked. Hallam recognized that Feudalism was an institution the ultimate origin of which is still, to some extent, obscure. It possibly began with the desire for protection, the rakhzvdli of the Rajputs, but it seems to have been ultimately based on the private law of Rome, while the influence of the Church, interested in securing its endowments, was a factor in its evolution. In its completed form it represented the final stage of a process which began under the Frankish conquerors of Gaul. At any rate, it was of European origin, and though it absorbed much that was common to the types of tribal organization found in other parts of the world, it was moulded by the political, social, and economical environment amidst which it was developed. Hence, while it is possible to trace, as Tod has done, certain analogies between the tribal institutions of the Rajputs and the social organization of medieval Europe — analogies of feudal incidents connected with Reliefs, Fines upon alienation, Escheats, Aids, Wardship, and Marriage — these analogies, when more closely examined, are found to be in the main superficial. If we desire to undertake a comparative study of the Rajput tribal system, it is unnecessary to travel to medieval Europe, while we have close at hand the social organization of more or less kindred tribes on the Indian borderland, Pathans, Afghans, or ^aloch ; or, in a more primitive stage, those of the Kandhs, Gonds, Mtindas, or Oraons. It is of little service to compare two systems of which only the nucleus is common to both, and to place side by side institutions which present only a factitious similitude, because the social development of each has progressed on different lines.
The Author's excursions into philology are the diversions of a- clever man, not of a trained scholar, but interested in the subject as an amateur. In his time the new learning on oriental subjects had only recently begun to attract the attention of
1 View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages, 12th ed. 1868, i. 186. VOL. I d
xl • INTRODUCTION
scholars, of which Sir W. Jones was the prophet. Tod was a diligent student of The Asiatic Researches, the publication of which began at Calcutta in 1788. While much material of value is to be found in these volumes, many papers of Captain Francis Wilford and others are full of rash speculations which have not survived later criticism. Tod is not to blame because he followed the guidance of scholars who contributed articles to the leading Indian review of his time ; because he was ignorant of the laws of Grimm or Verner ; because, like his contemporaries, he believed that the mythology of Egypt or Palestine influenced the beliefs of the Indian people. It was his fate that many of his guesses were quoted with approval by writers like T, Maurice in his Indian Antiquities, and by N. Pococke in his India in Greece. It is also well to remember that many of the derivations of the names of Indian deities, confidently proposed by Kuhn and Max Muller a few years ago, are no longer accepted. Tod, at any rate, published his views on Feudalism and Philology without any pretence of dogmatism.
One special question deserves examination — the constant references to the cult of Bal-Siva, a form of the Sun god. A learned Indian scholar. Pandit Gaurishankar Ojha, who is now engaged on an annotated edition of The Annals in Hindi, states that no temple or image dedicated to tliis god is known in Rajputana. It is, of course, not unlikely that Siva, as a deity of fertility, should be associated with Sun worship, but there is no evidence of the cult on which Tod lays special stress- It is almost useless to speculate on the source of his error. It may be based on a reference in the Ain-i-Akhari ^ to a certain Balnath, Jogi, who occupied a cell in a place in the Sindh Sagar Duab of the Panjab. At the same time, like many of the writers of his day, he may have had the Semitic Baal in his mind.
It was largely due to imperfect information received from his assistants that he shared with other writers of the time the con- fusion between Buddhism and Jainism, and supposed that the former religion was introduced into India from Central Asia. His elaborate attempt to extract history and a trustworthy scheme of chronology from the Puranas must be pronounced to be a failure. Recently a learned scholar, Mr. F. E. Pargiter, has
1 ii. 315.
INTRODUCTION xli
shown how far an examination of these authorities can be con- ducted with any approach to probability.^
The questions wliich have been discussed do not, to any important extent, detract from the real value of the work. Even in those points which are most open to criticism, The Annals possesses importance because it represents a phase in the study of Indian religions, ethnology, and sociology'. No one can examine it without increasing pleasure and admiration for a writer who, immersed in arduous official work, was able to in- dulge his tastes for research. His was the first real attempt to investigate the beliefs of the peasantry as contrasted with the official Brahmanism, a study which in recent years has revolu- tionized the current conceptions of Hinduism. Even if his versions of the inscriptions which he collected fail to satisfy the requirements of more recent scholars, he deserves credit for rescuing from neglect and almost certain destruction epigraphical material for the use of his successors. The same may be said of the drawings of buildings, some of which have fallen into decay, or have been mutilated by their careless guardians. When he deals with facts which came under his personal observation, his accounts of beliefs, folk-lore, social life, customs, and manners possess permanent value.
He observed the Rajputs when they were in a stage of transi- tion. Isolated by the inaccessibility of their country, they were the last guardians of Hindu beliefs, institutions, and manners against the rising tide of the Muhammadan invasions ; without their protection much that is important for the study of the Hindus must have disappeared. To avoid anarchy and the ultimate destruction of these States, it was necessary for them ta accept a closer union with the British as the paramount power. By this they lost something, but they gained much. The new connexion involved new duties and responsibiUties in adapting their primitive system of government to modern requirements. Tod thus stood at the parting of the ways. With the introduction of the railway and the post-office, the disappearance of the caravan as a means of transport, the increase of trade, the gi-owth of new wants and possibilities of development in association with the
^ " Ancient Indian Genealogies and Chronology," " Earliest Indian Traditional History," Journal Royal Asiatic Society, January 1910, April 1914.
xlii INTRODUCTION
Empire, the period of Rajput isolation came to a close. To some it may be a matter of regret that the personal rule of the Chief over a people strongly influenced by what they term swdmldharma, the reciprocal loyalty of subject to prince and of prince to people, should be replaced by a government of a more popular type. But this change was, in the nature of things, inevitable. As an example of this, a statement made by the Maharaja of BIkaner, when he was summoned to attend the Imperial Conference in 1917, may be quoted. " In my own territories we inaugurated some years ago the beginnings of a representative assembly. It now consists of elected, as well as nominated, non-official members, and their legislative powers follow the lines of those laid down for the Legislatures of British India in the 1909 reforms. In respect to the Budget they have the same powers as those conferred on the Supreme and Provincial Legislatures in British India by the Lansdowne reforms in force from 1893 to 1909. When announcing my intention of creating this representative body, I intimated that as the people showed their fitness they would be entrusted with more powers. Accordingly, at the end of the first triennial term, when the elections will take place, we are revising the rules of business in the direction of greater liberality and of removing unnecessary restrictions." It remains to be seen how far this policy will prove to be successful.
It was a happy accident that before the period of transi- tion had begun in earnest, such a competent and sympathetic observer should have been able to examine and record one of the most interesting surviving phases of the ancient Hindu polity.
A soldier and a sportsman, Tod learned to understand the romantic, adventurous side of the Rajput character, and he recorded with full appreciation the fine stories of manly valour, of the self-sacrifice of women, the tragedies of the sieges of Chitor, the heroism of Ranas Sanga and Partab Singh, or of Durgadas. Many of these tales recall the age of medieval chivalry, and Tod is at his best in recording them. No one can read without admira- tion his account of the attack of the Saktawats and Chondawats on Untala ; of Suja and the tiger ; the tragedy of Krishna Kunwari ; of the queen of Ganor ; of Sanjogta of Kanauj ; of Guga Chauhan and Alu Hara. In many of these tales the Rajput displays the loyalty and valour, the punctilious regard for his
INTRODUCTION xliu
personal honour wliicli in the case of the Spanish grandee have passed into a proverb.
While the Rajput is courteous in his intercourse with those who are prepared to take him as he is, when he meets an English officer he resents any hint of patronage, he is jealous of any intrusion on the secluded folk behind the curtain, and he is often rather an acquaintance than a friend, inchned to shelter himself behind a dignified reserve, unwilUng to open his mind to any one who does not accept his traditional attitude towards men of a different race and of a different faith. When he makes a cere- monial visit to a European officer, his conversation is often con- fined to conventional compliments, or chat about the weather and the state of the crops.
To remove these difficulties which obstruct friendly and con- fidential intercourse, the young officer in India may be advised to study the methods illustrated in this work. But he will do well to avoid Tod's openly expressed partisanship. He owed the affection and respect bestowed upon Mm by prince and peasant, and even by the jealously guarded ladies of the zenanah, to his kindhness and sympathy, his readiness to converse freely with men of aU classes, his patience in hstening to grievances, even those wliich he had no power to redress, his impartiahty as an arbitrator between the Rana of Mewar and his people or between individuals or sects unfriendly to each other. He studied the national traditions and usages ; he knew enough of reUgious behefs and of social customs to save lihn from giving offence by word or deed ; he could converse with the people in their own patois, and could give point to a remark by an apt quotation of a proverb or a scrap of an old ballad.
When, if ever, a new history of the Rajputs comes to be written, it must be largely based on Tod's collections, supple- mented by wider historical, antiquarian, and epigraphical research. The liistory of the last century cannot be compiled until the recent administration reports, now treated as confidential, and the muniment rooms of Calcutta and London are open to the student. But it is unlikely that, for the present at least, any writer will enjoy, as Tod did, access to the records and correspond- ence stored in the palaces of the Chiefs.
For the Rajput himself and for natives of India interested in the history of their coimtry, the work will long retain its value.
xliv INTRODUCTION
It preserves a record of tribal rights and privileges, of claims based on ancient tradition, of feuds and their settlement, of genealogies and family history which, but for Tod's careful record, might have been forgotten or misinterpreted even by the Rajputs themselves. In the original Enghsh text which many Rajputs are now able to study they will find a picture of tribal society, now rapidly disappearing, drawn by a competent and friendly hand. Its interest will not be diminished by the fact that while the writer displays a hearty admiration for the Rajput character, he is not blind to its defects. At any rate, the Rajput will enjoy the satisfaction that his race has been selected to furnish the materials for the most comprehensive monograph ever compiled by a British officer describing one of the leading peoples of India.
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Yule, Sir H. ; Burnell, A. C. Hobson-Jobson : A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Words and Phrases. 2nd ed. London, 1903,
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST VOLUME OF THE ORIGINAL EDITION
Much disappointment has been felt in Europe at the sterility of the liistoric muse of Hindustan. When Sir William Jones first began to explore the vast mines of Sanskrit literature, great hopes were entertained that the history of the world would acquire considerable accessions from this source. The sanguine expecta- tions that were then formed have not been realized ; and, as it usually happens, excitement has been succeeded by apathy and indifference. It is now generally regarded as an axiom, that India possesses no national history ; to which we may oppose the remark of a French Orientalist, who ingeniously asks, whence Abu-1 Fazl obtained the materials for his outlines of ancient Hindu history ? ^ Mr. Wilson has; indeed, done much to obviate this prejudice, by his translation of the Raja Tarangini, or History of Kashmir,^ which clearly demonstrates that regular historical composition was an art not unknown in Hindustan, and affords satisfactory ground for concluding that these productions were once less rare than at present, and that further exertion may bring more relics to Ught. Although the labours of Colebrooke, Wilkins, Wilson, and others of our own countrymen, emulated by
^ M. Abel Remusat, in his Melanges Asiatiques, makes many apposite and forcible remarks on this subject, which, without intention, convey a just reproof to the lukewarmness of our countiymen. The institution of the Royal Asiatic Society, especially that branch of it devoted to Oriental translations, may yet redeem this reproach.
2 Asiatic Researches, vol. xv. [The Rajatarangini of Kalhana has been translated by M. A. Stein, 2 vols., London, 1910.]
VOL. I Iv e
Ivi AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
many learned men in France [viii] and Germany,^ have revealed to Europe some of the hidden lore of India ; still it is not pre- tended that we have done much more than pass the threshold of Indian science ; and we are consequently not competent to speak decisively of its extent or its character. Immense libraries, in various parts of India, are still intact, which have sur^ved the devastations of the Islamite. The collections of Jaisalmer and Patan, for example, escaped the scrutiny of even the lynx-eyed Alau-d-din who conquered both these kingdoms, and who would have shown as little mercy to those literary treasures, as Omar displayed towards the Alexandrine library. Many other minor collections, consisting of thousands of volumes each, exist' in Central and Western India, some of which are the private property of princes, and others belong to the Jain commimities.^
If we consider the political changes and convulsions which have happened in Hindustan since Mahmud's invasion, and the in- tolerant bigotry of many of his successors, we shall be able to account for the paucity of its national works on history, without being driven to the improbable conclusion, that the Hindus were
^ When the genius and erudition of such men as Schlegel are added to the zeal which characterizes that celebrated writer, what revelations may we not yet expect from the cultivation of oriental literature ?
2 Some copies of these Jain MSS. from Jaisalmer, which were written from five to eight centuries back, I presented to the Royal Asiatic Society. Of the vast numbers of these MS. books in the libraries of Patan and Jaisal- mer, many are of the most remote antiquity, and in a character no longer understood by their possessors, or only by the supreme pontiff and liis initiated librarians. There is one volume held so sacred for its magical contents, that it is suspended by a chain in the temple of Chintaman, at the last-named capital in the desert, and is only taken down to have its covering renewed, or at the inauguration of a pontiff. Tradition assigns its author- ship to Somaditya Suru Acharya, a pontiff of past days, before the Islamite liad crossed the waters of the Indus, and whose diocese extended far beyond that stream. His magic mantle is also here preserved, and used on every new installation. The character is, doubtless, the nail-headed Pali ; and could we introduce the ingenious, indefatigable, and modest Mons. E. Burnouf, with his able coadjutor Dr. Lassen, into the temple, wo might learn something of this Sibylline volume, without their incurring the risk of loss of sight, which befcl the last individual, a female Yati of the Jains, who sacrilegiously endeavoured to acquire its contents. [For tlie temple library at Jaisalmer see I A, iv. 81 if; for those at Udaipur, ibid. xiii. 31. J. Burgess visited the Patan library, described by the Author (WI, 232 ff.), and found a collection of paliu-lcaf MSS., carefiilly wrapped in cloth and deposited in large chests (BO, vii. 598).]
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION Ivii
ignorant of an art which has been cultivated in other countries from ahnost the earhest ages. Is it to be imagined that a nation so highly civilized as the Hindus, amongst whom the exact sciences flourished in perfection, by whom the fine arts [ix], architecture, sculpture, poetry, music, were not only cultivated, but taught and defined by the nicest and most elaborate rules, were totally unacquainted with the simple art of recording the events of their history, the characters of their princes, and the acts of their reigns ? Where such ti'aces of mind exist, we can hardly believe that there was a want of competent recorders of events, which synchronical authorities tell us were worthy of commemoration. The cities of Hastinapur and Indraprastha, of Anhilwara and Somanatha, the triumphal columns of Delhi and Chitpr, the shrines of Abu and Girnar, the cave-temples of Elephanta and Ellora, are so many attestations of the same fact ; nor can we imagine that the age in which these works were erected was without an historian. Yet from the Mahabharata or Great War, to Alexander's invasion, and from that grand event to the era of Mahmud of Ghazni, scarcely a paragraph of pure native Hindu history (except as before stated) has hitherto been revealed to the curiosity of Western scholars. In the heroic history of Prithiraj, the last of the Hindu sovereigns of Delhi, written by his bard Chand, we find notices which authorize the inference that works similar to his own were then extant, relating to the period between Mahmud and Shihabu-d-din (a.d. 1000-1193) ; but these have disappeared.
After eight centuries of galling subjection to conquerors totally ignorant of the classical language of the Hindus ; after almost every capital city had been repeatedly stormed and sacked by barbarous, bigoted, and exasperated foes ; it is too much to expect that the literature of the comitry should not have sustained, in common with other important interests, irretrievable losses. My own animadversions upon the defective condition of the annals of Rajwara have more than once been checked by a very just remark : " when our princes were in exile, driven from hold to hold, and compelled to dwell in the clefts of the mountains, often doubtful whether they would not be forced to [x] abandon the very meal preparing for them, was that a time to think of historical records ? "
Those who expect from a people like the Hindus a species of
Iviii AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
composition of precisely the same character as the historical works of Greece and Rome, commit the very egregious error of overlooking the peculiarities which distinguish the natives of India from all other races, and which strongly discriminate their intellectual productions of every kind from those of the West. Their philosophy, their poetry, their architecture, are marked with traits of originality ; and the same may be expected to pervade their history, which, like the arts enumerated, took a character from its intimate association with the religion of the people. It must be recollected, moreover, that until a more correct taste was imparted to the literature of England and of France, by the study of classical models, the chronicles of both these countries, and indeed of all the polished nations of Europe, were, at a much more recent date, as crude, as wild, and as barren as those of the early Rajputs.
In the absence of regular and legitimate historical records, there are, however, other native works (they may, indeed, be said to aboimd), which, in the hands of a skilful and patient investi- gator, would afford no despicable materials for the history of India. The first of these are the Puranas and genealogical legends of the princes, which, obscured as they are by mythological details, allegory, and improbable circumstances, contain many facts that serve as beacons to direct the research of the liistorian. What Hume remarks of the annals and annalists of the Saxon Heptarchy, may be applied with equal truth to those of the Rajput Seven States : ^ " they aboimd in names, but are extremely barren of events ; or they are related so much without circum- stances and causes, that the most profound and eloquent writer must despair [xi] of rendering them either instructive or enter- taining to the reader. The monks " (for which we may read " Brahmans "), " who hved remote from public affairs, considered the civil transactions as subservient to the ecclesiastical, and were strongly affected with credulity, with the love of wonder, and with a propensity to imposture."
The heroic poems of India constitute another resource for history. Bards may be regarded as the primitive historians of mankind. Before fiction began to engross the attention of poets, or rather, before the province of liistory was dignified by a class of writers who made it a distinct department of literature, the 1 Mewar, Marwar, Amber, Bikaner, Jaisalmer, Kotah, and Bundi.
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION lix
functions of the bard were doubtless employed in recording real events and in commemorating real personages. In India Calliope has been worshipped by the bards from the days of Vyasa, the contemporary of Job, to the time of Benidasa, the present chronicler of Mewar. The poets are the chief, though not the sole, historians of Western India ; neither is there any deficiency of them, though they speak in a peculiar tongue, which requires to be translated into the sober language of probability. To compensate for their magniloquence and obscurity, their pen is free : the despotism of the Rajput princes does not extend to the poet's lay, wliich flows unconfined except by the shackles of the chand bhujanga^ or ' serpentine stanza ' ; no slight restraint, it must be confessed, upon the freedom of the historic muse. On the other hand, there is a sort of compact or understanding between' the bard and the prince, a barter of "solid pudding against empty praise," whereby the fidelity of the poetic chronicle is somewhat impaired. This sale of " fame," as the bards term it, by the court-laureates and historiographers of Rajasthan, will continue until there shall arise in the community a class sufficiently enlightened and independent, to look for no other recompense for literary labour than public distinction.
Still, however, these chroniclers dare utter truths, sometimes most [xii] unpalatable to their masters. When offended, or actuated by a virtuous indignation against immorality, they are fearless of consequences ; and woe to the individual who provokes them ! Many a resolution has sunk under the lash of their satire, which has condemned to eternal ridicule names that might other- wise have escaped notoriety. The vish, or poison of the bard, is more dreaded by the Rajput than the steel of the foe.
The absence of all mystery or reserve with regard to public affairs in the Rajput principalities, in which every individual takes an interest, from the noble to the porter at the city-gates, is of great advantage to the chronicler of events. When matters of moment in the disorganized state of the country rendered it imperative to observe secrecy, the Rana of Mewar, being applied to on the necessity of concealing them, rejoined as follows : " this is Chaumukha-raj ; ^ Eklinga the sovereign, I his vicegerent ; in liini I trust, and I have no secrets from my children." To this
^ ' Government of four mouths,' alluding to the quadriform image of the tutelary divinity.
Ix AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
publicity may be partly ascribed the inefficiency of every general alliance against common foes ; but it gives a kind of patriarchal character to the government, and inspires, if not loyalty and patriotism in their most exalted sense, feelings at least much akin to them.
A material drawback upon the value of these bardic histories is, that they are confined almost exclusively to the martial exploits of their heroes, and to the rang-ran-hhum, or ' field of slaughter.' Writing for the amusement of a warlike race, the authors disregard civil matters and the arts and pursuits of peaceful life ; love and war are their favourite themes. Chand, the last of the great bards of India, tells us, indeed, in his preface, " that he will give rules for governing empires ; the laws of grammar and composition ; lessons in diplomacy, home and foreign, etc." : and he fulfils his promise, by interspersing precepts on these points in various ejiisodes throughout his work [xiii].
Again : the bard, although he is admitted to the knowledge of all the secret springs which direct each measure of the govern- ment, enters too deeply into the intrigues, as well as the levities, of the court, to be qualified to pronounce a sober judgment upon its acts.
Nevertheless, although open to all these objections, the works of the native bards afford many valuable data, in facts, incidents, religious opinions, and traits of manners ; many of which, being carelessly introduced, are thence to be regarded as the least suspicious kind of historical evidence In the heroic history of Prithiraj, by Chand, there occur many geogTaphical as well as historical details, in the description of his sovereign's wars, of which the bard was an eye-witness, having been his friend, his herald, his ambassador, and finally discharging the melancholy office of accessory to his death, that he might save him from dishonour. The poetical histories of Chand were collected by the great Amra Singh of Mewar, a patron of literature, as well as a warrior and a legislator.^
Another species of historical records is found in the accoimts given by the Brahmans of the endowments of the temples, their dilapidation and repairs, wliich furnish occasions for the introduc- tion of historical and chronological details. In the legends,
^ [Only portions of the Chand-raesa or Prithiraj Raesa have been trans- lated (Smith, EHI, 387, note ; lA, i. 269 ff., iii. 17 ff., xxxii. 167 f.]
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION Ixi
respecting places of pilgrimage and religious resort, profane events are blended with superstitious rites and ordinances, local cere- monies and customs. The controversies of the Jains furnish, also, much historical information, especially with reference to Gujarat and Nahrwala, during the Chaulukya dynasty. From a close and attentive examination of the Jain records, which embody all that those ancient sectarians knew of science, many chasms in Hindu history might be filled up. The party-spirit of the rival sects of India was, doubtless, adverse to the purity of history ; and the very ground upon which the Brahmans built their ascendency was the ignorance of the people. There appears to have been in India [xiv], as well as in Egypt in early times, a coalition between the hierarchy and the state, with the view of keeping the mass of the nation in darkness and subjugation.
These different records, works of a mixed historical and geo- graphical character which I know to exist ; raesas or poetical legends of princes, which are common ; local Puranas, religious comments, and traditionary couplets ; ^ with authorities of a less dubious character, namely, inscriptions ' cut on the rock,' coins, copper-plate grants, containing charters of immunities, and ex- pressing many singular features of civil government, constitute, as I have already observed, no despicable materials for the historian, who would, moreover, be assisted by the synchronisms which are capable of being established with ancient Pagan and later Muhammadan writers.
From the earliest period of my official connexion with this interesting country, I applied myself to collect and explore its early historical records, with a ^^ew of throwing some light upon a people scarcely yet known in Europe and whose political con- nexion with England appeared to me to be capable of undergoing a material change, with benefit to both parties. It would be wearisome to the reader to be minutely informed of the process I adopted, to collect the scattered rehcs of Rajput history into the form and substance in which he now sees them. I began with the sacred genealogy from the Puranas ; examined the Mahabharata,
1 Some of these preserve the names of princes who invaded India between the time of Mahmud of Ghazni and Shihabu-d-din, who are not mentioned by Ferishta, the Muhammadan historian. The invasion of Ajmer and the capture of Bayana, the seat of the Yadu princes, were made known to us by this means.
Ixii AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
and the poems of Chand (a complete chronicle of his times) ; the voluminous historical poems of Jaisalmer, Marwar, and Mewar ; ^ the histories of the Khichis, and those of the Hara princes [xv] of Kotah and Bundi, etc., by their respective bards. A portion of the materials compiled by Jai Singh of Amber or Jaipur (one of the greatest patrons of science amongst the modern Hindu princes), to illustrate the history of his race, fell into my hands. I have reason to believe that there existed more copious materials, which his profligate descendant, the late prince, in his division of the empire with a prostitute, may have disposed of on the partition of the library of the State, which was the finest collection in Rajasthan. Like some of the renowned princes of Timur's dynasty, Jai Singh kept a diary, termed Kalpadruma, in which he noted every event : a work written by such a man and at such an interesting juncture, would be a valuable acquisition to history. From the Datia prince I obtained a transcript of the journal of his ancestor, who served with such eclat amongst the great feudatories of Aurangzeb's army, and from which Scott made many extracts in his history of the Deccan.
For a period of ten years I was employed, with the aid of a learned Jain, in ransacking every work which could contribute any facts or incidents to the history of the Rajputs, or diffuse any light upon their manners and character. Extracts and versions of all such passages were made by my Jain assistant into the more familiar dialects (which are formed frona the Sanskrit) of these tribes, in whose language my long residence amongst them enabled me to converse with facility. At much expense, and during many wearisome hours, to support which required no ordinary degree of enthusiasm, I endeavoured to possess myself not merely of their history, but of their religious notions, their familiar opinions, and their characteristic manners, by
^ Of Marwar, there were the Vijaya Vilas, the Surya Prakas, and Khyat, or legends, besides detached fragments of reigns. Of Mewar, there was the Khuman Raesa, a modem work formed from old materials which are lost, and commencing with the attack of Chitor by Mahmud, supposed to be the son of Kasim of Siiid, in tlie very earliest ages of Muhammadanisni : also the Jagat Vilas, tlic Raj -prakas, and the Jaya Vilas, all poems composed in the reigns of the princes whose names they bear, but generally introducing succinctly the early parts of history. Besides these, there were fragments of the Jaipur family, from their archives ; and the Man Charilra, or history of Raja Man.
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION Ixiii
associating with their chiefs and bardic chroniclers, and by listen- ing to their traditionary tales and allegorical poems. I might ultimately, as the circle of my [xvi] inquiries enlarged, have materially augmented my knowledge of these subjects ; but ill- health compelled me to relinquish this pleasing though toilsome pursuit, and forced me to revisit my native land just as I had obtained permission to look across the threshold of the Hindu Minerva ; whence, however, I brought some relics, the examina- tion of which I now consign to other hands. The large collection of ancient Sanskrit and Bhakha MSS., which I conveyed to England, have been presented to the Royal Asiatic Society, in whose library they are deposited. The contents of many, still unexamined, may throw additional light on the history of ancient India. I claim only the merit of having brought them to the knowledge of European scholars ; but I may hope that this will furnish a stimulus to others to make similar exertions.
The little exact knowledge that Europe has hitherto acquired of the Rajput States, has probably originated a false idea of the comparative importance of this portion of Hindustan. The splendour of the Rajput courts, however, at an early period of the history of that country, making every allowance for the exaggeration of the bards, must have been great. Northern India was rich from the earUest times ; that portion of it, situated on either side the Indus, formed the richest satrapy of Darius. It has aboiuided in the more striking events which constitute the materials for history ; there is not a petty State in Rajasthan that has not had its Thermopylae, and scarcely a city that has not produced its Leonidas. But the mantle of ages has shrouded from view what the magic pen of the historian might have con- secrated to endless admiration : Somnath might have rivalled Delphos ; the spoils of Hind might have vied with the wealth of the Libyan king ; and compared with the array of the Pandus, the army of Xerxes would have dwindled into insignificance. But the Hindus either never had, or have unfortunately lost, their Herodotus and Xenophon.
If " the moral effect of history depend on the sympathy it excites" [xvii], the annals of these States possess commanding interest. The struggles of a brave people for independence during a series of ages, sacrificing whatever was dear to them for the maintenance of the religion of their forefathers, and sturdily
Ixiv AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
defending to death, and in spite of every temptation, their rights and national hberty, form a picture which it is difficult to con- template without emotion. Could I impart to the reader but a small portion of the enthusiastic delight with which I have listened to the tales of times that are past, amid scenes where their events occurred, I should not despair of triumphing over the apathy which dooms to neglect almost every effort to enlighten my native country on the subject of India ; nor should I appre- hend any ill effect from the sound of names, which, musical and expressive as they are to a Hindu, are dissonant and unmeaning to a European ear : for it should be remembered that almost every Eastern name is significant of some quality, personal or mental. Seated amidst the ruins of ancient cities, I have listened to the traditions respecting their fall ; or have heard the exploits of their illustrious defenders related by their descendants near the altars erected to their memory. I have, whilst in the train of the southern Goths (the Mahrattas), as they carried desolation over the land, encamped on or traversed many a field of battle, of civil strife or foreign aggression, to read in the rude memorials on the tumuli of the slain their names and history. Such anecdotes and records afford data of history as well as of manners. Even the couplet recording the erection of a ' column of victory,' or of a temple or its repairs, contributes something to our stock of knowledge of the past.
As far as regards the antiquity of the djmasties now ruling in Central and Western India, there are but two the origin of which is not perfectly within the limits of historical probability ; the rest ha\nng owed their present establishments to the progress of the Muslim arms, their annals are confirmed by those of their conquerors. All the existing [xviii] families, indeed, have attained their present settlements subsequently to the Muhammadan invasions, except Mewar, Jaisalmer, and some smaller princi- pahtics in the desert ; whilst others of the first magnitude, such as the Pramara and Solanki, who ruled at Dhar and Anhilwara, have for centuries ceased to exist.
I have been so hardy as to affirm and endeavour to prove the common origin of the martial tribes of Rajasthan and those of ancient Europe. I have expatiated at some length upon the evidence in favour of the existence of a feudal system in India, similar to that which prevailed in the early ages on the European
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION Ixv
continent, and of which reUcs still remain in the laws of our own natipn. Hypotheses of this kind are, I am aware, viewed with suspicion, and sometimes assailed with ridicule. With regard to the notions which I have developed on these questions, and the frequent allusions to them in the pages of this volume, I entertain no obstinate prepossessions or prejudices in their favour. The world is too enhghtened at the present day to be in danger of being misled by any hypothetical writer, let him be ever so skilful ; but the probability is, that we have been induced, by the multitude of false theories which time has exposed, to fall into the opposite error, and that we have become too sceptical with regard to the common origin of the people of the east and west. However, I submit my proofs to the candid judgment of the world ; the analogies, if not conclusive on the questions, are still sufficiently curious and remarkable to repay the trouble of perusal and to provoke further investigation ; and they may, it is hoped, vindicate the author for endeavouring to elucidate the subject, " by steering through the dark channels of antiquity by the feeble lights of forgotten chronicles and imperfect records."
I am conscious that there is much in this work which demands the indulgence of the public ; and I trust it will not be necessary for me to assign a more powerful argument in plea than that which I have already [xix] adverted to, namely, the state of my health, which has rendered it a matter of considerable difficulty, indeed I may say of risk, to bring my bulky materials even into their present imperfect form. I should observe, that it never was my intention to treat the subject in the severe style of history, which would have excluded many details useful to the politician as well as to the curious student. I offer this work as a copious collection of materials for the future historian ; and am far less concerned at the idea of giving too much, than at the apprehension of suppressing what might possibly be useful.
I cannot close these remarks without expressing my obligations to my friend and kinsman, Major Waugh, to the genius of whose pencil the world is indebted for the preservation and transmission of the splendid monuments of art which adorn this work.
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND VOLUME OF THE ORIGI- NAL EDITION
In placing before the public the concluding volume of the Annals of Rajputana I have fulfilled what I considered to be a sacred obligation to the races amongst whom I have passed the better portion of my life ; and although no man can more highly appreciate public approbation, I am far less eager to court that approbation than to awaken a sympathy for the objects of my work, the interesting people of Rajputana,
I need add nothing to what was urged in the Introduction to the First Volume on the subject of Indian History ; and trust that, however slight the analogy between the chronicles of the Hindus and those of Europe, as historical works, they will serve to banish the reproach, which India has so long laboured under, of possessing no records of past events : my only fear now is, that they may be thought redundant.
I think I may confidently affirm, that whoever, without being alarmed at their bulk, has the patience attentively to peruse these Annals, cannot fail to become well acquainted with all the peculiar features of Hindu society, and will be enabled to trace the founda- tion and progress of each State in Rajputana, as well as to form a just notion of the character of a people, upon whom, at a future period, our existence in India may depend.
Whatever novelty the inquirer into the origin of nations may find in these [viii] pages, I am ambitious to claim for them a higher title than a mass of mere archaeological data. To see humanity under every aspect, and to observe the influence of different creeds upon man in his social capacity, must ever be one
Ixvii
Ixviii AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION
of the higliest sources of mental enjoyment ; and I may hope that the personal qualities herein delineated, will allow the labourer in this vast field of philosophy to enlarge his sphere of acquaint- ance with human varieties. In the present circumstances of our alliance with these States, every trait of national character, and even every traditional incident, which, by leading us to understand and respect their peculiarities, may enable us to secure their friendship and esteem, become of infinite importance. The more we study their history, the better shall we comprehend the causes of their international quarrels, the origin of their tributary engage- ments, the secret principles of their mutual repulsion, and the sources of their strength and their weakness as an aggregate body : without which knowledge it is impossible we can arbitrate with justice in their national disputes ; and, as respects ourselves, we may convert a means of defence into a source of bitter hostility.
It has been my aim to diversify as much as possible the details of this volume. In the Annals of Marwar I have traced the conquest and peopling of an immense region by a handful of strangers ; and have dwelt, perhaps, with tedious minuteness on the long reign of Raja Ajit Singh and the Thirty Years' War ; to show what the energy of one of these petty States, impelled by a sense of oppression, effected against the colossal power of its enemies. It is a portion of their history which should be deeply studied by those who have succeeded to the paramount power ; for Aurangzeb had less reason to distrust the stability of his dominion than we have : yet what is now the house of Timur ? The resources of Marwar were reduced to as low an ebb at the close of Aurangzeb's reign, as they are at the present time ; yet did that [ix] State surmount all its difficulties, and bring armies into the field that annihilated the forces of the empire. I,,et us not, then, mistake the supineness engendered by long oppression, for want of feeling, nor mete out to these high-spirited people the same measure of contumely, with which we have treated the subjects of our earlier conquests.
The Annals of the Bhattis may be considered as the link connect- ing the tribes of India Proper with the ancient races west of the Indus, or Indo-Scythia ; and although they will but slightly interest the general reader, the antiquary may find in them many new topics for investigation, as well as in the Sketch of the Desert, which has preserved the relics of names that once promised immortality.
AUTHOR'S INTRODUCTION Ixix
Tlie patriarchal simplicity of the Jat communities, upon whose ruins the State of Bikaner was founded, affords a picture, however imperfect, of petty republics — a form of government little known to eastern despotism, and proving the tenacity of the ancient Gete's attachment to hberty.
Amber, and its scion Shaikhavati, possess a still greater interest from their contiguity to our frontier. A multitude of singular privileges is attached to the Shaikhavati federation, wliich it behoves the paramount power thorouglily to understand, lest it should be led by false views to pursue a policy detrimental to them as well as to ourselves. To this extensive community belong the Larkhanis, so utterly imknown to us, that a recent internal tumult of that tribe was at first mistaken for an irruption of our old enemies, the Pindaris.
Haraoti may claim our regard from the high bearing of its gallant race, the Haras ; and the singular character of the in- dividual with whose biography its history closes, and which cannot fail to impart juster notions of the genius of Asiatics [x].
So much for the matter of this volume — with regard to the manner, as the Rajputs abhor all jileas ad misericordiam, so like- wise does their annalist, who begs to repeat, in order to deprecate a standard of criticism inapplicable to this performance, that it professes not to be constructed on exact historical principles : Non historia, sed particulae historiae.
In conclusion. I adopt the peroration of the ingenuous, pious, and liberal Abu-1 Fazl, when completing his History of the Provinces of India ; " Praise be unto God, that by the assistance of his Divine Grace, I have completed the History of the Rajputs. The accovmt cost me a great deal of trouble in collecting, and I found such difficulty in ascertaining dates, and in reconcihng the contradictions in the several histories of the Princes of Rajputana, that I had nearly resolved to relinquish the task altogether : but who can resist the decrees of Fate ? I trust that those, who have been able to obtain better information, will not dwell upon my errors ; but that upon the whole I may meet with approbation." '
1 [Atn, ii. 418.]
York Place, Portman Square, March 10, 1832.
i
ANNALS AND ANTIQUITIES OF RAJASTHAN
BOOK I
GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN OR RAJPUTANA
Boundaries of Rajputana. — Rajasthan is the collective and classi- cal denomination of that portion of India which is ' the abode ^ of (Rajput) princes.' In the familiar dialect of these countries it is termed Rajwara, but by the more refined Raethana, corrupted to Rajputana, the common designation amongst the British to denote the Rajput principalities.
\Miat might have been the nominal extent of Rajasthan prior to the Muhammadan conqueror Shihabu-d-din (when it probably- reached beyond the Jumna and Ganges, even to the base of the Himalaya) cannot now be known. At present we may adhere to its restrictive definition, still comprehending a wide space and a variety of interesting races.
Previous to the erection of the minor Muhammadan monarchies of ^landu and Ahmadabad (the capitals of Malwa and Gujarat), on the ruins of Dhar and Anhilwara Patan, the term Rajasthan would have been appropriated to the space comprehended in the map prefixed to this work : the valley of the Indus on the west, and Bundelkhand ^ on the east ; to the north, the sandy tracts (south of the Sutlej) termed Jangaldes ; and the Vindhya moun- tains to the south.
^ Or ' regal (raj) dwelling (than).'
* It is rather singular that the Sind River wiU mark this eastern boundary, a.s does the Indus (or great Sind) that to the west. East of this minor Sind the Hindu princes are not of pure blood, and are excluded from Rajasthan or Rajwara.
VOL. I B
2 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
This space comprehends nearly 8° of latitude and 9° of longi- tude, being from 22° to 30° north latitude, and 69° to 78° east longitude, embracing a superficial area of 350,000 square miles ^ [2].
Although it is proposed to touch upon the annals of all the States in this extensive tract, with their past and present condi- tion, those in the centre will claim the most prominent regard ; especially Mewar, which, copiously treated of, will afford a specimen, obviating the necessity of like details of the rest.
The States of Rajputana. — The order in which these States will be reviewed is as follows :
1. Mewar, or Udaipur.
2. Marwar, or Jodhpur.
3. Bikaner and Kishangarh.
4. Kotah^ __
I- T-. T or Haraoti.
5. BundiJ
6. Amber, or Jaipur, with its branches, dependent and
independent,
7. Jaisalmer.
8. The Indian desert to the valley of the Indus.
History o£ Geographical Surveys. — The basis of this work is the geography of the country, the historical and statistical por- tion being consequent and subordinate thereto. It was, indeed, originally designed to be essentially geographical ; but circum- stances have rendered it impossible to execute the intended details, or even to make the map * so perfect as the superabxmdant material at the command of the author might have enabled him to do ; a matter of regret to himself rather than of loss to the general reader, to whom geographic details, however important, arc usually dry and uninteresting.
It was also intended to institute a comparison between the map and such remains of ancient geography as can be extracted from the Puranas and other Hindu authorities ; which, however, must be deferred to a future period, when the deficiency of the
^ [Rajputana, as now officially defined, lies between lat. 23° 3' and 30° 12' N., and long. 69° 30' and 78° 17' E., the total area, according to the Census Report, 1911, including Ajmer-Merwara, being 131,698 square miles.]
^ Engraved by that meritorious artist Mr. Walker, engraver to the East India Company, who, I trust, will be able to make a fuller use of my materials hereafter. [This has been replaced by a modern map.]
PREVIOUS SURVEYS 3
present rapid and general sketch may be supplied, should the author be enabled to resume his labours.
The laborious research, in the course of which these data were accumulated, commenced in 1806. when the author was attached to the embassy sent, at the close of the Mahratta wars, to the court of Sindhia. This chieftain's army was then in Mewar, at that period almost a terra incognita, the position of whose two capitals, Udaipur and Chitor, in the best existing maps, was pre- cisely reversed [3] ; that is, Chitor was inserted S.E. of Udaipur instead of E.N.E., a proof of the scanty knowledge possessed at that period.
In other respects there was almost a total blank. In the maps prior to 1806 nearly all the western and central States of Rajasthan will be found wanting. It had been imagined, but a little time before, that the rivers had a southerly course into the Nerbudda ; a notion corrected by the father of Indian geography, the distin- guished Rennell.^
This blank the author filled up ; and in 1815, for the first time, the geography of Rajasthan was put into combined form and presented to the Marquess of Hastings, on the eve of a general war, when the labour of ten years was amply rewarded by its becoming in part the foundation of that illustrious commander's plans of the campaign. It is a duty owing to himself to state that every map, without exception, printed since this period has its foundation, as regards Central and Western India, in the labours of the author.^
1 [James Uennell, 1742-1830.]
^ When the war of 1817 broke out, copies of my map on a reduced scale were sent to all the divisions of the armies in the field, and came into posses- sion of many of the staff. Transcripts were made which were brought to Europe, and portions introduced into every recent map of India. One map has, indeed, been given, in a manner to induce a supposition that the furnisher of the materials was the author of them. It has fulfilled a pre- diction of the Marquess of Hastings, who, foreseeing the impossibility of such materials remaining private property, " and the danger of their being appropriated by others," and desirous that the author should derive the full advantage of his labours, had it signified that the claims for recompense, on the records of successive governments, should not be deferred. It will not be inferred the author is surprised at what he remarks. While he claims priority for himself, lie is the last person to wish to see a halt in science —
" For emulation has a thousand sons."
4 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
The Author's Surveys. — The route of the embassy was from Agra, through the southern frontier of Jaipur to Udaipur. A portion of this had been surveyed and points laid down from celestial observation, by Dr. W. Hunter, which I adopted as the basis of my enterprise. The Resident Envoy ^ to the court of Sindhia was possessed of the valuable sketch of the route of Colonel Palmer's embassy in 1791, as laid down by Dr. Hunter, the foundation of my subsequent surveys, as it merited from its im- portance and general accuracy. It embraced all the extreme points of Central India : Agra, Narwar, Datia, Jhansi, Bhopal, .Sarangpur, Ujjain, and on return from this, the first meridian of the Hindus, by Kotah; Bundi, Rampura (Tonk), Bayana, to Agra. The position of all these places was more or less accurately fixed, according to the time which could be bestowed, by astro- nomical observation [4].
At Rampura Hunter ceased to be my guide : and from this point commenced the new survey of Udaipur, where we arrived in June 1806. The position then assigned to it, with most inade- quate instruments, has been changed only 1 ' of longitude, though the latitude amounted to about 5'.
From Udaipur the subsequent march of the army with which we moved led past the celebrated Chitor, and through the centre of Malwa, crossing in detail all the grand streams flowing from the Vindhya, till we halted for a season on the Bundelkhand frontier at Khimlasa. In this journey of seven hundred miles I twice crossed the lines of route of the former embassy, and was gratified to find my first attempts generally coincide with their established points.
In 1807, the army having undertaken the siege of Rahatgarh, I determined to avail myself of the time which Mahrattas waste in such a process, and to pursue my favourite project. With a small guard I determined to push through untrodden fields, by tlte banks of the Betwa to Chanderi, and in its latitude proceed in a westerly direction towards Kotah, trace the course once more of all those streams from the south, and the points of junction of the most important (the Kali Sind, Parbati, and Banas) with the Chambal ; and having effected this, continue my journey to Agra. This I accomplished in times very different from the
^ My esteemed friend, Graeme Mercer, Esq. (of Maevisbank), who stimu- lated my exertions with his approbation.
THE AUTHOR'S SURVEYS 5
present, being often obliged to strike my tents and march at mid- night, and more than once the object of plunder.^ The chief points in this route were Khimlasa, Rajwara, Kotra on the Betwa, Kanyadana,'' Buradungar,* Shahabad, Barah,* Puleta,* Baroda, Sheopur, Pali,^ Ranthambhor, Karauli, Sri Mathura, and Agra.
On my return to the Mahratta camp I resolved further to increase the sphere, and proceeded westward by Bharatpur, Katumbar, Sentri, to Jaipur, Tonk, Indargarh, Gugal Chhapra, Raghugarh, Aron, Kurwai, Borasa, to Sagar : a journey of more than one thousand miles. I found the camp nearly where I left it.
With this ambulatory court I moved everywhere within this region, constantly employed in surveying till 1812, when Sindhia's court became stationary. It was then I formed my plans for obtaining a knowledge of those countries into which I could not personally penetrate [5].
Survey Parties. — In 1810-11 I had despatched two i^arties, one to the Indus, the other to the desert south of the Sutlej. The first party, under Shaikh Abu-1 Barakat, journeyed westward, by Udaipur, through Gujarat, Saurashtra and Cutch, Lakhpat and Hyderabad (the capital of the Sindi government) ; crossed the Indus to Tatta, proceeded up the right bank to Sehwan ; re- crossed, and continued on the left bank as far as lOiairpur, the residence of one of the triumvirate governors of Sind, and having reached the insulated Bakhar ' (the capital of the Sogdoi of Alexander), returned by the desert of Umrasumra to Jaisalmer, Marwar, and Jaipur, and joined me in camp at Narwar. It was
^ Many incidents in these journeys would require no aid of imagination to touch on the romantic, but they can have no place here. ^ Eastern tableland. ^ Sind River.
* Paibati River. . ^ Kali Sind River.
* Passage of the Chambal and junction of the Par.
' The Shaikh brought me specimens of the rock, which is siliceous ; and also a piece of brick of the very ancient fortress of Sehwan, and some of the grain from its pits, charred and alleged by tradition to have lain there since the period of Raja Bhartarihari, the brother of Vikramaditya. It is not impossible that it might be owing to Alexander's terrific progress, and to their supphes being destroyed by fire. Sehwan is conjectured by Captain Pottinger to be the capital of Musicanus. [The capital of the Sogdoi has been identified with Alor or Aror ; but Cunningham places it between Alor and Uchh. The capital of Mousikanos was possibly Alor, and Sehwan the Sindimana of the Greeks. But, owing to changes in the course of the Lower Indus, it is very difiicult to identify ancient sites (McCrindle, Akxaiider, 157, 354 f.).]
6 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
a perilous undertaking ; but the Shaikh was a fearless and enter- prising character, and moreover a man with some tincture of learning. His journals contained many hints and directions for future research in the geography, statistics, and manners of the various races amongst whom he travelled.
The other party was conducted by a most valuable, man, Madari Lai, who became a perfect adept in these expeditions of geographical discovery, and other knowledge resulting therefrom. There is not a district of anj^ consequence in the wide space before the reader which was not traversed by this spirited individual, whose qualifications for such complicated and hazardous journeys were never excelled. Ardent, persevering, prepossessing, and generally well-informed, he made his way when others might have perished.^
From these remote regions the best-informed native inhabitants were, by persuasion and recompense, conducted to me ; and I could at all times, in the Mahratta camp at Gwalior, from 1812 to 1817, have provided a native of the valley of the Indus, the deserts of Dhat, Umrasumra, or any of the States of Rajasthan.
The precision with which Kasids and other public conveyers of letters, in countries where posts are little used, can detail the peculiarities of a long line of route, and the accuracy of their distances would scarcely be credited in Europe. I have no hesitation in asserting that if a correct estimate were obtained of the measured [6] coss of a country, a line might be laid down upon a flat surface with great exactitude. I have heard it affirmed that it was the custom of the old Hindu governments to have measurements made of the roads from town to town, and that the Abu Mahatma ^ contains a notice of an instrument for that purpose. Indeed, the singular coincidence between lines measured by the perambulator and the estimated distances of the natives is the best proof that the latter are deduced from some more certain method than mere computation.
I never rested satisfied with the result of one set of my parties,
^ His health was worn out at length, and he became the victim of de- pressed spirits. He died suddenly : I beUeve poisoned. Fateh, almost as zealous as Madari, also died in the jmrsuit. Geography has been destructive to all who have pursued it with ardour in the East.
* A valuable aiid ancient work, which I presented to the Royal Asiatic Societj'.
THE AUTHOR'S SURVEYS 7
with the single exception of Madari's, always making the informa- tion of one a basis for the instruction of another, who went over the same ground ; but with additional views and advantages, and with the aid of the natives brought successively by each, till I exhausted every field.
Thus, in a few years, I had filled several volumes with lines of route throughout this space ; and having many frontier and intermediate points, the positions of which were fixed, a general outline of the result was constructed, wherein all this information was laid down. I speak more particularly of the western States, as the central portion, or that watered by the Chambal and its tributary streams, whether from the elevated Aravalli on the west, or from the Vindhya mountains on the south, has been personally surveyed and measured in every direction, with an accuracy sufficient for every political or military purpose, until the grand trigonometrical survey from the peninsula shall be •extended throughout India. These coimtries form an extended plain to the Sutlej north, and west to the Indus, rendering the amalgamation of geographical materials much less difficult than where mountainous regions intervene.
After having laid down these varied lines in the outline described, I determined to check and confirm its accuracy by recommencing the survey on a new plan, viz. trigonometrically.
My parties were again despatched to resume their labours over fields now familiar to them. They commenced from points whose positions were fixed (and my knowledge enabled me to give a series of such), from each of which, as a centre, they col- lected every radiating route to every town within the distance of twenty miles. The points selected were generally such as to approach equilateral [7] triangles ; and although to digest the information became a severe toil, the method will appear, even to the casual observer, one which must throw out its own errors ; for these lines crossed in every direction, and consequently corrected each other. By such means did I work my way in those unknown tracts, and the result is in part before the reader. I say, in part ; for my health compels me reluctantly to leave out much which could be combined from ten folios of journeys extending throughout these regions.
The Author's Map. — In 1815, as before stated, an outline map containing all the information thus obtained, and which the
8 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
subsequent crisis rendered of essential importance, was presented by me to the Governor- General of India. Upon the very eve of the war I constructed and presented another, of the greater portion of Malwa, to which it appeared expedient to confine the oiDcrations against the Pindaris. The material feature in this small map was the general position of the Vindhya mountains, the sources and course of every river originating thence, and the passes in this chain, an object of primary importance. The boundaries of the various countries in this tract were likewise defined, and it became essentially useful in the subsequent dis- memberment of the Peshwa's dominions.
In the construction of this map I had many fixed points, both of Dr. Hunter's and my own, to work from ; and it is gratifying to observe that though several measured lines have since been run through this space, not only the general, but often the identi- cal features of mine have been preserved in the maps since given to the world. As considerable improvement has been made by several measured lines through this tract, and many positions affixed by a scientific and zealous geographer, I have had no hesitation in incorporating a small portion of this improved geography in the map now presented.^
Many surveyed lines were made by ine from 1817 to 1822 ; and here I express my obligations to my kinsman,^ to whom alone I owe any aid for improving this portion of my geographical labours. This officer made a circuitous survey, which compre- hended nearly the extreme points of Mewar, from the capital by Chitor, Mandalgarh, Jahazpur, Rajmahall, and in return by Banai, Radnor, Deogarh [8], to the point of outset. From these extreme points he was enabled to place many intermediate ones, for which Mewar is so favourable, by reason of its isolated hills.
In 1820 I made an important journey across the Aravalli, by Kumbhalmer, Pali, to Jodhpur, the capital of Marwar, and thence by Merta, tracing the course of the Luni to its source at Ajmer ; and from this celebrated residence of the Chauhan
^ It is, however, limited to Malwa, whose geography was greatly im- proved and enlarged by the labours of Captain Dangerfield ; and though my materials could fill up the whole of tliis province, I merely insert the chief points to connect it with Rajasthan.
^ Captain P. T. Waugh, 10th Regiment Light Cavalry, Bengal.
PHYSIOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN 9
kings and Mogul emperors; returning through the central lands of Mewar, by Banai and Banera, to the capital.
I had the peculiar satisfaction to find that my position of Jodhpur, which has been used as a capital point in fixing the geography west and north, was only 3' of space out in latitude, and little more in longitude ; which accounted for the coincidence of my position of Bikaner with that assigned by Mr. Elphtnstone in his account of the embassy to Kabul.
Besides Udaipur, Jodhpur, Ajmer, etc., whose positions I had fixed by observations, and the points laid down by Hunter, I availed myself of a few positions given to me by that enterprising traveller, the author of the journey into Ivliorasan,^ who marched from Delhi, by Nagor and Jodhpur, to Udaipur.
The outline of the countries of Gujarat,^ the Saurashtra peninsula, and Cutch, inserted chiefly by way of connexion, is entirely taken from the labours of that distinguished geographer, the late General Reynolds. We had both gone over a great portion of the same field, and my testimony is due to the value of his researches in countries into which he never personally penetrated, evincing what may be done by industry, and the use of such materials as I have described.
Physiography of Bajputana. — I shall conclude with a rapid sketch of the physiognomy of these regions ; minute and local descriptions will appear more appropriately in the respective historical portions
Rajasthan presents a great variety of feature. Let me place the reader on the highest peak of the insulated Abu, ' the saint's pinnacle,' ^ as it is termed, and guide his eye in a survey over this wide expanse, from the ' blue waters ' of the Indus west to the ' withy-covered ' * Betwa on the east. From this, the most [9] elevated spot in Hindustan, overlooking by fifteen hundred feet the Aravalli moimtains, his eye descends to the plains of Medpat *
^ Sir. J. B. Fraser [whose book was published in 1825].
^ My last journey, in 1822-23, was from Udaipur, through these countries towards the Delta of the Indus, but more with a view to historical and antiquarian than geographical research. It proved the most fruitful of all my many journeys. [The results are recorded in Travels in Western India, pubhshed in 1839, after the author's death.] ® Guru Sikhar.
* Its classic name is Vetravati, Vetra being the common willow [or reed] in Sanskrit ; said by WiLford to be the same in Welsh.
* Literally 'the central {madJiya] flat.' [It means 'Land of the Med tribe.']
10 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
(the classic term for Mewar), whose chief streams, flowing from the base of the AravaUi, join the Berach and Banas, and are prevented from uniting with the Chambal only by the Patar ^ or plateau of Central India.
Ascending this plateau near the celebrated Chitor, let the eye deviate slightly from the direct eastern line, and pursue the only practicable path by Ratangarh, and Singoli, to Kotah, and he will observe its three successive steppes, the miniature representa- tion of those of Russian Tartary. Let the observer here glance across the Chambal and traverse Haraoti to its eastern frontier, guarded by the fortress of Shahabad : thence abruptly descend the plateau to the level of the Sind, still proceeding eastward, until the table-mountain, the western limit of Bundelkhand, affords a resting-point.
To render this more distmct, I present a profile of the tract described from Abu to Kotra on the Betwa : ^ from Abu to the Chambal, the result of barometrical measurement, and from the latter to the Betwa from my general observations ^ of the irregu- larities of surface. The result is, that the Betwa at Kotra is one thousand feet above the sea-level, and one thousand lower than the city and valley of Udaipur, which again is on the same level with the base of Abu, two thousand feet above the sea. This line, the general direction of which is but a short distance from the tropic, is about six geographic degrees in length : yet is this small space highly diversified, both in its inhabitants and the produc- tion of the soil, whether hidden or revealed.
^ Meaning ' table {pat) mountain (ar).' — Although ar may not be found ill any Sanskrit dictionary with the signification ' mountain,' yet it appears to be a primitive root possessing such meaning — instance, Ar-buddha, 'hill of Buddha'; Aravalli, 'hill of strength.' Ar is Hebrew for 'moun- tain ' (qu. Ararat ?) "Opos in Greek ? The common word for a mountain in Sanskrit, gir, is equally so in Hebrew. [These derivations are out of date. The origin of the word pntdr is obscure. Sir G. Grierson, to whom the question was referred, suggests a connexion with Marathi pathdr, ' a tableland,' or Gujarati pathdr (Skr. prastara, ' expanse, extent '). The word is probably not connected with Hindi pdt, ' a board.']
2 The Betwa River runs under the tableland just alluded to, on the east.
^ I am familiar with these regions, and confidently predict that when a similar measurement shall be made from the Betwa to .Kotah, these results will little err, and the error will be in having made Kotah somewhat too elevated, and the bed of the Betwa a little too low. [Udaipur city is 1950 feet above sea-level.]
1^ i ^1
PHYSIOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN 11
Let us now from our eleva^d station (still turned to the east) carry the eye both south and north of the line described, which nearly bisects Madhyadesa,^ ' the central land ' of Rajasthan ; best defined by the course of the Chambal and [10] its tributary streams, to its confluence with the Jumna : while the regions west of the transalpine Aravalli^^ may as justly be defined Western Rajasthan.
Looking to the south, the eye rests on the long-extended and strongly - defined line of the Vindhya mountains, the proper bounds of Hindustan and the Deccan. Though, from our elevated stand on ' the Saint's Pinnacle ' of Abu, we look down on the Vindhya as a range of diminished importance, it is that our position is the least favourable to viewing its grandeur, which would be most apparent from the south ; though throughout this skirt of descent, irregular elevations attain a height of many hundred feet above such points of its abrupt descent.
The Aravalli itself may be said to coiuiect with the Vindhya, and the point of junction to be towards Champaner ; though it might be as correct to say the Aravalli thence rose upon and stretched from the Vindhya. Whilst it is much less elevated than more to the north, it presents bold features throughout,^ south by Lunawara, Dungarpur, and Idar, to Amba Bhawani and Udaipur.
Still looking from Abu over the tableland of Malwa, we observe her plains of black loam furrowed by the numerous streams from the highest points of the Vindhya, pursuing their northerly course ; some meandering through valleys or faUing over precipices ; others bearing down all opposition, and actually forcing an exit through the central plateau to join the Chambal. The Aravalli Range. — Having thus glanced at the south, let us cast the eye north of this line, and pause on the alpine Aravalli.*
^ Central India, a term which I first applied as the title of the map pre- sented to the Marquess of Hastings, in 1815, 'of Central and Western India,' and since become famiUar. [Usually applied to the Ganges-Jumna Duab.]
"^ Let it be remembered that the Aravalli, though it loses its tabular form, sends its branches north, terminating at DeUii.
^ Those who have marched from Baroda towards Malwa and marked the irregularities of surface will admit this chain of connexion of the Vmdhya and AravaUi.
* ' The refuge of strength ' [?], a title justly merited, from its affording protection to the most ancient sovereign race which holds dominion, whether
12 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
Let us take a section of it, from the capital, Udaipur, the line of our station on Abu, passing through Oghna Panarwa, and Mirpur, to the western descent near Sirohi, a space of nearly sixty miles in a direct h"ne, where " hills o'er hills and alps on alps arise," from the ascent at Udaipur, to the descent to ISIarwar. All this space to the Sirohi frontier is inhabited by communities of the aboriginal races, living in a state of primeval and almost savage independence, owning no paramount power, paying no tribute, but with all the simplicity of republics ; their leaders, with the title of Rawat, being hereditary. Thus the Rawat of the Oghna commune can assemble five thousand bows, and several others [11 J can on occasion muster considerable numbers. Their habitations are dispersed through the valleys in small rude hamlets, near their pastures or places of defence.^
Let me now transport the reader to the citadel pinnacle of Kumbhalmer,^ thence surveying the range running north to Ajmer, where, shortly after, it loses its tabular form, and breaking into lofty ridges, sends numerous branches through the Shaikhavati federation, and Alwar, till in low heights it terminates at Delhi.
From Kumbhalmer to Ajmer the whole space is termed Merwara, and is inhabited by the mountain race of Mer or Mair, the habits and history of which singular class will be hereafter related. The range averages from six to fifteen miles in breadth,
in the east or west — the ancient stock of the Suryavans, the Hehadai of India, our ' children of the sun,' the princes of Mewar. [Aravalli probably means ' Comer Line.']
^ It was my intention to have penetrated through their singular abodes ; and I had negotiated, and obtained of these ' forest lords ' a promise of hospitable passport, of which I have never allowed myself to doubt, as the virtues of pledged faith and hospitahty are ever to be found in stronger keeping in the inverse ratio of civiUzation. Many years ago one of my parties was permitted to range through this tract. In one of the passes of their lengthened valleys ' The Lord of the Mountain ' was dead : the men were all abroad, and his widow alone in the hut. Madari told his story, and claimed her surety and passport ; which the Bhilni dehvered from the quiver of her late lord ; and the arrow carried in his hand was as well recognised as the cumbrous roll with all its seals and appendages of a traveller in Europe.
* Meru signifies ' a hill ' in Sanskrit, hence Komal, or properly Kumbhal- mer, is 'the hill' or 'mountain of Kumbha/ a prince whose exploits are narrated. Likewise Ajmer is the 'hiU of Ajaj^a,' the 'Invincible' hill. Mer is with the long e, like Mere in French, in classical orthography. [Ajmer, ' hill of Aja, Cha^uhan.']
PHYSIOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN 13
having upwards of one hundred and fifty villages and hamlets scattered over its valleys and rocks, abundantly watered, not deficient in pasture, and with cultivation enough for all internal wants, though it is raised with infinite labour on terraces, as the vine is cultivated in Switzerland and on the Rhine.
In vain does the eye search for any trace of wheel-carriage across this compound range from Idar to Ajmer ; and it conse- quently well merits its appellation ara, ' the barrier,' for the strongest arm of modern warfare, artillery, would have to turn the chain by the north to avoid the impracticable descent to the west.^
Views from the Aravalli Hills. — Guiding the eye along the chain, several fortresses are observed on pinnacles guarding the passes on either side, while numerous rills descend, pouring over the declivities, seeking their devious exit between the projecting ribs of the mountain. The Berach, the Banas, the Kothari, the Khari, the Dahi all unite with the Banas to the east, while to the west the still more numerous streams which fertilize the rich province of Godwar, unite to ' the Salt River,' the Luni, and mark the true line of the desert. Of these the chief are the Sukri and the [12] Bandi ; while others which are not perennial, and depend on atmospheric causes for their supply, receive the general denomination of rela, indicative of rapid mountain torrents, carrying in their descent a vast volume of alluvial deposit, to enrich the siliceous soil below.
However grand the view of the chaotic mass of rock from this elevated site of Kumbhalmer, it is from the plains of Marwar that its majesty is most apparent ; where its ' splintered pinnacles ' are seen rising over each other in varied form, or frowning over the dark indented recesses of its forest-covered and rugged declivities.
On reflection, I am led to pronounce the Aravalli a connexion of the ' Apennines of India ' ; the Ghats on the Malabar coast of
^ At the point of my descent this was characteristically illustrated by my Rajput friend of Semar, whose domain had been invaded and cow-pens emptied, but a few days before, by the mountain bandit of Sirohi. With their booty they took the shortest and not most practicable road : but though their alpine kine are pretty well accustomed to leaping in such abodes, it would appear they had hesitated here. The difficulty was soon got over by one of the Minas, who with his dagger transfixed one and rolled him over the height, his carcase serving at once as a precedent and a stepping-stone for his horned kindred.
14 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
the peninsula : nor does the passage of the Nerbudda or the Tapti, through its diminished centre, mihtate against the hypo- thesis, which might be better substantiated by the comparison of their intrinsic character and structure.
Geology of the Aravallis. — The general character of the Aravalli is its primitive formation : ^ granite, reposing in variety of angle (the general dip is to the east) on massive, compact, dark blue slate, the latter rarely appearing much above the surface or base of the superincumbent granite. The internal valleys abound in variegated quartz and a variety of schistous slate of every hue, which gives a most singular appearance to the roofs of the houses and temples when the sun shines upon them. Rocks of gneiss and of syenite appear in the intervals ; and in the diverging ridges west of Ajmer the summits are quite dazzling with the enormous masses of vitreous rose-coloured quartz.
The Aravalli and its subordinate hills are rich in both mineral and metallic products ; and, as stated in the annals of Mewar, to the latter alone can be attributed the resources which enabled this family so long to struggle against superior power, and to raise those magnificent structures which would do honour to the most potent kingdoms of the west.
The mines are royalties ; their produce a monopoly, increasing the personal revenue of their prince. An-Dan- Khan is a triple figurative expression, which comprehends the sum of sovereign rights in Rajasthan, being allegiance, commercial duties, mines. The tin-mines of Mewar were once very productive, and yielded, it is asserted, no inconsiderable portion of silver : but the caste of miners is extinct, and political reasons, during the Mogul domination, led to the [13] concealment of such sources of wealth. Copper of a very fine description is likewise abundant, and supplies the currency ; and the chief of Salumbar even coins by sufferance from the mines on his own estate. Surma, or the oxide of anti-
^ [" Oldest of all the physical features which intersect the continent is the range of mountains known as the Aravallis, which strilies across the Peninsula from north-east to south-west, overlooking the sandy wastes of Rajputana. The Aravallis are but the depressed and degraded relics of a far more prominent mountain system, which stood, in Palaeozoic times, on the edge of the Rajputana Sea. The disintegrated rocks which once formed part of the Aravallis are now spread out in wide red-stone plains to the east" {lOI.i. 1).]
PHYSIOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN 15
mony, is found on the western frontier. The garnet, amethystine quartz, rock crystal, the chrysolite, and inferior kinds of the emerald family are all to be found within Mewar ; and though I have seen no specimens decidedly valuable, the Rana has often told me that, according to tradition, his native hills contained every species of mineral wealth.
The Patar Plateau. — Let us now quit our alpine station on the Aravalli, and make a tour of the Patar, or plateau of Central India, not the least important feature of this interesting region. It possesses a most decided character, and is distinct from the Vindhya to the south and the Aravalli to the west, being of the secondary formation, or trap, of the most regular horizontal stratification.
The circimiference of the plateau is best explained in the map, though its surface is most unequally detailed, and is continually alternating its character between the tabular form and clustering ridges.
Commencing the tour of Mandalgarh, let us proceed south, skirting Chitor (both on insulated rocks detached from the plateau), thence by Jawad, Dantoli, Rampura,^ Bhanpura, the Mukunddarra Pass,^ to Gagraim (where the Kali Sind forces an entrance through its table - barrier to Eklera)' and Margwas (where the Parbati, taking advantage of the diminished eleva- tion, passes fromMalwa to Haraoti), and by Raghugarh, Shahabad, Ghazigarh, Gaswani, to Jadonwati, where the plateau terminates on the Chambal, east ; while from the same point of outset, Mandalgarh, soon losing much of its table form, it stretches away in bold ranges, occasionally tabular, as in the Bundi fortress, by Dablana, Indargarh,* and Lakheri,* to Ranthambhor and Karauli, terminating at Dholpur Bari
The elevation and inequalities of this plateau are best seen by crossing it from west to east, from the plains to the level of the Chambal, where, with the exception of the short flat between Kotah and Pali ferry, this noble stream is seen rushing through the rocky barrier.
At Ranthambhor the plateau breaks into lofty ranges, their
^ Near this the Chambal first breaks into the Patar.
^ Here is the celebrated pass through the mountains.
^ Here the Niwaz breaks the chain.
* Both celebrated passes, where the ranges are very compHcated.
16 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
white summits [14] sparkling in the snn ; cragged but not peaked, and preserving the characteristic formation, though disunited from the mass. Here there are no less than seven distinct ranges {Satpara), through all of which the Banas has to force a passage to unite with the Chambal. Beyond Ranthambhor, and the whole way from Karauli to the river, is an irregular tableland, on the edge of whose summit are the fortresses of Utgir, Mandrel, and that more celebrated of Thun. But east of the eastern side there is still another steppe of descent, which may be said to originate near the fountain of the Sind at Latoti, and passing by Chanderi, Kanyadana, Narwar, and Gwalior, terminates at Deogarh, in the plains of Gohad. The descent from this second steppe is into Bundelkhand and the valley of the Betwa.
Distinguished as is this elevated region of the surface of Central India, its summit is but little higher than the general elevation of the crest of the Vindhya, and upon a level with the valley of Udaipur and base of the Aravalli. The slope or descent, therefore, from both these ranges to the skirts of the plateau is great and abrupt, of which the most intelligible and simple proof appears in the course of these streams. Few portions of the globe attest more powerfully the force exerted by the action of waters to subdue every obstacle, than a view of the rock-bound channels of these streams in this adamantine barrier. Four streams — one of v/hich, the Chambal, would rank with the Rhine and almost with the Rhone — have here forced their way, laying bare the stratification from the water's level to the summit, from three to six hundred feet in perpendicular height, the rock appear- ing as if chiselled by the hand of man. Here the geologist may read the book of nature in distinct character ; few tracts (from Rampura to Kotah) will be foimd more interesting to him, to the antiquarian, or to the lover of nature in her most rugged attire.
The surface of this extensive plateau is greatly diversified. At Kotah the bare protruding rock in some places presents not a trace of vegetation ; but where it bevels off to the banks of the Par it is one of the richest and most productive soils in India, and better cultivated than any spot even of British India. In its indented sides are glens of the most romantic description (as the fountain of ' the snake King ' near Hinglaj), and deep dells, the source of small streams, where many treasures of art,^ ^ I have rescued a few of these from oblivion to present to my countrymen.
PHYSIOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN 17
in temples and ancient dwellings, yet remain to reward the traveller [15].
This central elevation, as before described, is of the secondary formation, called trap. Its prevailing colour, where laid bare by the Chambal, is milk-white : it is compact and close-grained, and though perhaps the mineral offering the greatest resistance to the chisel, the sculptures at the celebrated BaroUi evince its utility to the artist. White is also the prevailing colour to the westward. About Kotah it is often mixed white and porphyritic, and about .Shahabad of a mixed red and brown tint. When exposed to the action of the atmosphere in its eastern declivity the decomposed and rough surface would almost cause it to be mistaken for gritstone.
This formation is not favourable to mineral wealth. The only metals are lead and iron ; but their ores, especially the latter, are abundant. There are mines, said to be of value, of sulphuret of lead (galena) in the GAvalior province, from which I have had specimens, but these also are closed. The natives fear to extract their mineral wealth ; and though abounding in lead, tin, and copper, they are indebted almost entirely to Europe even for the materials of their culinary utensils.
Without attempting a delineation of inferior ranges, I will only further direct the reader's attention to an important deduc- tion from this superficial review of the physiognomy of Rajwara.
The Mountain System of Central India. — There are two dis- tinctly marked declivities or slopes in Central India : the chief is that from west to east, from the great rampart, the Aravalli (interposed to prevent the drifting of the sands into the central plains, bisected by the Chambal and his hundred arms) to the Betwa ; the other slope is from south to north, from the Vindhya, t he southern buttress of Central India, to the Jumna.
Extending our definition, we may pronounce the course of the Jumna to indicate the central fall of that immense vale which has its northern slope from the base of the Himalaya, and the southern from that of the Vindhya mountains.
It is not in contemplation to delineate the varied course of the magnificent Nerbudda, though I have abundant means ; for the moment we ascend the summit of the tropical ^ Vindhya, to
^ Hence its name, Vindhija, ' the barrier,' to the further progress of the sun in his northern decHnation. [Skr. root, bind, bid, ' to divide.']
VOL. I C
18 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
descend into the valley of the Nerbudda, we abandon Rajasthan and the Rajputs for the aboriginal, races, the first proprietors of the land. These I shall leave to others, and commence and end with the Chambal, the paramount lord of the floods of Central India [16].
The Chambal River. — The Chambal has his fountains in a very elevated point of the Vindhya, amidst a cluster of hills on which is bestowed the local appellation of Janapao. It has three co- equal sources from the same cluster, the Chambal, Chambela, and Gambhir ; while no less than nine other streams have their origin on the south side, and pour their waters into the Nerbudda.
The Sipra from Pipalda, the little Sind ^ from Dewas, and other minor streams passing Ujjain, all unite with the Chambal in different stages before he breaks through the plateau.
The Kali Sind, from Bagri, and its petty branch, the Sodwia, from Raghugarh ; the Niwaz (or Jamniri), from Morsukri and Magarda ; the Parbati, from the pass of Amlakhera, with its more eastern arm from Daulatpur, uniting at Pharhar, are all points in the crest of the Vindhya range, whence they pursue their course through the plateau, rolling over precipices,^ till engulfed in the Chambal at the ferries of Nunera and Pali. All these unite on the right bank.
On the left bank his flood is increased by the Banas, fed by the perennial streams from the Aravalli, and the Berach from the lakes of Udaipur ; and after watering Mewar, the southern frontier of Jaipur, and the highlands of Karauli, the river turns south to unite at the holy Sangam,' Rameswar. Minor streams contribute (unworthy, however, of separate notice), and after a thousand involutions he reaches the Jumna, at the holy Triveni,* or ' triple-allied ' stream, between Etawa and Kalpi.
^ This ii the fourth Sind of India. We have, first, the Sind or Indus ; this little Sind ; then the Kali Sind, or ' black river ' ; and again the Sind rising at Latoti, on the plateau west and above Sironj. Sin is a Scythio word for river (now unused), so applied by the Hindus. [Skr. Sindhu, probably from the root syand, ' to flow.']
^ The falls of the Kali Sind through the rocks at Gagraun and the Par- bati at Chapra (Gugal) are well worthy of a visit. The latter, though I encamped twice at Chapra, from which it was reputed five miles, I did not see.
^ Sangam is the point of confluence of two or more rivers, always sacred to Mahadeva.
* The Jumna, Chambal, and Sind [triveni, ' triple braid '].
PHYSIOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN 19
The course of the Chambal, not reckoning the minor sinuosities, is upwards of five hundred miles ; ^ and along its banks specimens of nearly every race now existing in India may be found : Sondis, Chandarawats, Sesodias, Haras, Gaur, Jadon, Sakarwal, Gujar, Jat,* Tuar, Chauhan, Bhadauria, Kachhwaha, Sengar, Bundela ; each in associations of various magnitudes, from the substantive state of the little republic communes between the Chambal and Kuwari' [17]-
The Western Desert. — Having thus sketched the central portion of Rajasthan, or that eastward of the Aravalli, I shall give a rapid general * view of that to the west, conducting the reader over the ' Thai ka Tiba,' or ' sand hills ' of the desert, to the valley of the Indus.
The Luni River. — Let the reader again take post on Abu, by which he may be saved a painful journey over the Thal.^ The most interesting object in this arid ' region of death ' is the ' salt river,' the Luni, with its many arms falling from the Aravalli to enrich the best portion of the principality of Jodhpur, and dis- tinctly marking the line of that extensive plain of ever-shifting sand, termed in Hindu geography Marusthali, corrupted to Marwar.
The Luni, from its sources, the sacred lakes of Pushkar and Ajmer, and the more remote arm from Parbatsar to its em- bouchure in the great western salt marsh, the Rann, has a course of more than three hundred miles.
In the term Eirinon of the historians of Alexander, we have the corruption of the word Ran or Rann,* still used to describe that extensive fen formed by the deposits of the Luni, and the equally saturated saline streams from the southern desert of Dhat. It is one hundred and fifty miles in length ; and where broadest, from Bhuj to Baliari, about seventy : ' in which direc-
^ [650 miles.]
2 The only tribes not of Rajput blood. ^ Tj^g ' virgin ' stream.
* I do not repeat the names of towns forming the arrondissements of the various States ; they are distinctly laid down in the boundary lines of each.
5 Thai is the general term for the sand ridges of the desert. [Skr. slhala, ' firm ground.']
* Most probably a corruption of aranya, or desert ; [or iriiia, irina, ' desert, salt soil '], so that the Greek mode of writing it is more correct than the present.
' [The area of the Rann is about 9000 square miles : its length 150, breadth, 60 miles. Bhuj lies inland, not on the banks of the Rann.]
20 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
tion the caravans cross, having as a place of halt an insulated oasis in this mediterranean salt marsh. In the dry season, nothing meets the eye but an extensive and glaring sheet of salt, spread over its insidious surface, full of dangerous quicksands : and in the rains it is a dirty saline solution, up to the camels' girths in many places. The little oasis, the Khari Kaba^ furnishes pasture for this useful animal and rest for the traveller pursuing his journey to either bank.
The Mirage. — It is on the desiccated borders ^ of this vast salt marsh that the illusory phenomenon, the mirage, presents its fantastic appearance, pleasing to all but the wearied traveller, who sees a haven of rest in the embattled towers, the peaceful hamlet,^ [18] or shady grove, to which he hastens in vain ; reced- ing as he advances, till " the sun in his might," dissipating these " cloud-capp'd towers," reveals the vanity of his pursuit.
Such phenomena are common to the desert, more particularly where these extensive saline depositions exist, but varying from certain causes. In most cases, this powerfully magnifying and reflecting medium is a vertical stratum ; at first dense and opaque, it gradually attenuates with increased temperature, till the maximum of heat, which it can no longer resist, drives it off in an ethereal vapour. This optical deception, well known to the Rajputs, is called sikot, or ' winter castles,' because chiefly visible in the cold season : hence, possibly, originated the equally illusory and delightful ' Chateau en Espagne,' so well known in the west.^
^ It is here the wild ass {ijorlJiar) roams at large, untamable as in the day of the Arabian Patriarch of Uz, " whose house I have made the wilder- ness, the barren land (or, according to the Hebrew, salt places), his dwelling. He scorneth the multitude of the city, neither regardeth he the cr3ing of the driver " (Job xxxix. 6, 7). ^ Purwa.
^ I have beheld it from the top of the ruined fortress of Hissar with un- limited range of vision, no object to diverge its ray, save the miniature forests ; the entire circle of tlie horizon a chain of more than fancy could form of palaces, towers, and these airy ' pillars of heaven ' terminating in turn their ephemeral existence. But in the deserts of Dhat and Umrasumra, where the shepherds pasture their flocks, and especially where the alkaline plant is produced, the stratification is more horizontal, and produces more of the watery deception. It is this illusion to which the inspired writer refers, when he says, " the mock pool of the desert shall become real water " [Isaiah xxv. 7]. The inhabitants of the desert term it Chitram, literally ' the picture,' by no means an unhappy designation.
PHYSIOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN 21
The Desert. — From the north bank of the Luni to the south, and the Shaikhavat frontier to the east, the sandy region com- mences. Bikaner, Jodhpur, Jaisalmer are all sandy plains, increasing in volume as you proceed westward. All this portion of territory is incumbent on a sandstone formation : soundings of all the new wells made from Jodhpur to Ajmer yielded the same result : sand, concrete siliceous deposits, and chalk.
Jaisalmer is everywhere encircled by desert ; and that portion round the capital might not be improperly termed an oasis, in which wheat, barley, and even rice are produced. The fortress is erected on the extremity of a range of some hundred feet in elevation, which can be traced beyond its southern confines to the ruins of the ancient Chhotan erected upon them, and which tradition has preserved as the capital of a tribe, or prince, termed Hapa, of whom no other trace exists. It is not unlikely that this ridge may be connected with that which runs through the rich provuice of Jalor ; consequently an offset from the base of Abu.
Though all these regions collectively bear the terra Marusthali, or ' region of death ' (the emphatic and figurative phrase for the desert), the restrictive definition applies to a part only, that under the dominion of the Rathor race [19].
From Balotra on the Luni, throughout the whole of Dhat and Umrasumra, the western portion of Jaisalmer, and a broad strip between the southern limits of Daudputra and Bikaner, there is real solitude and desolation. But from the Sutlej to the Rann, a space of five hundred miles of longitudinal distance, and varying in breadth from fifty to one hundred miles, numerous oases are found, where the shepherds from the valley of the Indus and the Thai pasture their flocks. The springs of water in these places have various appellations, tar, par, rar, dar, all expressive of the element, round which assemble the Rajars, Sodhas, Mangalias, and Sahariyas,^ inhabiting the desert.
^ Sehraie [in the text], from sahra, ' desert.' Hence Sarrazin, or Saracen, is a corruption from sahra, ' desert,' and zadan, ' to strike,' contracted. Rdhzani, ' to strike on the road ' (rah). Rdhbar, ' on the road,' corrupted by the Pindaris to labar, the designation of their forays. [The true name is Sahariya, which has been connected with that of the Savara, a tribe in Eastern India. Saracen comes to us from the late Latin Saraceni,oi which the origin is unknown ; it cannot be derived from the Arabic Sharqi, ' eastern ' (see New English Dictionary, s.v.).]
22 GEOGRAPHY OF RAJASTHAN
I will not touch on the salt lakes or natron beds, or the other products of the desert, vegetable or mineral ; though the latter might soon be described, being confined to the jasper rock near Jaisalmer, which has been much used in the beautiful arabesques of that fairy fabric, at Agra, the mausoleum of Shah Jahan's queen.
Neither shall I describe the valley of the Indus, or that portion eastward of the stream, the termination of the sand ridges of the desert. I will inerely remark, that the small stream which breaks from the Indus at Dara, seven miles north of the insulated Bakhar, and falls into the ocean at Lakhpat, shows the breadth of this eastern portion of the valley, which forms the western boundary of the desert. A traveller proceeding from the Khichi or flats of Sind to the east, sees the line of the desert distinctly marked, with its elevated tibas or sand ridges under which flows the Sankra, which is generally dry except at periodical inunda- tions. These sand-hills are of considerable elevation, and may be considered the limit of the inundation of the ' sweet river,' the Mitha Maran, a Scythic or Tatar name for river, and by which alone the Indus is known, from the Panjnad ^ to the ocean [20].
^ The confluent arms or sources of the Indus.
BOOK II HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
CHAPTER 1
The Puranas. — Being desirous of epitomizing the chronicles of the martial races of Central and Western India, it was essential to ascertain the sources whence they draw, or claim to draw, their lineage. For this purpose I obtained from the library of the Rana of Udaipur their sacred volumes, the Puranas, and laid them before a body of pandits, over whom presided the learned Jati Gyanchandra. From these extracts were made of all the genealogies of the great races of Surya and Chandra, and of facts historical and geographical.
Most of the Puranas ^ contain portions of historical as well as geographical knowledge ; but the Bhagavat, the Skanda, the I Agni, and the Bhavishya are the chief guides. It is rather j fortunate than to be regretted that their chronologies do not perfectly agxee. The number of princes in each line varies, and names are transposed ; but we recognize distinctly the principal features in each, affording the conclusion that they are the productions of various writers, borrowing from some common original source [21].
^ " Every Parana," says the first authority existing in Sanskrit lore, " treats of five subjects : the creation of the universe ; its progress, and the renovation of the world ; the genealogy of gods and heroes ; chronology, according to a fabulous system ; and heroic history, containing the achieve- ments of demi-gods and heroes. Since each purana contains a cosmogony, both mythological and heroic history, the works which bear that title may not unaptly be compared to the Grecian theogonies " ('Essay on the Sanskrit and Pracrit Languages,' by H. T. Colebrooke, Esq. ; As. Res. vol. vii. p. 202). [On the age of the Puranas see Smith, EHI, 21 if.]
23
24 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Deluge Legend. — The Genesis ^ of India commences with an event described in the history of almost all nations, the deluge, which, though treated with the fancy peculiar to the orientals, is not the less entitled to attention. The essence of the extract from the Agni Pur ana is this : " When ocean quitted his bounds and caused universal destruction by Brahma's command, Vaiva- swata ^ Manu (Noah), who dwelt near the Himalaya ^ mountains was giving water to the gods in the Kritamala river, when a small fish fell into his hand. A voice commanded him to preserve it. The fish expanded to an enormous size. Manu, with his sons and their wives, and the sages, with the seed of every living thing, entered into a vessel which was fastened to a horn on the head of the fish, and thus they were preser-fed."
Here, then, the grand northern chain is given to which the abode of the great patriarch of mankind approximated. In the Bhavishya it is stated, that " Vaivaswata (sun-born) Manu ruled at the mountain Sumeru. Of his seed was Kakutstha Raja, who obtained sovereignty at Ayodhya,* and his descendants filled the land and spread over the earth."
I am aware of the meaning given to Sumeru, that thus the Hindus designated the north pole of the earth. But they had also a mountain with this same appellation of pre-eminence of Meru, ' the hill,' with the prefix Su, ' good, sacred ' : the Sacred Hill.
Meru, Sumeru. — In the geography of the Agni Purana, the term is used as a substantial geographical limit ; ^ and some of
^ Resolvable into Sanskrit, janarn, ' birth,' and is and iswar, ' lords ' \jyivw, yl-yvofiai, Skr. root jan, ' to generate '].
^ Son of the sun.
^ The snowy Caucasus. Sir WiUiara Jones, in an extract from a work entitled Essence of the Pooranas, says that this event took place at Dravira in the Deccan.
* The present Ajodhya, capital of one of the twenty-two satrapies con- stituting the Mogul Empire, and for some generations held by the titular Vizir, who has recently assumed the regal title. [Ghaziu-d-din Haidar in 1819.]
* " To the south of Sumeru are the mountains Himavan, Hemakuta, and Nishadha ; to the north are the countries Nil, Sveta, and Sringi. Between Hemachal and the ocean the land is Bharatkhand, called Kukarraa Bhumi (land of vice, opposed to Aryavarta, or land of virtue), in which the seven grand ranges are Mahendra, Malaya, Sahya, Suktimat, Riksha, Vindhya, and Paripatra " {Agni Purana).
EARLY TRADITIONS 25
the rivers flowing from the mountainous ranges, whose relative position with Sumeru are thei'e defined, still retain their ancient appellations. Let us not darken the subject, by supposing only allegorical meanings attached to explicit points. In the distribu- tion of their seven dwipas, or continents, though they interpose seas of curds, milk, or wine, we should not reject strong and evident facts, because subsequent ignorant interpolators filled up the page with puerilities [22].
This sacred mountain (Sumeru) is claimed by the Brahmans as the abode of Mahadeva,^ Adiswar,^ or Baghes ' ; by the Jains, as the abode of Adinath,* the first Jiniswara, or Jain lord. Here they say he taught mankind the arts of agriculture and civilized life. The Greeks claimed it as the abode of Bacchus ; and hence the Grecian fable of this god being taken from the thigh of Jupiter, confounding rncros (thigh) with the merii (hill) of this Indian deity. In this vicinity the followers of Alexander had their Saturnalia, drank to excess of the wine from its indigenous vines, and bound their brows with ivy (vela) ^ sacred to the Baghes of the east and west, whose votaries alike indulge in ' strong drink.'
These traditions appear to point to one spot, and to one individual, in the early history of mankind, when the Hindu and the Greek approach a common focus ; for there is little doubt that Adinath, Adiswara, Osiris, Baghes, Bacchus, Manu, Menes designate the patriarch of majjikind, Noah.
The Hindus can at this time give only a very general idea of the site of Meru ; but they appear to localize it in a space of which Bamian, Kabul, and Ghazni would be the exterior points. The former of these cities is Known to possess remains of the
^ The Creator, literally ' the Great God.
2 The ' first lord.'
^ Baghes, ' the tiger lord. He wears a tiger's or panther's hide ; which he places beneath him. So Bacchus did. The phallus is the emblem of each. Baghes has several temples in Mewar. [In identifying Bacchus with a Hindu tiger god the author depended on Asiatic Researches, i. 258, viii. 51. For the Greek story in the text see Quintus Curtius viii. 10; Diodorus iii. 63; Arrian, Anabasis, vii.]
* First lord.
' Vela is the general term for a climber, sacred to the Indian Bacchus (Baghes, Adiswara, or Mahadeva), whose priests, following his example, are fond of intoxicating beverages, or drugs. The amarbel, or immortal vela, is a noble cUmber.
26 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
religion of Buddha, in its caves and colossal statues.^ The Paropamisaa Alexandria is near Baniian ; but the Meru and Nyssa ^ of Alexander are placed more to the eastward by the jGreek writers, and according to the cautious Arrian between the Cophas and Indus. Authority localizes it between Peshawar and Jalalabad, and calls it Merkoh, or Markoh,* " a bare rock 2000 feet high [23] with caves to the westward, termed Bedaulat by the Emperor Humayun from its dismal appearance." * This
^ [" In the Tuman of Zohak and Bamiiin, the fortress of Zohak is a monument of great antiquity, and in good preservation, but the fort of Bamian is in ruins. In the mountain -side caves have been excavated and ornamented with plaster and paintings. Of these there are 12,000 which are called Sumaj, and in former times were used by the people as winter retreats. Three colossal figures are here : one is the statue of a man, 80 yards in height ; another that of a woman, 50 yards high, and the third that of a child measuring 15 yards. Strange to relate, in one of the caves is placed a coffin containing the body of one who reposes in his last sleep. The oldest and most learned of antiquarians can give no account of its origin, but suppose it to be of great antiquity. In days of old the ancients prepared a medicament with which they anointed corpses and consigned them to earth in a hard soil. The simple, deceived by this art, attribute their preservation to a miracle " {Ain, ii. 409 f., with Jarrett's notes). For Bamian see EB, iii. 304 f.]
2 Nishadha is mentioned in the Parana as a mountain. If in the genitive case (which the final syllable marks), it would be a local term given from the city of Nissa. [Nysa has no connexion with Nishadha. It probably lay near Jalalabad or Koh-i Mor (Smith^HI, 53).]
* Meru, Sanskrit, and Koh, Persian, for a ' hiU.'
* Asiatic Researches, vol. vi. p. 497. Wilford appears to have borrowed largely from that ancient store-house (as the Hindu would call it) of learning. Sir Walter Raleigh's History of the World. He combines, however, mucli of what that great man had so singularly acquired and condensed, with what he himself collected, and with the aid of imagination has formed a curious mosaic. But when he took a peep into " the chorographical description of the Terrestrial Paradise," I am surprised he did not separate the nurseries of mankind before and after the flood. There is one passage, also, of Sir Walter Raleigh which would have aided his hypothesis, that Eden was in Higher Asia, between the common sources of the Jihun and other grand rivers : the abundance of the Ficus Indica, or bar-tree, sacred to the first lord, Adnath or Mahadeva.
" Now for the tree of knowledge of good and evil, some men have pre- sumed further ; especially Gorapius Bocanus, who giveth liimself the honour to have found out the kind of this tree, which none of the writers of former times could ever guess at, whereat Gorapius much marvelleth."
" Both together went
Into the thickest v/ood ; there soon they chose
EARLY TRADITIONS 27
designation, however, of Dasht-i Bedaulat, or ' unhappy plain,' was given to the tract between the cities beforementioned [24]. The only scope of these remarks on Sumeru is to show that
The fig tree ; not that kind for fruit renowned. But such as at this day, to Indians known In Malabar or Decan, spreads her arms Branching so broad and long, that in the ground The bended twigs take root, and daughters grow About the mother tree, a pillar'd shade High overarched, and echoing walks between. There oft the Indian herdsman, shunning heat, Shelters in cool and tends his pasturing herds."
" Those leaves
They gathered, broad as Amazonian targe."
Paradise Lost, Book ix. 1100 ff.
Sir V/alter strongly supports the Hindu hypothesis regarding the locality of the nursery for rearing mankind, and that " India was the first planted and peopled countrie after the flood " (p. 99). His first argument is, that it was a place where the vine and olive were indigenous, as amongst the Sakai Scythai (and as they still are, together with oats, between Kabul and Bamian) ; and that Ararat could not be in Armenia, because the Gordian mountains on which the ark rested were in longitude 75°, and the VaUey of Shinar 79° to 80°, which would be reversing the tide of migration. "As they journeyed from the East, they found a plain, in the land of Shinar, and they dwelt there " (Genesis, chap. xi. ver. 2). He adds, " Ararat, named by Moses, is not any one hill, but a general term for the great Caucasian range ; therefore we must blow up this mountain Ararat, or dig it down and carry it out of Armenia, or find it elsewhere in a warmer country, and east from Shinar." He therefore places it in Indo-Scythia, in 140° of longitude and 35° to 37° of latitude, " where the mountains do build them- selves exceeding high " : and concludes, " It was in the plentiful warm East where Noah rested, where he planted the viae, where he tilled the ground and hved thereon. Placuit vero Noacho agricultur£e studium in qua trac- tanda ipse omnium peritissimus esse dicitur ; ob eamque rem, sua ipsius lingua, Ish-Adamath : * hoc est, Telluris Vir, appellatur, celebratusque est. The study of husbandry pleased Noah (says the excellent learned man, Arius Montanus) in the order and knowledge of which it is said that Noah excelled all men, and therefore was he called in his own language, a man exercised in the earth." The title, character, and abode exactly suit the description
* In Sanskrit, Ish, ' Lord,' adi, ' the first,' matti, ' Earth.' [The deriva- tion is absurd : matti, ' clay,' is modern Hindi.] Here the Sanskrit and Hebrew have the same meaning, ' first lord of the earth.' In these remote Rajput regions, where early manners and language remain, the strongest phrase to denote a man or human being is literally ' earth.' A chief de- scribing a fray between his own followers and borderers whence death ensued, says, Meri matti mdri, ' My earth has been struck ' : a phrase requiring no comment, and denoting that he must have blood in return.
28 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
the Hindus themselves do not make India within the Indus the cradle of their race, but west, amidst the hills of Caucasus,' whence the sons of Vaivaswata, or the ' sun-born,' migrated eastward to the Indus and Ganges, and founded their first estab- lishment in Kosala, the capital, Ayodhya, or Oudh.
Most nations have indulged the desire of fixing the source whence they issued, and few spots possess more interest than this elevated Madhya-Bhumi, or ' central region ' of Asia, where the Amu, Oxus, or Jihun, and other rivers, have their rise, and in which both the Surya and Indu * races (Sakha) claim the hill,'
the Jains give of their first Jiniswara, Adinath, the first lordly man, who taught them agriculture, even to " muzzling the bull in treading out the corn."
Had Sir Walter been aware that the Hindu sacred books styled their country Aryavarta,* and of which the great Imaus is the northern boundary, he would doubtless have seized it for his Ararat. [Needless to say, these speculations are obsolete.]
^ Hindu, or Indu-kush or koh, is the local appellation ; ' mountain of the moon.' [Hindu-kush is said to mean ' Hindu-slayer ' or ' Indian Caucasus.'] ^ Solar and lunar.
* Meru, ' the hill,' is used distinctively, as in Jaisalmer (the capital of the Bhatti tribe in the Western Desert), ' the hill of Jaisal ' ; Merwara, or the ' mountainous region ' ; and its inhabitants Meras, or ' mountaineers.' Thus, also, in the grand epic the Ramayana (Book i. p. 236), Mena is the mountain-nymph, the daughter of Meru and spouse of Himavat ; from whom sprung two daughters, the river goddess Ganga and the mountain- nymph Parbati. She is, in the Mahabharata, also termed Saila, the daughter of Sail, another designation of the snowy chain ; and hence mountain streams are called in Sanskrit sillelee [?]. Saila bears the same attributes with the Phrygian Cybele, who was also the daughter of a mountain of the same name ; the one is carried, the other drawn, by lions. Thus the Greeks also metamorphosed Parbat Pamer, or ' the mountain Pamer,' into Paro- pamisan, apphed to the Hindu Koh west of Bamian : but the Parbat pat Pamer, or ' Pamer chief of hills,' is mentioned by the bard Chand as being far cast of that tract, and under it resided Hamira, one of the great feuda- tories of Prithwiraja of Delhi. Had it been Paropanisan (as some authorities write it), it would better accord with the locality where it takes up the name, being near to'Nyssa and Meru, of which Parbat or Pahar would be a version, and form Paronisan, ' the Mountain of Nyssa,' the range Nishadha of the Puranas. [The true form is Paropanisos : the suggested derivation is
impossible.]
. ^
* Afydvarta, or the land of promise or virtue, cannot extend to the flat plains of India south of the Himavat ; for this is styled in the Puranas the very reverse, kukarma des, or land of vice. [Aryavarta is the land bounded by the Himalaya and Vindhya, from the eastern to the western seas (Manu, Laws, ii. 22).]
EARLY TRADITIONS : GENEALOGIES 29
sacred to a great patriarchal ancestor, whence they migrated eastward.
The Rajput tribes could scarcely have acquired some of their still existing Scythic habits and warlike superstitions on the burning plains of Ind It was too hot to hail with fervent adora- tion the return of the sun from his southern course to enliven the northern hemisphere. This should be the religion of a colder clime, brought from their first haunts, the sources of the Jihim and Jaxartes. The grand solstitial festival, the Aswamedha, or sacrifice of the horse (the type of the sun), practised by the children of Vaivaswata, the ' sun-born,' was most probably simultaneously introduced from Scythia into the plains of Ind, and west, by the sons of Odin, Woden, or Budha, into Scandinavia, where it became the Hi-el or Hi-ul,^ the festival of the winter solstice ; the grand jubilee of northern nations, and in the first ages of Christianity, being so near the epoch of its rise, gladly used by the first fathers of the church to perpetuate that event- [25|,
CHAPTER 2
Puranie Genealogies. — The chronicles of the Bhagavat and Agni, containing the genealogies of the Surya (sun) and Indu [moon) races, shall now be examined. The first of these, by calculation, brings down the chain to a period six centuries subsequent to Vikramaditya (a.d. 650), so that these books may have beeiV remodelled or commented on about this period : their fabrication' cannot be supposed.
Althovigh portions of these genealogies by Sir William Jones, Mr. Bentley, and Colonel Wilford, have appeared in the volumes of the Asiatic Researches, yet no one should rest satisfied with the inquiries of others, if by any process he can reach the fountain- head himself.
If, after all, these are fabricated genealogies of tbe ancient
^ Ilaya or Hi, in Sanskrit, ' horse ' — El, ' sun ' : whence ittttos and rJ\(os. HX appears to have been a term of Scythian origin for the sun ; and Hari, the Indian Apollo, is addressed as the sun. Hiul, or Jul, of northern nations (qu. Noel of France ?), is the Hindu Sankranti, of which more will be said hereafter. [The feast was known as Hvil, .Tnl, or Yule, and the suggested derivation is impossible.]
* Mallet's Northern Antiquities.
30 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
families of India, the fabrication is of ancient date, and they are all they know themselves upon the subject. The step next in importance to obtaining a perfect acquaintance with the genuine early history of nations, is to learn Avhat those nations repute to be such.
I Doubtless the original Puranas contained much valuable historical matter ; but, at present, it is difficult to separate a little pure metal from the base alloy of ignorant expounders and interpolators. I have but skimmed the surface : research, to the capable, may yet be rewarded by many isolated facts and important transactions, now hid under the veil of ignorance and allegory.
Neglect of History by the Hindus. — The Hindus, with the de- crease of intellectual power, their possession of which is evinced by their architectural remains, where just proportion and elegant mythological device are still visible, lost the relish for the beauty of truth, and adopted the monstrous in their writings as well as their edifices. But for detection and shame, matters of history would be hideously distorted even in civilized Europe ; but in the East, in the moral decrepitude of ancient Asia, with no judge to condemn, no public to praise, each priestly expounder may revel in a:n unfettered imagination, and reckon his admirers in proportion to the mixture of the marvellous ^ [26]. Plain histori- cal truths have long ceased to interest this artificially fed people.
If at such a comparatively modern period as the third century before Christ, the Babylonian historian Berosus composed his fictions, which assigned to that monarchy such incredible anti- quity, it became capable of refutation from the many historians of repute who preceded him. But on the fabulist of India we have no such check. If Vyasa himself penned these legends as now existing, then is the stream of knowledge corrupt from the fountain-head. If such the source, the stream, filtering through ages of ignorance, has only been increased by fresh impurities. It is difficult to conceive how the arts and sciences could advance,
^ The celebrated Goguet remarks on the ii'.adness of most nations pre- tending to trace their origin to infinity. The Babylonians, the Egyptians, and the Scythians, particularly, piqued themselves on their high antiquity, and the first assimilate with- the Hindus in boasting they had observed the course of the stars 473,000 years. Each heaped ages on ages ; but the foundations of this pretended antiquity are not supported by probability, and are even of modern invention (Origin of Laws).
PURANIC GENEALOGIES 31
when it is held impious to doubt the truth of whatever has been handed down, and still more to suppose that the degenerate could improve thereon. The highest ambition of the present learned priesthood, generation after generation, is to be able to compre- hend what has thus reached them, and to form commentaries upon past wisdom ; v>'hich commentaries are commented on ad J infinitum. \Mioever dare now aspire to improve thereon mustj keep the secret in his own breast. They are but the expounders of the olden oracles ; were they more they would be infidels. But this could not always Imve been the case. ^
With the Hindus, as with other nations, the progress to the heights of science they attained must have been gradual ; unless we take from them the merit of original invention, and set them down as borrowers of a system. These slavish fetters of the mind must have been forged at a later period, and it is fair to infer that the monopoly of science and religion was simultaneous. What must be the effect of such monopoly on the impulses and operations of the understanding ? Where such exists, knowledge could not long remain stationary' ; it must perforce retrograde. Could we but discover the period when religion ^ ceased to be a profession [27] and became hereditary (and that such there was these very genealogies bear evidence), we might approximate the era when science attained its height.
The Priestly Office. — In the early ages of these Solar and Lunar dynasties, the priestly office was not hereditary in families ; it was a profession ; and the genealogies exhibit frequent instances of branches of these races terminating their martial career in the
^ It has been said that the Brahmanical religion was foreign to India ; but as to the period of importation we have but loose assertion. We can easily give credit to various creeds and tenets of faith being from time to time incorporated, ere the present books were composed, and that previously the sons of royalty alone possessed the office. Authorities of weight infonn t us of these grafts ; for instance, Mr. Colebrooke gives a passage in his I Indian Classes : " A chief of the twice-bom tribe was brought by Vishnu's j "it eagle from Saca Dwipa ; hence Saca Dwipa Brahmins were known in Jambu 1 Dwipa." By Saka Dwipa, Scythia is understood, of which more will be ' said hereafter. Ferishta also, translating from ancient authorities, says, to the same effect, that " in the reign of Mahraje, King of Canouj, a Brahmin ' came from Persia, who introduced magic, idolatry, and the worship of tlie stars " ; so that there is no want of authority for the introduction of new tenets of faith. [The passage, inaccurately quoted, is taken from Dow i. 16. See Briggs's translation, i. Introd. Ixviii.]
7f
32 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
commencement of a religions sect, or gotra, and of their descend- ants reassuming their warhke occupations. Thus, of the ten sons of Ikshwaku,^ three are represented as abandoning worldly affairs and taking to religion ; and one of these, Kanina, is said to be the first who made an agnihotra, or pyreum, and worshipped fire, while another son embraced commerce. Of the Lunar line and the six sons of Pururavas, the name of the fourth was Raya ; " from him the fifteenth generation was Harita, who with his eight brothers took to the office of religion, and established the Kausika Gotra, or tribe of Brahmans."
From the twenty-fourth prince in lineal descent from Yayati, by name Bharadwaja, originated a celebrated sect, who still bear his name, and are the spiritual teachers of several Rajput tribes.
Of the twenty-sixth prince, Manava, two sons devoted them- selves to religion, and established celebrated sects, viz. Mahavira, whose descendants were the Pushkar Brahmans ; and Sankriti. whose issue were learned in the Vedas From the line of Ajamidha these ministers of religion were continually branching off.
In the very early periods, the princes of the Solar line, like the Egyptians and Romans, combined the offices of the priesthood with kingly power, and this whether Brahmanical or Buddhist.* Many of the royal line, before and subsequent to Rama, passed great part of their lives as ascetics ; and in ancient sculpture and drawings the head is as often adorned with the braided lock of the ascetic as with the diadem of royalty.*
The greatest monarchs bestowed their daughters on these royal hermits and sages [28]. Ahalya, the daughter of the power- ful Panchala,* became the wife of the ascetic Gautama. Tlie sage .Jamadagni espoused the daughter of Sahasra '^ Arjuna, of
^ Sec Table T. [now obsolete, not reprinted].
^ Some of the earlier of the twenty-four Tirthakaras, or Jain hierarchs, trace their origin from the solar race of princes. [As usual, Buchlhisni confused with Jainism.]
' Even now the Rana of Mewar mingles sj^iritual duties with those of royalty, and when he attends the temple of the tutelary deity of his race, he performs himself all the offices of the high priest for the day. In this point a strong resemblance exists to many of the races of antiquity.
■• Prince of the country of Panjab, or five streams east of the Indus. [Panchrda was in the Ganges-Jumna Duab and its neighbourhood.]
'' The legend of this monarch stealing his son-in-law's, the hermit's, cow (of which the Ramayana gives another version), the incarnation of Para-
PURANIC GENEALOGIES 33
Mahishmat,' king of the Haihaya tribe, a great branch of the Yadu race.
Among the Egyptians, according to Herodotus [ii. 87, 141], the priests succeeded to sovereignty, as they and the mihtary class alone could hold lands ; and Sethos, the priest of Vulcan, caused a revolution, by depriving the military of their estates.
We have various instances in India of the Brahmans from Jamadagni to the Mahratta Peshwa, contesting for sovereignty ; power * and homage being still their great aim, as in the days of Vishvamitra ^ and Vasishtha, the royal sages [29] whom " Janaka
suram, son of Jamadagni, and his exploits, appear purely allegorical, signify- ing the violence and oj)pression of royalty over the earth (prithivi), personified by the sacred gao, or cow^ and that the Brahmans were enabled to 'wrest royalty from the martial tribe, shows how they had multiplied.
On the derivatives from the word gao, I venture an etymologj^ for others to pursue :
I'AI A, yia, yij (Dor. 7a), that which produces aU things (from ydoj, genero) ; the earth. — Jones's Dictionary.
TAAA, IVIilk. Gaola, Herdsman, in Sanskrit. VaXariKoi, KeXroL, Galatians, or Gauls, and Celts (allowed to be the same) would be the shep- herd races, the pastoral invaders of Europe [?].
^ Maheswar, on the Nerbudda River.
^ Hindustan abounds with Brahmans, who make excellent soldiers, as far as bravery is a virtue ; but our oflficers are cautious, from experience, of admitting too many into a troop or company, for they still retain their intriguing habits. I have seen nearly as many of the Brahmans as of mihtary in some companies ; a dangerous error [reaUzed in the Great Mutiny]. ;
* The Brahman Vasishtha possessed a cow named Savala, so fruitful that with her assistance he could accomplish whatever he desired. By her aid he entertained King Vishvamitra and his army. It is evident that this cow denotes some tract of country which the priest held (bearing in mind that gao, prithivi, signify ' the earth,' as well as ' cow ') : a grant, beyond doubt, by some of Vishvamitra's unwise ancestors, and which he wislied to resume. From her were suppUed " the oblations to the gods and the pitrideva (father- gods, or ancestors), the perpetual sacrificial fire, the burnt-oli'erings and sacrifices." This was " the fountain of devotional acts " ; this was the Savala for which the king offered " a hundred thousand cows " ; this was " the jewel of which a king only should be proprietor." — The subjects of the Brahman appeared not to relish such transfer, and by " the lowing of the I cow Savala " obtained numerous foreign auxiliaries, which enabled the I Brahman to set his sovereign at defiance. Of these " the Pahlavi (Persian) ; kings, the dreadful Sakas (Sakai), and Yavanas (Greeks), with scymitars and ; gold armour, the Kambojas," etc., were each in turn created by the aU- producing cow. The armies of the Pahlavi kings were cut to pieces by Vishvamitra ; who at last, by continual reinforcements, was overpowered
VOL. I D
34 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIRES
sovereign of Mitliila, addressed witli folded hands in token of superiority."
Relations of Rajputs with Brahmans. — But this deference for the Brahmans is certainly, with many Rajput classes, very weak. In obedience to prejudice, they show them outward civility ; but, unless when their fears or wishes interfere, they are less esteemed than the bards.
The story of the King Vishvamitra of Gadhipura ^ and the Brahman Vasishtha, which fills so many sections of the first book of the Ramayana,^ exemplifies, under the veil of allegory, the
by the Brahman's levies. These reinforcements would appear to have been the ancient Persians, the Sacae, the Greeks, the inhabitants of Assam and Southern India, and various races out of the jiale of the Hindu rehgion ; all classed under the term Mlechchha, equivalent»to the ' barbarian ' of the Greeks and Romans.
The King Vishvamitra, defeated and disgraced by this powerful priest, " like a serpent with his teeth broken, like the sun robbed by the eclipse of its splendour, was filled with perturbation. Deprived of his sons and array, stripped of his pride and confidence, he was left without resource as a bird bereft of his wings." He abandoned his kingdom to his son, and like all Hindu princes in distress, determined, by penitential rites and austerities, " to obtain Brahmanhood." He took up his abode at the sacred Pushkar, living on fruits and roots, and fixing his mind, said, " I will become a Brah- man." By these penances he attained such spiritual power that he was enabled to usurp the Brahman's office. The theocrats caution Vishvamitra, thus determined to become a Brahman by austerity, that " the divine books are to be observed with care only by those acquainted with their evidence ; nor does it become thee (Vishvamitra) to subvert the order of things estab- lished by the ancients." The history of his wanderings, austerities, and the temptations thrown in his way is related. The celestial fair were com- missioned to break in upon his meditations. The mother of love herself descended ; while Indra, joining the cause of the Brahmans, took the shape of the kokila, and added the melody of his notes to the allurements of Rambha, and the perfumed zephyrs which assailed the royal saint in the wilderness. He was proof against all temptation, and condemned the fair to become a pillar of stone. He persevered " till every passion was subdued," till " not a tincture of sin appeared in him," and gave such alarm to the whole priesthood, that they dreaded lest his excessive sanctity should be fatal to them : they feared " mankind would become atheists." " The gods and Brahma at their head were obliged to grant his desire of Brahman- hood ; and Vashishtha, conciliated by the gods, acquiesced in their wish, and formed a friendship with Vishvamitra " [Muir, Original Sanskril Texts, Part i. (1858), 75 ff.].
^ Kanauj, the ancient capital of the present race of Marwar. [This is a myth. J
* See translation of this epic, by Messrs. Carey and Marshman [in verse, by R. T. H. Griffith].
PURANIC GENEALOGIES 35
contests for power between the Brahmanical and military classes, and will serve to indicate the probable period when the castes became immutable. Stripped of its allegory, the legend appears to point to a time when the division of the classes was yet imperfect ; though we may infer, from the violence of the struggle, that it was the last in which Brahmanhood could be obtained by the military.
Vishvamitra was the son of Gadhi (of the race of Kausika), King of Gadhipura, and contemporary of Ambarisha, King of Ayodhya or Oudh, the fortieth prince from Ikshwaku ; consequently about two hundred years anterior to Rama. This event therefore, whence we infer that the system of castes was approaching per- fection, was probably about one thousand foiu' hundred years before Christ.
Dates o£ the Genealogies. — If proof can be given that these genealogies existed in the days of Alexander, the fact would be interesting. The legend in the Puranas, of the origin of the Lunar race, appears to afford this testimonj^
Vyasa, the author of the grand epic the Mahabharata, was son of Santanu (of the race of Hari),^ sovereign of Delhi, by Yojana- gandha, a fisherman's daughter,^ [30] consequently illegitimate. He became the spiritual father, or preceptor, of his nieces, the daughters of Vichitravirya, the son and successor of Santanu.
The Herakles Legend. — Vichitravirya had no male offspring. Of his three daughters, one was named Pandaia * ; and Vyasa,
^ Hari-Kula.
^ It is a very curious circumstance that Hindu legend gives to two of their most celebrated authors, whom they have invested with a sacred character, a descent from the aboriginal and impure tribe3"of India : Vyasa from a fisherman, and Valmiki, the author of the other grand epic the Ramayana, from a Baddhik or robber, an associate of the Bhil tribe at Abu. The conversion of Vahniki (said to have been miraculous, when in the act of robbing the shrine of the deity) is worked into a story of con- siderable effect, in the works of Chand, from olden authority.
3 The reason for this name is thus given. One of these daughters being by a slave, it was necessary to ascertain which : a difficult matter, from the secl\ision in which they were kept. It was therefore left to Vyasa to discover the pure of birth, who determined that nobihty of blood would show itself, and comm.anded that the princesses should wallc uncovered before him. The elder, from shame, closed her eyes, and from her was born the blind Dhritarashtra, sovereign of Hastinapura ; the second, from the same feeling, covered herself with yellow ochre, called pandit, and henceforth she bore the name of Pandya, and her son was called Pandu ; while the third stepped forth unabashed. She was adjudged not of gentle blood, and her issue was Vidura.
36 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
being the sole remaining male branch of the house of Santanu, took his niece, and spiritual daughter, Pandaia, to wife, and became the father of Pandu, afterwards sovereign of Indraprastha. Arrian gives the story thus : "It is further said that he [Herakles] ^ had a very niunerous progeny of children born to
^ A generic term for the sovereigns of the race of Hari, used by Arrian as a proper name [?]. A section of the Mahabharata is devoted to the history of the Harikula, of which race was Vyasa.
Arrian notices the similarity of the Theban and the Hindu Hercules, and cites as authority the ambassador of Seleucus, Megasthenes, who says : " This Herakles is held in special honour by the Sourasenoi, an Indian tribe who possess two large cities, Methora and Cleisobora. . . . But the dress which this Herakles wore, Megasthenes tells us, resembled that of the Theban Herakles, as the Indians themselves admit." [Arrian, Indika, viii., Methora is Mathura ; Growse {Mathura, 3rd ed. 279) suggests that Cleiso- bora is Krishnapura, ' city of Krishna.']
Diodorus has the same legend, with some vai'iety. He says : " Hercules was bom amongst the Indians, and Uke the Greeks they furnish him with a club and lion's hide. In strength (bala) he excelled all men, and cleared the sea and land of monsters and wild beasts. He had many sons, but only one daughter. It is said that he built Pahbothra, and divided his kingdom amongst his sons (the Bahka-putras, sons of Bah). They never colonized ; but in time most of the cities assumed a democratical form of government (though some were monarchical) till Alexander's time." The combats of Hercules, to which Diodorus alludes, are those in the legendary haunts of the Harikulas, during their twelve years' exile from the seats of their fore- fathers.
How invaluable such remnants of the ancient race of Harikula ! How refreshing to the mind yet to discover, amidst the riiins on the Yamuna, Hercules (Baldeva, god of strength) retaining his club and lion's hide, stand- ing on his pedestal at Baldeo, and yet worshipped by the Suraseni ! This name was given to a large tract of country round Mathura, or rather round Surpura, the ancient capital founded by Surasena, the grandfather of the Indian brother-deities, Krishna and Baldeva, ApoUo and Hercules. The title would apply to either ; though Baldeva has the attributes of the ' god of strength.' Both are es (lords) of the race (Jcula) of Hari (Hari-kul-es), of which the Greeks might have made the compound Hercules. Might not a colony after the Great War have migrated westward ? The period of the return of the HeracUdae, the descendants of Atrens (Atri is progenitor of the Harikula), would answer : it was about half a century after the Great War. [These speculations are worthless.]
It is unfortunate that Alexander's historians were unable to penetrate into the arcana of the Hindus, as Herodotus appears to have done with those of the Egyptians. The shortness of Alexander's stay, the unknown language in which their science and rehgion were hid, presented an insuperable difficulty. They could have made very little progress in the study of the language without discovering its analogy to their own.
PURANIC GENEALOGIES 37
! him in India . . . [31] but that he had only one daughter.^ The
name of this cliild was Pandaia, and the land in which she was
born, and with the sovereignty of which Herakles entrusted her,
was called after her name Pandaia " (Indika, viii.).
This is the very legend contained in the Puranas, of Vyasa (who was Hari-kul-es, or chief of the race of Hari) and his spiritual daughter Pandaia, from whom the grand race the Pandavas, and from whom Delhi and its dependencies were designated the Pandava sovereignty.
Her issue ruled for thirty-one generations in direct descents, or frona 1120 to 610 before Christ ; when the military minister,' connected by blood, was chosen by the chiefs who rebelled against the last Pandu king, represented as " neglectful of all the cares of government," and whose deposition and death introduced a new dynasty.
Two other dynasties succeeded in like manner by the usurpa- tion of these military ministers, untU Vikramaditya, when the Pandava sovereignty and era of Yudhishthirawere both overturned.
^ Arrian generally exercises his judgment in these matters, and is the reverse of credulous. On this point he says, " Now to me it seems that even if Herakles could have done a thing so marvellous, he could have made himself longer-hved, in order to have intercourse with his daughter when she was of mature age " [Indika, ix.].
Sandrocottus is mentioned by Arrian to be of this line ; and we can have no hesitation, therefore, in giving him a place in the dynasty of Puru, the second son of Yayati, whence the patronymic used by the race now extinct, as was Yadu, the elder brother of Puru. Hence Sandrocottus, if not a Puru himself, is connected with the chain of which the hnks are Jarasandha (a hero of the Bharat), Ripunjaya, the twenty-third in descent, when a new race, headed by Sanaka and Sheshnag, about six hundred years before Christ, usurped the seat of the lineal descendants of Puru ; in which line of usurpation is Chandragupta, of the tribe Maurya, the Sandrocottus of Alexander, a branch of this Sheshnag, Takshak, or Snake race, a race whicli, stripped of its allegory, will afiford room for subsequent dissertation. The Prasioi of Arrian would be the stock of Puru j Prayag is claimed in the annals yet existing as the cradle of their race. This is the modern Allahabad ; and the Eranaboas must be the Jumna, and the point of junction with the Ganges, where we must place the capital of the Prasioi. [For Sandrokottos or Chandragupta Maurya see Smith, EIII, 42 ff. He certainly did not belong to the ' Snake Race.' The Erannoboas (Skr. Hiranyavaha, ' gold-bearing ') is the river Son. The Prasioi (Skr. Prachyas, dweUers in the east') had their capital at Patahputra, the modem Patna (McCrindle, Alexander, 365 f.).]
* Analogous to the maire du 2}alaiii of the first races of the Franks.
38 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Indraprastha remained without a sovereign, supreme power being removed from the north to the southern parts of India, till the fourth, or, according to some authorities, the eighth century after Vikrama, when the throne of Yudhishthira was once more occupied by the Tuar tribe of Rajputs, claiming descents from the Pandus. To this ancient capital, thus re founded, the new appellation of Delhi was given ; and the dynasty of the founder, Anangpal, lasted to the twelfth century, when he abdicated in favour of his grandson,^ Prithiviraja, the last imperial Rajput sovereign of India, whose defeat and death introduced the Muhammadans.
This line has also closed with the pageant of a prince, and a colony returned from the extreme west is now the sole arbiter of the thrones of Pandu and Timur.
Britain has become heir to the monuments of Indraprastha raised by the descendants of Budha and Ila ; to the iron pillar of the Pandavas, " whose pedestal ^ [32] is fixed in hell " ; to the columns reared to victory, inscribed with characters yet unknown ; to the massive ruins of its ancient continuous cities, encompassing a space still larger than the largest city in the world, whose moulder- ing domes and sites of fortresses,' the very names of which are
^ His daughter's son. This is not the first or only instance of the SaUc law of India being set aside. There are two in the history of the sovereigns of Anhilwara Patan. In all adoptions of this nature, when the child ' binds round his head the turban ' of his adopted father, he is finally severed from the stock whence he had his birth. [For the early history of Delhi see Smith, EHI, 386 ff.]
^ The khil, or iron pillar of the Pandus, is mentioned in the poems of Chand. An infidel Tuar prince wished to prove the truth of the tradition of its depth of foundation : " blood gushed up from the earth's centre, the pillar became loose (dhili)," as did the fortune of the house from such im- piety. This is the origin of Delhi. [The inscription on the pillar proves the falsity of the legend, and the name Delhi is older than the Tuar dynasty {/G/, xi.233).]
' I doubt if Shahpur is yet known. I traced its extent from the remains of a tower between Humayun's tomb and the grand column, the Kutb. In 1809 I resided four months at the mausoleum of Safdar Jang, the ancestor of the present [late] King of Oudh. amidst the ruins of Indraprastha, several miles from inhabited Delhi, but with which these ruins forms detached links of connexion. I went to that retirement with a friend now no more, Lieutenant Macartney, a name well known and honoured. We had both been employed in surveying the canals which had their sources in common from the head of the Jumna, where this river leaves its rocky barriers, the Siwalik chain, and issues into the plains of Hindustan. These canals on
GENEALOGIES 3D
lost, present a noble field for speculation on the ephemeral nature of power and glory. What monument would Britain bequeath to distant posterity of her succession to this dominion ? Not one : except it be that of a still less perishable nature, the monu- ment of national benefit. Much is in our power : much has been given, and posterity will demand the result.
CHAPTER 3
Princes of the Solar Line.— Vyasa gives but fifty-seven prhiccs of the Solar line, from Vaivaswata Manu to Rama ; and no list which has come under my observation exhibits more than fifty- eight, for the same period, of the Lunar race. How different from the Egyptian priesthood, who, according to Herodotus, gave a list up to that period of three hundred and thirty ^ sovereigns from their first prince, also the ' sun-born ^ Menes ! '
Ikshwaku was the son of Manu, and the first who moved to the eastward, and founded Ayodhya.
Budha (Mercury) founded the Lunar line ; but we are not told who established their first capital, Prayag,' though we are author- ized to infer that it was founded by Puru, the sixth in descent from Budha [33].
A succession of fifty-seven princes occupied Ayodhya from Ikshwaku to Rama. From Yayati's sons the Lunar races descend
each side, fed by the parent stream, returned the waters again into it ; one through the city of Delhi, the other on the opposite side. [Cunningham (ASR, i. 207 £f.) proved that the true site of the ancient city, Siri, was the old ruined fort to the north-east of Ral Pithora's stronghold, which is at present called Shahpur. This identification has been disputed by C. J. Campbell (JASB, 1866, p. 206). But Cunningham gives good reasons for maintaining his opinion. The place took its name from Sher Shah and his son Islam or Salim Shah. See also Carr Stephens, Archaeological and Monumental Remains of DeUii (1876), pp. 87 f., 190.]
1 Herodotus ii. 99, 100.
2 The Egyptians claim the sun, also, as the first founder of the kingdom of Egypt.
' The Jaisalmer annals give in succession Prayag, Mathura, Kusasthala,
Dwaraka, as capitals of the Indu or Lunar race, in the ages preceding the
Bharat or Great War. Hastinapur was founded twenty generations after
, these, by Hastin, from whom ramified the three grand Sakha, viz. Ajamidha,
Vimidha, and Purumidha, which diversified the Yadu race.
40 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
in unequal lengths. The lines from Yadu,^ concluding with Krishna and his cousin Kansa, exhibit fifty-seven and fifty-nine descents from Yayati ; while Yudhishthira,' Salya,' Jarasandha,* and Vahurita,* all contemporaries of Krishna and Kansa, are fifty-one, forty-six, and forty-seven generations respectively, from the common ancestor Yayati.
Solar and Lunar Genealogies. — There is a wide difference between the Solar and the Yadu branches of the Lunar lines ; yet is that now given fuUer than any I have met with. Sir William Jones's lists of the Solar line give fifty-six, and of the Limar (Budha to Yudhishthira) forty-six, being one less in each than in the tables now presented ; nor has he given the important branch terminating with Krishna. So close an affinity between lists, derived from such different authorities as this distinguished character and myself had access to, shows that there was some general source entitled to credit.
Mr. Bentley's * lists agree with Sir William Jones's, exhibiting fifty-six and forty-six respectively for the last-mentioned Solar and Lunar races. But, on a close comparison, he has either copied them or taken from the same original source ; afterwards transposing names which, though aiding a likely hypothesis, will not accord with their historical belief.
Colonel Wllford's ' Solar list is of no use ; but his two dynasties of Puru and Yadu of the Liuiar race are excellent, that part of the line of Furu, from Jarasandha to Chandragupta, being the only correct one in print.
It is surprising Wilford did not make use of Sir William Jones's Solar chronology ; but he appears to have dreaded bringing down Rama to the period of Krishna, as he is known to have preceded by four generations ' the Great War ' of the Yadu races.
It is evident that the lAmar line has reached us defective. It is supposed so by their genealogists ; and WUl'ord would have
^ See Table I. [not reprinted].
* Of Delhi — Indraprastlia.
' Salya, the founder of Aror on the Indus, a capital Ihad the good fortune to discover. Salya is the Siharas of Abu-1 Fazl. [Ain, ii. 343.]
* Jarasandha of Bihar.
' Vahoorita, unknown yet. [? Bahuratha.]
* Asiatic Researches, vol. v. p. 341. ' Ibid. vol. V. p. 241.
GENEALOGIES 41
increased the error by taking it as the standard, and reducing the Solar to conform thereto.
Mr. Bentley's method is therefore preferable ; namely, to suppose eleven princes omitted in the Lunar between Janmejaya and Prachinvat. But as there is no [34] authority for this, the Lunar princes are distributed in the tables collaterally with the Solar, preserving contemporaneous affinity where synchronisms will authorise. By this means all hypothesis will be avoided, and the genealogies will speak for themselves.
There is very little difference between Sir William Jones's and Colonel Wilford's lists, in that main branch of the Lunar race, of which Puru, Hastin, Ajamidha, Kuru, Santanu, and Yud- hishthira are the most distinguished links. The coincidence is so near as to warrant a supposition of identity of source ; but close inspection shows WUford to have had a fuller supply, for he produces new branches, both of Hastin's and Kuru's progeny. He has also one name (Bhimasena) towards the close, which is in my lists, but not in Sir William Jones's ; and immediately follow- ing Bhimasena, both these lists exhibit Dilipa, wanting in my copy of the Bhagavat, though contained in the Agni Purana : proofs of the diversity of the sources of supply, and highly grati- fying when the remoteness of those sources is considered. There is also in my lists Tansu, the nineteenth from Budlia, who is not in the lists either of Sir William Jones or Wilford. Again ; Wilford has a Suhotra preceding Hastin, who is not in Sir William Jones's genealogies. '^
Again ; Jahnu is made the successor to Kuru ; whereas the Purana (whence my extracts) makes Parikshit the successor, who adopts the son of Jahnu. This son is Viduratha, who has a place in all tliree. Other variations are merely orthographical.
A comparison of Sir William Jones's Solar genealogies with my tables will yield nearly the same satisfactory result as to original authenticity. I say Sir William Jones's list, because there is no other efficient one. We first differ at the fourth from Iksliwaku. In my list this is Am-Prithu, of which he makes two names, Anenas and Prithu. Thence to Purukutsa, the eighteenth, the difference is only in orthography. To Irisuaka, the twenty-third in mine, the twenty-sixth in Sir William Jones's list, one name is above accounted for ; but here are two wanting in mine, Trasa- ^ I find them, however, in the Agni Purana.
42 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
dasyu and Haryaswa. There is, also, considerable difference in the orthography of those names which we have in common. Again ; we differ as to the successors of Champa, the twenty- seventh, the founder of Champapur in Bihar. In Sir William's, Sadeva succeeds, and he is followed by Vijaya ; but my authorities state these both to be sons of Champa, and that Vijaya, the [35] younger, was his successor, as the elder, Sadeva, took to religious austerity. The thirty-third and thirty-sixth, Kesi and Dilipa, are not noticed by Sir William Jones ; but there is a much more important person than either of these omitted, who is a grand link of connexion, and affording a good synchronism of the earliest history. This is Ambarisha, the fortieth, the contem- porary of Gadhi, who was the founder of Gadhipura or Kanauj. Nala, Sarura, and Dilipa (Nos. 4i, 45, 54 of my lists) are all omitted by Sir William Jones.
This comparative analysis of the chronologies of both these grand races cannot fail to be satisfactory. Those which I furnish are from the sacred genealogies in the library of a prince who claims common origin with them, and are less liable to inter- polation. There is scarcely a chief of character for knowledge who cannot repeat the genealogy of his line. The Prince of Mewar has a peculiarly retentive memory in this way. The pro- fessed genealogists, the Bhats, must have them graven on their memory, and the Charanas (the* encomiasts) ought to be well versed therein.
The first table exhibits two dynasties of the Solar race of Princes of Ayodhya and Mithila Des, or Tirhut, which latter I have seen nowhere else. It also exhibits four great and three lesser dynasties of the Lunar race ; and an eighth line is added, of the race of Yadu, from the annals of the Bhatti tribe at Jaisalmer.
Ere quitting this halting-place in the genealogical history of the ancient races, where the celebrated names of Rama, Krishna, and Yudhishthira close the brazen age of India, and whose issue introduce the present iron age, or Kali Yuga, I shall shortly refer to the few synchronic points which the various authorities admit.
Of periods so remote, approximations to truth are the utmost to be looked for ; and it is from the Ramayana and the Puranas these synchronisms are hazarded.
Harischandra. — The first commences with a celebrated name of the Solar line, Harischandra, son of Trisanku, still proverbial for
GENEALOGIES 43
his humility.^ He is the twenty-fourth,^ and declared contem- porary of Parasurama, who slew the celebrated Sahasra-Arjuna ^ of [36] the Haihaya (Lunar) race, Prince of Mahishniati on the Nerbudda. This is confirmed by the Ramayana, which details the destruction of the military class and assumption of political power by the Brahmans, under their chief Parasurama, marking the period when the military class ' lost the umbrella of royalty,' and, as the Brahmans ridiculously assert, their purity of blood. This last, however, their own books sufficiently contradict, as the next synchronism will show.
Sagara. — This synchronism we have in Sagara, the thirty - second prince of the Solar line, the contemporary of Talajangha, of the Lunar line, the sixth in descent from Sahasra Arjuna, who had five sons preserved from the general slaughter of the military class by Parasurama, whose names are given in the Bhavishya Purana.
Wars were constantly carried on between these great rival races, Surya and Indu, recorded in the Puranas and Ramayana. The Bhavishya describes that between Sagara and Talajangha
^ [The tragical story of Harischandra is told by J. Muir, Original Sanskrit Texts, i. 88 ff.]
^ Sahyadri Khanda of the Skanda Purana.
' In the Bhavishya Purana this prince, Sahasra-Arjuna, is termed a Chakravartin, or paramount sovereign. It is said that iie conquered Kar- kotaka of the Takshak, Turushka, or Snake race, and brought with him the population of Mahishmati, and founded Hemanagara in the north of India, on his expulsion from his dominions on the Nerbudda. Traditionary legends yet remain of this prince on the Nerbudda, where be is styled Sahasrabahu, or ' with a thousand arms,' figurative of his numerous progeny. The Takshak, or Snake race, here alluded to, will hereafter engage our attention. The names of animals in early times, planets, and things inanimate, all furnished symbolic appellations for the various races. In Scrii^ture we have the fly, the bee, the ram to describe the princes of Egypt, Assyria, and Macedonia ; here we have the snake, horse, monkey, etc. The Snake or Takshak race was one of the most extensive and earliest of Higher Asia, and celebrated in all its extent, and to which I shall have to recur hereafter. [By the Takshak race, so often referred to, the author seems to mean a body of Scythian snake-worshippers. There are instances of a serpent barrow, and of the use of the snake as a form of ornament among the Scythians ; but bej'ond this the evidence of worship of the serpent is scanty (E. H. Minns, Scythians and Greeks, 328 f., 66 note, 294, 318, 323, etc.). It was really the Takka, a Panjab tribe (Beal, Si-yu-ki, i. 165 ft". ; Cunningham, Ancient Geography of India, 148 ff. ; Stein, Rdjatarangini, i. 204 f.).]
In the Ramayana it is stated that the sacrificial horse was stolen by " a serpent (Takshak) assuming the form of Ananta."
44 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
" to resemble that of their ancestors, in which the Haihayas suffered as severely as before." But that they had recovered all their power since Parasuraina is evident from their having com- pletely retaliated on the Suryas, and expelled the father ^ of Sagara from his capital of Ayodhya. Sagara and Talajangha appear to have been contemporary with Hastin of Hastinapura, and with Anga, descended from Budha, the founder of Angadesa,^ or Ongdesa, and the Anga race.
Ambarisha. — The Ramayana affords another synchronism ; namely, that Ambarisha of Ayodhya, the fortieth prince of the Solar line, was the contemporary of Gadhi, the foimder of Kanauj, and of Lomapada the Prince of Angadesa.
Krishna. — The last synchronism is that of Krishna and Yud- hishthira, which terminates the [37] brazen, and introduces the Kali Yuga or iron age. But this is in the Lunar line ; nor have we any guide by which the difference can be adjusted between the appearance of Rama of the Solar and Krishna of the Lunar races.
Thus of the race of Krostu we have Kansa, Prince of Mathura, the fifty-ninth, and his cousin Krishna, the fifty-eighth from Budha ; while of the hne of Puru, descending through Ajamidha and Dvimidha, we have Salya, Jarasandha, and YudhLshthira. the fifty-flrstj fifty-third, and fifty-fourth respectively.
The race of Anga gives Prithusena as one of the actors and survivors of the Mahabharata, and the fifty-third from Budha.
Thus, taking an average of the whole, we may consider fifty- five princes to be the number of descents from Budha to Krishna
^ " Asita, the father of Sagara, expelled by hostile kings of the Haihaj'as, the Talajanghas, and the Sasa-vindus, fled to the Himavat mountains, whei'o he died, leaving his wives pregnant, and from one of these Sagara was born " (Ramayana, i. 41). It was to preserve the Solar race from the destruction which threatened it from the prohfic Lunar race, that the Brahman Parasu- rama armed : evidently proving that the Brahmanicai faith was held by the Solar race ; while the rehgion of Budha, the great progenitor of the Lunar, still governed his descendants. This strengthened the opposition of the sages of the Solar line to Vishvamitra's (of Budha's or the Lunar line) obtaining Brahmanhood. That Krishna, of Lunar stock, prior to founding a new sect, worshipped Budha, is susceptible of proof.
^ Angdcs, Ongdes, or Undes adjoins Tibet. The inhabitants call them- selves Hungias, and appear to be the Hong-niu of the Chinese authors, the Huns (Huns) of Europe and India, which prove this Tartar race to be Lunar, and of Budha. [Anga, the modern Bhagalpur, is confounded with Hundes or Tibet.]
THE FOUNDATION OF ANCIENT CITIES 45
and Yudhishthira ; and, admitting an average of twenty years for each reign, a period of eleven hundred years ; which being added to a. Hke period calculated from thence to Vikramaditya, who reigned fifty-six years before Christ, I venture to place the establishment in India Proper of these two grand races, distinct- ively called those of Surj^a and Chandra, at about 2256 years before the Christian era ; at which period, though somewhat later, the Egyptian, Chinese, and Assyrian monarchies are gener- ally stated to have been established,^ and about a century and a half after that great event, the Flood.
Though a passage in the Agni Purana indicates that the line of Surj^a, of which Ikshwaku was the head, was the first colony which entered India from Central Asia, yet we are compelled to place the patriarch Budha as his contemporary, he being stated to have come from a distant region, and married to Ila, the sister of Ikshwaku.
Ere we proceed to make any remarks on the descendants of Krishna and Arjuna, who carry on the Lunar line, or of the Kushites and Lavites, from Kusa and Lava, the sons of Rama, who carry on that of the Sun, a few observations on the chief kingdoms established by their progenitors on the continent of India will be hazarded in the ensuing Chapter [38].
CHAPTER 4
Ayodhya. — iVyodhya ^ was the first city founded by the race of Surya. Like other capitals, its importance must have risen by
^ Egyptian, under Misraim, 2188 b.c. ; Assyrian, 2059 ; Chinese, 2207. [The first Egyptian dynasty is now dated 5500 B.C. ; Chinese, 2852 B.C. ; Babylonian, 2300 B.C. Any attempt to establish an Indian chronology from the materials used by the Author does not promise to be successful.]
^ The picture drawn by Valmild of the capital of the Solar race is so highly coloured that Ayodhya might stand for Utopia, and it would be difficult to find such a catalogue of metropolitan embellishments in this, the iron age of Oudh. " On the banks of the Surayu is a large country called Kosala, in which is Ayodhya, built by Mann, twelve yojans (forty- eight miles) in extent, with streets regular and well watered. It was filled with merchants, beautified by gardens, ornamented with stately gates and high-arched porticoes, furnished v/ith arms, crowded with chariots, elephants, and horses, and with ambassadors from foreign lands ; embeUisbed with palaces whose domes resembled the mountain tops, dwellings of equal height, resounding with the delightful music of the tabor, the flute, and the harp.
46 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
slow degrees ; ye^ making every allowance for exaggeration, it must have attained great splendour long anterior to Rama. Its site is well known at this day under the contracted name of Oudh, which also designates the country appertaining to the titular wazir of the Mogul empire ; which country, twenty-five years ago, nearly marked the limits of Kosala, the pristine kingdom of the Surya race. Overgrown greatness characterized all the ancient Asiatic capitals, and that of Ayodhya was immense. Lucknow, the present capital, is traditionally asserted to have been one of the suburbs of ancient Oudh, and so named by Rama, in compliment to his brother Lakshman.
Mithila. — Nearly coeval in point of. time with Ayodhya was Mithila,^ the capital of a country of the same name, founded by Mithila, the grandson of Ikshwaku.
The name of .Janaka,^ son of Mithila, eclipsed that of the founder and became the patronymic of this branch of the Solar race.
Other Kingdoms. — These are the two chief capitals of the kingdoms of the Solar line described in [39] this early age : though there were others of a minor order, such as Rohtas, Champapura,^ etc., all founded previously to Rama.
By the numerous dynasties of the Lunar race of Budha many kingdoms were founded. Much has been said of the antiquity of Prayag ; yet the first capital of the Indu or Lunar race appears
It was surrounded by an impassable moat, and guarded by archers. Dasa- ratha was its king, a mighty charioteer. There were no atheists. The affections of the men were in their consorts. The women were chaste and obedient to their lords, endowed with beautj, wit, sweetness, prudence, and industry, with bright ornaments and fair apparel ; the men devoted to truth and hospitality, regardful of their superiors, their ancestors, and their gods.
" There were eight councillors ; two chosen priests profoimd in the law, besides another inferior council of six. Of subdued appetites, disinterested, forbearing, pleasant, patient ; not avaricious ; well acquainted with their duties and popular customs ; attentive to the army, the treasury ; im- partially awarding punishment even on their own sons ; never oppressing even an enemy ; not arrogant ; comely in dress ; never confident about doubtful matters ; devoted to the sovereign."
^ Mithila, the modern Tirhut in Bengal [including the modern districts of Darbhanga, Champaran, and Muzaffarpur].
^ Kusadhwaja, father of Sita (spouse of Rama), is also called Janaka ; a name common in this line, and borne by the third prince in succession after Suvarna Roma, the ' golden-haired ' chief Mithila. I ' [Rohtas in the modern Shahabad district ; Charapapura in Ehagalpur.]
THE FOUNDATION OF ANCIENT CITIES 47
to have ITeen founded by Sahasra Arjuna, of the Haihaya tribe. This was Mahishmati on tlie Nerbudda, still existing in Mahes- war.^ The rivalry between the Lnnar race and that of the Suryas of Ayodhya, in whose aid the priesthood armed, and expelled Sahasra Arjuna from Mahishmati, has been mentioned. A small branch of these ancient Haihayas ^ yet exist in the line of the Nerbudda, near the very top of the valley at Sohagpur, in Baghel- khand, aware of their ancient lineage ; and, though few in number, are still celebrated for their valour.^
Dwarka. — Kusasthali Dwarka, the capital of Krishna, was founded prior to Prayag, to Surpur, or Mathura. The Bhagavat attributes the foundation of the city to Anrita, the brother of Ikshwaku, of the Solar race, but states not how or when the Yadus became possessed thereof.
The ancient annals of the Jaisalmer family of the Yadu stock give the priority of foundation to Prayag, next to Mathura, and last to Dwarka. All these cities are too well known to require description ; especially Prayag, at the confluence of the Yamuna and Ganges. The Prasioi were the descendants of Puru * of Prayag, visited by Megasthenes, ambassador of Seleucus, and the principal city of the Yadus, ere it sent forth the four branches from Satwata. At Prayag resided the celebrated Bharat, the son of Sakuntala.
In the Ramayana the Sasavindus ^ (another Yadu race) are inscribed as allied with the Haihayas in the wars with the race of Surya ; and of this race was Sisupal " (the founder of Chedi ^), one of the foes of Krishna [40].
* Familiarly designated as Sahasra Bahu ki Basti, or ' the town of the thousand-armed.' [In Indore State {IGI, xvii. 8).]
2 The Haihaya race, of the line of Budha, may claim affinity with the Chinese race which first gave nionarchs to China [?].
* Of this I have heard the most romantic proofs in very recent times.
* Puru became the patronymic of this branch of the Lunar race. Of this Alexander's historians made Porus. The Suraseni of Methoras (descendants of the Sursen of Mathura) were all Purus, the Prasioi of Megasthenes [see p. .37, n.]. Allahabad yet retains its Hindu name of Prayag, pronounced Prag.
^ The Hares. Sesodia is said to have the same derivation. [From Sesoda in Mewar.]
* The princes of Ranthambhor, expelled by Prithwiraja of Delhi, were of this race.
' The modern Chanderi [in the Gwalior State, IQI, x. 163 f.] is said to be
48 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Surpur. — We are assured by Alexander's historians that the country and people round Mathura, when he invaded India, were termed Surasenoi. There are two princes of the name of Sursen in the immediate ancestry of Krishna ; one his grandfather, the other eight generations anterior Which of these founded the capital Surpur/ whence the country and inhabitants had their appellation, we cannot say Mathura and Cleisobara are men- tioned by the historians of Alexander as the chief cities of the Surasenoi. Though the Greeks sadly disfigure names, we cannot trace any affinity between Cleisobara and Surpur.
this capito.l, and one of the few to which no Englishman has obtained entrance, though I tried hard in 1807. Doubtless it would afford food for curiosity ; for, being out of the path of armies in the days of conquest and revolution, it may, and I believe does, retain much worthy of research. [The capital of the Chedi or Kalachuri dynasty was Tripura or Karanbel, near Jabalpur {IGI, x. 12).]
^ I had the pleasure, in 1814, of discovering a remnant of this city, which the Yamuna has overwhelmed. [The ancient Surj^apura was near Batesar, 40 miles south-east of Agra city. Sir H. Elliot (Supplemental Glossary, 187) remarks that it is strange that the Author so often claims the credit of dis- covery when its position is fixed in a set of familiar verses. For Suryapura see A. Fiihrer, Monumental Antiquities and Inscriptions, 69.] The sacred place of pilgrimage, Batesar, stands on part of it. My discovery of it was doubly gratifying, for while I found out the Surasenoi of the Greeks, I obtained a medal of the little known ApoUodotus, who carried his arms to the mouths of the Indus, and possibly to the centre of the land of the Yadus. He is not included by Bayer in his lists of the kings of Bactria, but wo have only an imperfect knowledge of the extent of that dynasty. The Bhagavat Purana asserts thirteen Yavan or Ionian princes to have ruled in Balichdes [?] or Bactria, in which they mention Pushpamitra Dvimitra. We are justified in asserting this to be Demetrius, the son of Euthydemus, but who did not succeed his father, as Menander intervened. Of this last conqueror I also possess a medal, obtained amongst the Surasenoi, and struck in com- memoration of victory, as the winged messenger of heavenly peace extends the palm branch from her hand. These two will fill up a chasm in the Bactrian annals, for Menander is well known to them. ApoUodotus would have perished but for Arrian, who wrote the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea in the second century, while commercial agent at Broach, or classically Brigukachchha, the Barugaza of the Greeks. [The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea was written by an unknown Greek merchant of first century a.d. (McCrindlo, Commerce and Navigation, Introd. p. 1).]
Without the notice this writer has afforded us, my ApoUodotus would have lost half its value. Since my arrival in Europe I have also been made acquainted with the existence of a medal of Demetrius, discovered in Bokhara, and on which an essay has been written by a savant at St. Petersburg.
THE FOUNDATION OF ANCIENT CITIES 49
Hastinapura. — The city of Hastinapura was built by Hastin a name celebrated in the Lunar dynasties. The name of this city is still preserved on the Ganges, about forty miles south of Hardwar,^ where the Ganges breaks through the Siwalik moun- tains and enters the plains of India. This mighty stream, rolling its masses of waters from the glaciers of the Himalaya, and joined by many auxiliary streams, frequently carries destruction before it. In one night a column of thirty feet in perpendicular height has been known to bear away all within its sweep, and to such an occurrence the capital of Hastin is said to have owed its ruin.^ As it existed, however, long after the Mahabharata, it is surpris- ing it is not mentioned by the historians of Alexander, who in- vaded India probably about eight centuries after that event. In this abode of the sons of Puru resided Porus, one of the two princes of that name, opponents of Alexander, and probably Bindusara the son of Chandragupta, surmised to be the Abisares ^ and Sandrakottos of Grecian authorities. Of the two princes named Porus mentioned by Alexander's [41] historians, one resided in the very cradle of the Puru dynasties ; the abode of the other bordered on the Panjab : warranting an assertion that the Pori of Alexander were of the Lunar race, and destroying all the claims various authors * have advanced on behalf of the princes of Mewar.*
Hastin sent forth three grand branches, Ajamidha, Dvimidha, and Purumidha. Of the two last we lose sight altogether ; but Ajamidha's progeny spread over all the northern parts of India, in the Panjab and across the Indus. The period, probably one thousand six hundred years before Christ.
^ The portal of Hari or Hara, whose trisula or trident is there.
^ Wilford says this event is mentioned in two Puranas as occurring in the sixth or eighth generation of the Great War. Those who have travelled in the Duab must have remarked where both the Ganges and Jumna have shifted their beds.
' [Abisares is Abhisara in the modern Kashmir State (Smith, EHI, 59).]
* Sir Thomas Roe ; Sir Thomas Herbert ; the Holstein ambassador (by Olearius) ; Delia Valle ; Churchill, in his collection : and borrowing from these, D'Anville, Bayer, Orme, Rennell, etc.
'' The ignorance of the family of Mewar of the fact would by no means be a conclusive argument against it, could it be otherwise substantiated ; but the race of Surya was completely eclipsed at that period by the Lunar and new races which soon poured in from the west of the Indu.s, and in time displaced them all.
VOL. I E
50 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
From Ajamidha/ in the fourth generation, was Bajaswa, who obtained possessions towards the Indus, and whose five sons gave their name, Panchala, to the Panjab, or space watered by the five rivers. The capital founded by the younger brother, Kam- pila, was named Kampilnagara.^
The descendants of Ajamidha by his second "wife, Kesini, founded another kingdom and dynasty, celebrated in the heroic history of Northern India. This is the Kausika dynasty.
Kanauj. — Kusa had four sons, two of whom, Kusanablia and Kusamba, are well known to traditional history, and by the still surviving cities founded by them. Kusanabha founded the city of Mahodaya on the Ganges, afterwards changed to Kanyakubja, or Kanauj, which maintained its celebrity until the Muhammadan invasion of Shihabu-d-din (a.d. 1193), when this overgrown city was laid prostrate for ever. It was not unfrequently called Gadhipura, or the ' city of Gadhi.' This practice of multiply- ing names of cities in the east is very destructive to history. Abu-1 Fazl has taken from Hindu authorities an account of Kanauj ; and could we admit the authority of a poet on such subjects, Chand, the bard of Prithwiraja,* would afford materials. Ferishta states it in the early ages to have been twenty- five coss [42] (thirty-five miles) in circumference, and that there were thirty thousand shops for the sale of the areca or beetle - nut only ; * and this in the sixth century, at which period the Rathor dynasty, which terminated with Jaichand, in the twelfth, had been in possession from the end of the fiftli century.
Kusamba also founded a city, called after his own name
^ Ajamidha, by his wife Nila, had five sons, who spread their branches (Sakha) on both sides the Indus. Regarding three the Puranas are silent, which impHes their migration to distant regions. Is it possible they might be the origin of the Medes ? Tliese Medes are descendants of Yayati, third son of the patriarch Manu ; and Madai, founder of the Medes, was of Japhet's line. Ajamidha, the patronymic of the branch of Bajaswa, is from Aja, ' a goat.' The Assyrian Mode, in Scripture, is typified by the goat. [These speculations are worthless.]
^ Of this house was Draupadi, the wife, in common, of the five Pandava brothers : manners peculiar to Scythia.
' King of Delhi.
* [Briggs i. 57. The accounts of tlie size of the citj' are extravagant (Elphinstone, HI, 3.32 note ; Cunningham, ASR, i. 270 tf.).]
THE FOUNDATION OF ANCIENT CITIES 51
Kaiisambi.^ The name was in existence in the eleventh century ; and ruins might yet exist, if search were made on the shores of the Ganges, from Kanauj southward.
The otlier sons built two capitals, Dharmaranya and Vasumati ; but of neither have we any correct knowledge.
Kuru had two sons, Sudhanush and Parikhshita. The descend- ants of the former terminated with Jarasandha, whose capital was Rajagriha (the modern Rajmahal) on the Ganges, in the province of Bihar.^ From Parikhshita descended the monarchs Santanu and Balaka : the first producing the rivals of the Great War, Yudhishthira and Duryodhana ; the other the Balakaputras.
Duryodhana, the successor to the throne of Kuru, resided at the ancient capital, Hastinapura ; while the junior branch, Yudhishthira, founded Indraprastha, on the Yamuna or Jumna, which name in the eighth century was changed to Delhi.
The sons of Balaka founded two kingdoms : Palibothra, on the lower Ganges ; and Aror,' on the eastern bank of the Indus, founded by Sahl [43].
^ An inscription was discovered at Kara on the Ganges, in which Yaspal is mentioned as prince of the realm of Kausambi {As. Res. vol. ix. p. 440). WiKord, in his Essay on the Geography of the Purans, says " Causambi, near Alluhabad " {As. Res. vol. xiv.). [The site is uncertain (Smith, EHI, 29.3, note).] ^ [Rajglr in Patna District.]
' Aror, or Alor, was the capital of Sind in remote antiquity : a bridge over the stream which branched from the Indus, near Dara, is almost the sole vestige of this capital of the Sogdoi of Alexander. On its site the shepherds of the desert have estabhshed an extensive hamlet ; it is placed on a ridge of siliceous rock, seven miles east of the insular Bakhar, and free from the inundations of the Indus. The Sodha tribe, a powerful branch of the Pramara race, has ruled in these countries from remote antiquity, and to a very late period they were lords of Umarkot and Umrasurara, in which divisions was Aror. Sahl and his capital were known to Abu-1 Fazl, though he was ignorant of its position, which he transferred to Debal, or Dewal, the modern Tatta. This indefatigable historian thus describes it : '' In ancient times there lived a raja named Siharas (Sahl), whose capital was Alor, and his dominions extended north to Kashmir and south to the ocean " [Atn, ii. 343]. Sahl, or Sahr, becaine a titular appellation of the country, its princes, and its inhabitants, the Sehraes. [See p. 21 above.] Alor appears to have been the capital of the kingdom of Sigerdis, conquered by Menander of Bactria. Ibn Haukal, the Arabian geographer, mentions it ; but a superfluous point in writing has changed Aror into Azor, or Azour, as translated by Sir W. Ouseley. The illustrious D'AnviUe mentions it ; but, in ignorance of its position, quoting AbuLfeda, says, in grandeur " Azour est presque comparable a Mooltan." I have to claim the discovery of
52 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
One great arm of the tree of Yayati remains unnoticed, that of Uru or Urvasu, written by others Turvasu. Uru was the father of a hne of kings who founded several empires. Virupa, the eighth prince from Uru, had eight sons, two of whom are particu- larly mentioned as sending forth two grand shoots, Druhyu and Bhabru. From Druhyu a dynasty was established in the north. Aradwat, with his son Gandhara, is stated to have founded a State : Prachetas is said to have become king of Mlecchhades, or the barbarous regions. This line terminated with Dushyanta, the husband of the celebrated Sakuntala, father of Bharat, and who, labouring under the displeasure of some offended deity, is said by the Hindus to have been the cause of all the woes which subsequent^ befell the race. The four grandsons of Dushyanta, Kalanjar, Keral, Pand, and Chaul, gave their names to countries.
Kalanjar.^ — Kalanjar is the celebrated fortress in Bundelkhand, so well known for its antiquities, which have claimed considerable notice.
Kerala. — Of the second, Kerala, it is only known that in the list of the thirty-six royal races in the twelfth century, the Kerala makes one, but the capital is unknown.^
several ancient capital cities in the north of India : Surpur, on the Jumna, the capital of the Yadus ; Alor, on the Indus, the capital of the Sodhas ; Mandodri, capital of the Pariharas ; Chandravati, at the foot of the Aravalli mountains ; and Valabhipura, in Gujarat, capital of the Balaka-raes, the Balharas of Arab travellers. The Bala Rajput of Saurashtra may have given the name to Valabhipura, as descendants of Balaka, from Sahl of Aror. The blessing of the bard to them is yet, Tatta Multan ka Rao ( ' lord of Tatta and Multan,' the seats of the Balaka-putras) : nor is it improbable that a branch of these under the Indian Hercules, Balaram, who left India after the Great War, may have founded Bahch, or Balkh, emphatically called the ' mother of cities.' The Jaisalmer annals assert that the Yadu and Balaka branches of the Indu race ruled Khorasan after the Great War, the Indo-Scythic races of Grecian authors. Besides the Balakas, and the numerous branches of the Indo-Medes, many of the sons of Kuru dispersed over these regions : amongst whom we may place Uttara Kuru (Northern Kurus) of the Puranas, the Ottorokorrhai of the Greek authors. Both the Indu and Surya races were eternally sending their superfluous population to those distant regions, when ])robably the same primeval rchgion governed the races east and west of the Indus. [Much of this is incorrect.]
^ [The Chera or Kerala kingdom comj)rised the Southern Konkans or Malabar coast, the present Malabar district with Travancore and Cochin, the dynasty being in e.Kistence early in the Christian era (Smith, EHI, 447 ; IGI, X. 192 f.).]
THE FOUNDATION OF ANCIENT CITIES 53
Fandya. — The kingdom founded by Pand may be that on the coast of Malabar, the Pandu-Mandal of the Hindus, the Regia Pandiona of the geographers of the west, and of which, probably, Tanjore is the modern capital.^
Chaul.— Chaul ^ is in the Saurashtra penmsula, and on the coast, towards Jagat Khunt, ' the world's end,' and still retains its appellation.
Anga. — The other shoot from Bhabru became celebrated. The thirty-fourth prince, Anga, founded the kingdom of Angadesa, of which Champapuri * was the [44] capital, estabhshed about the same time with Kanauj, probably fifteen himdred years before Christ. With him the patronymic was changed, and the Anga race became famous in ancient Hindu history ; and to this day Un-des still designates the Alpine regions of Tibet bordering on Chinese Tartary.
Prithusena terminates the line of Anga ; and as he survived the disasters of the Great War, his race probably multiplied in those regions, where caste appears never to have been introduced.
Recapitulation. — Thus have we rapidly reviewed the dynasties of Surya and Chandra, from Manu and Budha to Rama, Krishna, Yudhishthira, and Jarasandha ; estabhshing, it is hoped, some new points, and perhaps adding to the credibility of the whole.
The wrecks of almost all the vast cities founded by them are yet to be traced in ruins. The city of Ikshwaku and Rama, on the Sarju ; Indraprastha, Mathura, Surpura, Prayag on the Yamuna ; Hastinapura, Kanyakubja, Rajagriha on the Ganges ; Maheswar on the Nerbudda ; Aror on the Indus ; and Kusasthali
^ [The Pandya kingdom included the Madura and Tinnevelly districts, with parts of Trichinopoly, and sometimes Travancore, its capitals being Madura, or Kudal, and Korkai (Smith, op. cil. 449 f. ; IGI, xix. 394 f.).]
^ From Chaul on the coast, in journeying towards Junagarh, and about seven miles from the former, are the remains of an ancient city.
* From the description in the Raraayana of King Dasaratha proceeding to Champamalina, the capital of Lomapada, king of Anga (sixth in descent from the founder), it is evident that it was a very mountainous region, and the deep forests and large rivers presented serious obstructions to his journey. From this 1 should imagine it impossible that Angadesa should apply to a portion of Bengal, in which there is a Champamalina, described by Colonel Francklin in his Essay on PaUbothra. [The Anga kingdom, with its capital at Champapuri, near Bhagalpur, corresponded to the modern districts of North Monghyr, North Bhagalpur, and Purnea west of the Mahananda river {IGI, v. 373).]
54 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Dwarka on the shore of the Indian Ocean. Each has left some memorial of former grandeur : research may discover others.
There is yet an unexplored region in Panchala ; Kampilana- gara its capital, and those cities established west of the Indus by the sons of Bajaswa.
Traces of the early Indo-Scythic nations may possibly reward the search of some adventurous traveller who may penetrate into Transoxiana, on the sites of Cyropolis, and the most northern Alexandria ; in Balkh, and amidst the caves of Bamian.
The plains of India retain yet many ancient cities, from whose ruins somewhat may be gleaned to add a mite to knowledge ; and where inscriptions may be foimd in a character which, though yet unintelligible,- will not always remain so in this age of dis- covery. For such let the search be general, and when once a key is obtained, they will enlighten each other. Wherever the races of Kuru, Urn, and Yadu have swayed, have been found ancient and yet imdeciphered characters.
Much would reward him who would make a better digest of the historical and geographical matter in the Puranas. But we must discard the idea that the history of Rama, the INIahabharata of Krishna and the five Pandava ^ brothers, are [45] mere alle- gory : an idea supported by some, although their races, their cities, and their coins still exist. Let us master the characters on the columns of Indraprastha, of Prayag and Mewar, on the rocks of Junagarh,^ at Bijolli, on the Aravalli, and in the Jain
^ The history and exploits of the Pandavas and Harikulas are best known in the most remote parts of India : amidst the forest-covered mountains of Saurashtra, the deep woods and caves of Hidiniba and Virat (still the shelter of the savage Bhil and KoH), or on the craggy banks of the Charmanvati (Chambal). In each, tradition has locaUzed the shelter of these heroes when exiled from the Yamuna ; and colossal figures cut from the mountain, ancient temples and caves inscribed with characters yet unknown, attributed to the Pandavas, confirm the legendary tale.
* The ' ancient city,' par eminence, is the only name this old capital, at the foot of, and guarding, the sacred mount Girnar, is known by. Abu-1 Fazl says it had long remained desolate and unknown, and was discovered by mere accident. {Ain, ii. 245. For a description of the place see BG, viii. 487 ; E. C. Bayley, Local Muhammadan Dynasties, Gujarat, 182 ff.] Tradition even being silent, they gave it the emphatic appellation of Juna (old) Garh (fortress). J have httle doubt that it is the Aaaldurga, or | Asalgarh, of the Guhilot annals ; where it is said that prince Asal raised a fortress, called after him, near to Girnar, by the consent of the Dabhi i^rince, his uncle.
LATER DYNASTIES 5S
temples scattered over India, and then we shall be able to arrive at just and satisfactory conclusions.
CHAPTER 5
Having investigated the line from Ikshwaku to Rama, and that from Budha (the parent and first emigrant of the Indu ^ race, I from Saka Dwipa, or Scythia, to Hindustan) to Krishna andj Yudhishthira, a period of twelve hundred years, we proceed to' the second division and second table of the genealogies.
The Suryavansa or Solar Line. — From Rama all the tribes termed Surj'avansa, or ' Race of the Sun,' claim descent, as the present princes of Mewar, Jaipur, Marwar, Bikaner, and their numerous clans ; while from the Lunar (Indu) line of Budha and Krishna, the families of Jaisalmer and Cutch (the Bhatti ^ and Jareja races), extending throughout the Indian desert from the Sutlej to the ocean, deduce their pedigTees.
Rama preceded Krishna : but as their historians, Valmiki and Vyasa, who wrote the events they witnessed, were contemporaries, it could not have been by many years [46].
The present table contains the dynasties which succeeded these great beacons of the Solar and Lvmar races, and are three in number.^
1. The Suryavansa, descendants of Rama
2. The Induvansa, descendants of Pandu through Yudhish- thira.
3. The Induvansa, descendants of Jarasandha, monarch of Rajagriha.
The Bhagavat and Agni Puranas are the authorities for the
^ Indu, Som, Chandra, in Sanskrit ' the moon ' ; hence the Lunar race is termed the Chandravansa, Sotnvansa, or Induvansa, most probably the
' root of Hindu. [Pers. hindu. Skr. sindhu.]
; ^ The isolated and now dependent chieftainship of Dhat, of which
• Umarkot is the capital, separates the Bhattis from the Jarejas. Dhat is
] now amalgamated with Sind ; its prince, of Pramara race and Sodha tribe,
I ancient lords of all Sind.
,! ' A fourth and fifth might have been given, but imperfect. First the descendants of Kusa, second son of Rama, from whence the princes of
j Narwar and Amber : secondly, the descendants of Krishna, from whom
[the princes of Jaisalmer.
66 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
lines from Rama and Jarasandha ; while that of Pandu is from the Raja Tarangini and Raj avail.
The existing Rajput tribes of the Solar race claim descent from Lava and Kusa, the two elder sons of Rama ; nor do I believe any existing tribes trace their ancestry to his other children, or to his brothers.
From the eldest son, Lava, the Ranas of Mewar claim descent : so do the Bargujar tribe, formerly powerful within the confines of the present Amber, whose representative now dwells at Anup- shahr on the Ganges.
From Kusa descend the Kachhwaha ^ princes of Narwar and Amber, and their numerous clans. Amber, though the first in power, is but a scion of Narwar, transplanted about one thousand years back, whose chief, the representative of the celebrated Prince Nala, enjoys but a sorry district ^ of all his ancient pos- sessions.
The house of Marwar also claims descent from this stem, which appears to originate in an error of the genealogists, confounding the race of Kusa with the Kausika of Kanauj and Kausambi. Nor do the Solar genealogists admit this assumed pedigree.
The Amber prince in his genealogies traces the descent of the Mewar ^ family from Rama to Sumitra, through Lava, the eldest brother, and not through Kusa,* as in some copies of the Puranas, and in that whence Sir William Jones had his lists [47J.
Mr. Bentley, taking this genealogy from the same authority as Sir William Jones, has mutilated it by a transposition, for
^ In modem times always written and pronounced KiUchwdha.
^ It is in the plateau of Central India, near Shahabad.
^ Whatever dignity attaches to this pedigree, whether true or false, every prince, and every Hindu of learning, admit the claims of the princes of Mewar as heir to ' the chair of Rama ' ; and a degree of reverence has consequently attached, not only to his person, but to the seat of his power. When Mahadaji Sindhia was called by the Rana to reduce a traitorous noble in Chitor, such was the reverence which actuated that (in other respects) little scrupulous chieftain, that he could not be prevailed on to point his cannon on the walls within which consent established ' the throne of Rama.' The Rana himself, then a jouth, had to break the ice, and fired a cannon agauist his own ancient abode.
* Bryant, in his Analysis, mentions that the children of the Cushite Ham used his name in salutation as a mark of recognition. ' Ram, Ram,' is the common salutation in these Hindu countries ; the respondent often joining Sita's name with that of her consort Rama, ' Sita Ram.'
LATER DYNASTIES 57
which his reasons are insufficient, and militate against every opinion of the Hindus. Finding the names Vrihadbala and Vridasura, declared to be princes contemporary with Yudhish- thira, he transposes the whole ten princes of his list intervening between Takshak ^ and Bahuman.^
Bahuman,* or ' the man witli arms ' (Darazdaslit or Longi- manus) is the thirty-fourth prince from Rama ; and his reign must be placed nearly intermediate between Rama and Sumitra, or his contemporary Vikrama, and in the sixth century from either.
Sumitra concludes the line of Surya or Rama from the Bhaga- vat Purana. Thence it is connected with the present line of Mewar, by Jai Singh's authorities ; which list has been compared with various others^ chiefly Jain, as will be related in the annals of Mewar. ,
It will be seen that the line of Surya exliibits fifty-six princes, \ from Lava, the son of Rama, to Sumitra, the last prince given in I the Puranas. Sir William Jones exhibits fifty-seven.
To these fifty-six reigns I sliould be willing to allow the average of twenty years, which would give 1120 from Rama to Sumitra, who preceded by a short period Vikramaditya ; and as 1100 have been already calculated to have preceded the era of Rama and Yudhishthira, the inference is, that 2200 years elapsed from Ikshwaku, the founder of the Solar line, to Sumitra.
Chandravansa or the Lunar Line. — From the Raja Tarangini 1 and Rajavali the Induvansa family (descendants of Pandu 1 tlirough Yudhishthira) is supplied. These works, celebrated in llajwara as collections of genealogies and historical facts, by the |
^ Twenty-eighth prince from Rama in JMr. Bentley's list, and twenty- ^ fifth in mine.
2 Thirty-seventh in Mr. Bentley's hst and thirty-fourth in mine ; but the intervening names being made to follow Rama, Bahuman (written by him Banumat) follows Takshak.
* The period of time, also, would allow of their grafting the son of Artaxerxes and father of Darius, the worshipper of Mthras, on the stem of the adorers of Surya, while a curious notice of the Raja Jai Singh's on a subsequent name on this list which he calls Naushirwan, strengthens the coincidence. Bahuman (see article ' Bahaman,' D'Herbelot's Bibl. Orient.) actually carried his arms into India, and invaded the kingdoms of the Solar race of Mithila and Magadha. The time is appropriate to the first Darius and his father ; and Herodotus [iii. 94] tells us that the richest and best of the satrapies of his empire was the Hindu,
58 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Pandils Vidyadhara and Raghunatli, were compUed under the eye of the most learned prince of his period, Sawai Jai Singh of Amber, and give the various dynasties which ruled at Indra- prastha, or Delhi, from Yudhishtliira to Vikramaditya ; and although barren of events, may be considered of value in filling up a period of entire darkness [48].
The Tarangini commences with Adinath ^ or Rishabhdeva,^ being the Jain * theogony. Rapidly noticing the leading princes of the dynasties discussed, they pass to the birth of the kings Dhritarashtra and Pandu, and their offspring, detailing the causes of their civil strife, to that conflict termed the Mahabharata or Great War.
The Pandava Family. — The origin of every family, whether of east or west, is involved in fable. That of the Pandu * is entitled to as much credence as the birth of Romulus, or other founders of a race.
Such traditions ^ were probably invented to cover some great disgrace in the Pandu family, and have relation to the story already related of Vyasa, and the debasement of this branch of the Harikulas. Accordingly, on the death of Pandu, Duryo- dhana, nephew of Pandu (son of Dhritarashtra, who from blindness could not inherit), asserted their illegitimacy before the assembled kin at Hastinapura. With the aid, however, of the priesthood, and the blind Dhritarashtra, his nephew, Yudhishthira, elder son of Pandu, was invested by him with the seal of royalty, in the capital, Hastinapura.
Duryodhana's plots against the Pandu and his partisans were
1 First lord. ^ j^qj.^ ^f ^^^^ 5^11.
^ Vidhyadhar was a Jain.
* Pandu not being blessed with progeny, his queen made use of a charm by which she enticed the deities from their spheres. To Dharma Raj (Minos) she bore Yudhishthira ; by Pavan (Aeolus) she had Bhima ; by Indra (Jupiter Coelus) she had Arjuna, who was taught by his sire the use of the bow, so fatal in the Great War ; and Nakula and Sahadeva owed their birth to Aswini Kumar (Aesculapius) the physician of the gods.
* We must not disregard the intellect of the Amber prince, who allowed these ancient traditions to be incorporated with the genealogy compiled under his eye. The prince who obtained De Silva from Emmanuel III. of Portugal, who combined the astronomical tables of Europe and Asia, and raised these monuments of his scientific genius in his favourite pursuit (astronomy) in all the capital cities of India, while engrossed in war and pohtics, requires neither eulogy nor defence.
LATER DYNASTIES 59
so numerous that the five brothers determined to leave for a while their ancestral abodes on the Ganges. They sought shelter in foreign countries about the Indus, and were first protected by Drupada, king of Panchala, at whose capital, Kampilanagara, the surrounding princes had arrived as suitors for the hand of his daughter, Draupadi.^ But the prize was destined for the exiled Pandu, and the skill of Arjuna in archery obtained him the fair, who " threw roimd his neck the (barmala) garland of marriage." The disappointed princes indulged their resentment against the exile ; but by Arjuna's bow they suffered the fate of Penelope's suitors, and the Pandu brought home his bride, who became the wife in common of the five brothers : manners ^ decisively Scythic [49].
The deeds of the brothers abroad were bruited in Hastinapura and the blind Dhritarashtra's influence effected their recall. To stop, however, their intestine feuds, he partitioned the Pandu sovereignty ; and while his son, Duryodhana, retained Hastina- pura, Yudhishthira founded the new capital of Indraprastha ; but shortly after the Mahabharata he abdicated in favour of his gi-and- nephew, Parikshita, introducing a new era, called after himself, which existed for eleven hundred years, when it was overturned, and Indraprastha was conquered by Vila-amaditya Tuar of Ujjain, of the same race, who established an era of his own.
On the division of the Pandu sovereignty, the new kingdom of Indraprastha eclipsed that of Hastinapura. The brothers reduced to obedience the surrounding ^ nations, and compelled their princes to sign tributary engagements {paenama)^
Yudhishthira, firmly seated on his throne, determined to
^ Drupada was of the Aswa race, being descended from Bajaswa (or Hyaswa) of the line of Ajamidha.
^ This marriage, so inconsistent with Hindu deUcacy, is glossed over. Admitting the polyandry, but in ignorance of its being a national custom, puerile reasons are interpolated. In the early annals of the same race, predecessors of the Jaisalmer family, the younger son is made to succeed : also Scythic or Tatar. The manners of the Scythae described by Herodotus are found still to exist among their descendants : "a pair of shppers at the wife's door " is a signal well understood by all Eimauk husbands (Elphin- stone's Caubul, vol. ii. p. 251).
' Tarangini.
* Paenama is a [Persian] word pecuharly expressive of subserviency to paramount authority, whether the engagement be in money or service : from pae, ' the foot.'
60 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
signalize his reign and paramount sovereignty, by the imposing and solemn rites of Asvamedha ^ and Rajasuya.
The Asvamedha. — In these magnificent ceremonies, in which princes alone officiate, every duty, down to that of porter, is per- formed by royalty.
The ' Steed of Sacrifice ' was liberated under Arjuna's care, having wandered whither he listed for twelve months ; and none daring to accept this challenge of supremacy, he was reconducted to Indraprastha, Avhere, in the meanwhile, the hall of sacrifice was prepared, and all the princes of the land were summoned to attend.
The hearts of the Kurus ^ burned with envy at the assumption of supremacy by the Pandus, for the Prmce of Hastinapura's office was to serve out the sacred food [50].
The rivalry between the races burst forth afresh ; but Duryo- dhana, who so often failed in his schemes against the safety of his antagonists, determined to make the virtue of Yudhishthira the instrument of his success. He availed himself of the national propensity for play, in which the Rajput continues to preserve his Scythic ^ resemblance. Yudhishthira fell into the snare prepared for him. He lost his kingdom, his wife, and even his personal liberty and that of his brothers, for twelve years, and became an exile from the plains of the Yamuna.
The traditional historj'^ of these wanderers during the term of probation, their many lurking jilaces now sacred, the return to their ancestral abodes, and the grand battle (Mahabharata) which ensued, form highly interesting episodes in the legends of Hindu antiquity.
To decide this civil strife, every tribe and chief of fame, from the Caucasus to the ocean, assembled on Kurukshetra, the field
^ Sacrifice of the horse to the sun, of which a full description is given hereafter.
^ Duryodhana, as the elder ))ranch, retained his title as head of the Kurus ; while the junior, Yudhishthira, on the separation of authority, adopted his father's name, Pandu, as the patronymic of his new dynasty. The site of the great conflict (or Mahabharata) between these rival clans, is called Kurukshetra, or ' Field of the Kurus.'
* Herodotus describes the ruinous passion for play amongst the Scythic hordes, and which may have been carried west by Odin into Scandinavia and Germany. Tacitus tells us that the Germans, like the Pandus, staked even iiersonal liberty, and were sold as slaves by the winner [Germania, 24].
LATER DYNASTIES 61
on which the empire of India has since more than once been contested ^ and lost.
This combat was fatal to the dominant influence of the " fifty- six tribes of Yadu." On each of its eighteen days' combat, myriads were slain ; for " the father knew not the son, nor the disciple his preceptor."
Victory brought no happiness to Yudhishthira. The slaughter of his friends disgusted him with the world, and he determined to withdraw frona it ; previously performing, at Hastinapura, funeral rites for Duryodhana (slain by the hands of Bhima), whose ambition and bad faith had originated this exterminating war. " Having regained his kingdom, he proclaimed a new era, and placing on the throne of Indraprastha, Parikshita, grandson to Arjuna, retired to Dwarka with KJrislina and Baldeva : and since the war to the period of writing, 4638 j^ears have elapsed." -
Yudhishthira, Baldeva, and Krishna, having retired with the wreck of this ill-fated struggle to Dwarka, the two former had soon to lament the death of Krishna, slain by one of the aboriginal tribes of Bhils ; against whom, from their shattered condition, they were luiable to contend. After this event, Yudhishthira, with [51] Baldeva and a few followers, entirely withdrew from India, and emigrating northwards, by Sind, to the Himalayan mountains, are there abandoned by Hindu traditional history, and are supposed to have perished in the snows.'
^ On it the last Hindu monarch, Prithwiraja, lost his kingdom, his hberty, and life.
2 Rajatarangini. The period of writing was a.d. 1740. ;
^ Having ventured to surmise analogies between the Hercules of the east and west, I shall carry them a point further. Amidst the snows of Caucasus, Hindu legend abandons the Harikulas, under their leaders Yudhishthira and Baldeva : yet if Alexander estabhshed his altars in Panchala, amongst the sons of Puru and the Harikulas, what physical impossibility exists that a colony of them, under Yudhishthira and Baldeva, eight centuries anterior, should have penetrated to Greece ? Comparatively far advanced in science and arms, the conquest would have been easy. When Alexander attacked the ' free cities ' of Panchala, the Purus and Harikulas who opposed him evinced the recollections of their ancestor, in carrying the figure of Hercules as their standard. Comparison proves a common origin to Hindu and Grecian mythology ; and Plato says the Greeks had theirs from Egypt and the East. May not this colony of the Harikulas be the Herachdae, who pene- trated into the Peloponnesus (according to Volney) 1078 years before Christ, sufficiently near our calculated period of the Great War ? The Herachdae claimed from Atreus : the Harikxilas claim from Atri. Eurysthenes was
62 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
From Parikshita, who succeeded Yudhishthira, to Vikrama- ditya, four ^ dynasties are given in a continuous chain, exhibiting sixty-six princes to Rajpal, who, invading Kumaon, was slain by Sukwanti. The Kumaun conqueror seized upon Delhi, but was soon dispossessed by Vikramaditya, who transferred the seat of imperial power from Indraprastha to Avanti, or Ujjain, from which time it became the first meridian of the Hindu astronomy.
Indraprastha ceased to be a regal abode for eight centuries, when it was re-established by Anangpal,^ the founder of the Tuar race, claiming descent from the Pandus. Then the name of Delhi superseded that of Indraprastha.
the first king of the HeracUdae : Yudhishthira has suflEicient affinity in name to the first Spartan king not to startle the etymologist, the d and r being always permutable in Sanskrit. The Greeks or lonians are de- scended from Yavan, or Javan, the seventh from Japhet. The Harikulas are also Yavans claiming from Javan or Yavan, the thirteenth in descent from Yayati, the third son of the primeval patriarch. The ancient Hera- clidae of Greece asserted they were as old as the sun, and older than the moon. May not this boast conceal the fact that the Heliadae (or Suryct- vansa) of Greece had settled there anterior to the colony of the Indu (Lunar) race of Harikula ? In all that relates to the mythological history of the Indian demi-gods, Baldeva (Hercules), Krishna or Kanhaiya (Apollo), and Budha (Mercury), a powerful and almost perfect resemblance can be traced ))etween those of Hindu legend, Greece, and Egypt. Baldeva (the god of strength) Harikula, is still worshipped as in the days of Alexander ; his shrine at Baldeo in Vraj (the Surasenoi of the Greeks), his club a plough- share, and a lion's skin his covering. A Hindu intaglio of rare value represents Hercules exactly as described by Arrian, with a monogram con- sisting of two ancient characters now unknown, but which I have found wherever tradition assigns a spot to the Harikulas ; especially in Saurashtra, where they were long concealed on their exile from Delhi. This we may at once decide to be the exact figure of Hercules which Arrian describes his descendants to have carried as their standard, when Porus opposed Alexander. The intaglio will appear in the Trans. li.A.S. [The specula- tions in this note have no authority.]
^ The twenty-eighth prince, Khemraj, was the last in lineal descent from Parikshita, the grand-nephew of Yudhishthira. The first dynasty lasted 1 864 years. The second dynasty was of Visarwa, and consisted of fourteen princes ; this lasted five hundred years. The third dynasty was headed by Mahraj, and terminated by Antinai, the fifteenth prince. The fourth dynasty was headed by Dudhsen, and terminated by Rajpal, the ninth and last king (Rajatarangini).
'^ The Rajatarangini gives the date A.v. 848, or a.v. 792, for this ; and adds : " Princes from Siwalik, or northern hills, held it during this time, and it long continued desolate until the Tuars."
LATER DYNASTIES 63
" Sukwanti, a prince from the northern mountains of Kumaun, ruled fourteen [52] years, when he was slain by Vikramaditya ; ^ and from the Bharat to this period 2915 years have elapsed." *
Such a period asserted to have elapsed while sixty-six princes occupied the throne, gives an average of forty-four years to each ; which is incredible, if not absolutely impossible.
In another passage the compiler says : " I have read many books (shastras), and all agreed to make one hundred princes, all of Khatri ^ race, occupy the throne of Delhi from Yudhishthira to Pritliwiraja, a period of 4100 years,* after which the Ravad * race succeeded."
It is fortunate for these remnants of historical data that thej^ have only extended the duration of reigns, and not added more heads. Sixty-six links are quite sufficient to connect Yudhishthira and Vikramaditya.
We cannot object to the " one hundred princes " who fill the space assigned from Yudhishthira to Prithwiraja, though there is no proportion between the number which precedes and that which follows Vikramaditya, the former being sixty-six, the latter only thirty-four princes, although the period cannot differ half a century.
I^et us apply a test to these one hundred kings, from Yudhish thira to Prithwiraja : the result will be 2250 years.
This test is derived from the average rate of reigns of the chief dynasties of Rajasthan, during a pei-iod of 63.S ® to 663 ' years, I or from Prithwiraja to the present date. \>^©:.\ OP K<^^
1 .50 B.C. [Cunningham remarks that the defeat of Raja Pal of Delhi Vw'^ bj^ Sukwanti, Sukdati, or Sukaditya, Raja of Kumaun, must be assigned to A.D. 79 : but he has little confidence in such. traditions, iniless supported by independent evidence {ASB, i. 1.38).]
- Raghunath. ^ J^^jput, or Kshatriya.
* 'J'his period of 4100 years may have been arrived at by the compiler taking for granted the number of years mentioned by Raghunath as having elapsed from the Mahabharata to Vikrainaditya, namely 291.5, and adding thereto the well-authenticated period of Prithwiraja, who was born in iSamvat 1215 : for if 2915 be subtracted from 4100, it leaves 1185, the period within thirty years of the birth of Prithwiraja, according to the Chauhan chronicles.
* Solar.
* From S. 1250, or a.d. 1194, captivity and dethronement of Pritliwiraja. ' From S. 1212, a.d. 1516, the founding of Jaisalmer by Jaisal, to the
accession of Gaj Singh, the present prince, in S. 1876, or a.d. 1820.
64 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Of Mewar . . 34 ^ princes, or 19 years to each reign.
Of Marwar . . 28 princes, or 23i „ ,,
Of Amber . . 29 princes, or 22i ,, ,,
Of Jaisalmer . . 28 princes, or 23J ,, ,,
giving an average of twenty-two years for each reign [53].
It would not be proper to ascribe a longer period to each reign, and it were perhaps better to give the minimum, nineteen, to extended dynasties ; and to the sixty-six princes from Yudhish- thira and Vikramaditya not even so much, four revolutions ^ and usurpations marking this period.
Jarasandha. — The remaining line, that of Jarasandha, taken from the Bhagavat, is of considerable importance, and will afford scope for further speculation.
Jarasandha was the monarch of Rajagriha,^ or Bihar, whose son Sahadeva, and grandson Marjari, are declared to have been contemporaries of the Mahabharata, and consequently coeval with Parikshita, the Delhi sovereign.
The direct line of Jarasandha terminates in twenty-three descents with Ripimjaya, who was slain, and his throne assumed by his minister, Sanaka, whose dynasty terminated in the fifth generation with Nandivardandhana. Sanaka derived no personal advantage from his usurpation, as he immediately placed his son, Pradyota, on the throne. To these five princes one hundred and thirty-eight years are assigned.
A new race entered Hindustan, led by a conqueror termed Sheshnag, from Sheshnagdesa,* who ascended the Pandu throne,
^ Many of its early princes were killed in battle ; and the present prince's father succeeded his own nephew, which was retrograding.
^ The historians sanction the propriety of these changes, in their remarks, that the deposed were " deficient in [capacity for] the cares and duties of government."
® Rajagriha, or Rajmahal, capital of Magadhades, or Bihar. [In Patna district, lOI, xxi. 72.]
* Figuratively, the country of the ' head of the Snakes ' ; Nag, Talc, or Takshak, being synonymous : and which I conclude to be the abode of the ancient Scythic Tachari of Strabo, the Tak-i-uks of the Cliinese, the Tajiks of the present day of Turkistan. This race appears to be the same with that of the Turushka (of the Puranas), who ruled on the Arvarma (the Araxes), in Sakadwipa, or Scytliia. [This is a confused reference to the Saisunaga dynasty, which took its name from its founder, Sisunaga, and comprised roughly the present Patna and Gaya districts, its capital being
LATER DYNASTIES 65
and whose line terminates in ten descents with Mahanandin, of spurious birth. This last prince, who was also named Baikyat, carried on an exterminating warfare against the ancient Rajput princes of pui-e blood, the Puranas declaring that since the dynasty of Sheshnag the princes were Sudras. Three hundred and sixty years are allotted to these ten princes.
Chandragupta Maurya. — A fourth dynasty commenced with Chandragupta Maurya, of the same Takshak race.^ The Maurya dynasty consisted of ten princes, who are stated to have passed away in one hundred and thirty-seven years. [322-185 B.C.]
Sunga, Kanva Dynasties. — The fifth dynasty of eight princes were from Sringides, and are said to have ruled one hundred and twelve years, when a prince of Kanvades deprived the last of life and kingdom. Of these eight princes, four were of pure blood, when Kistna, by a Sudra woman, succeeded. The dynasty of Kanvades terminates in twenty-three generations with Sus- arman* [54].
Recapitulation. — Thus from the Great War six successive dynasties are given, presenting a continuous chain of eighty-two princes, reckoning from Sahadeva, the successor of Jarasandha, to Susarman.
To some of the short dynasties periods are assigned of moderate length : but as the first and last are without such data, the test
Rajagriha ; the modern Rajglr-Sisunaga means ' a young elephant,' and has no connexion with Sheshnag, the serpent king {Vishnu Purana, 466 f. ; Smith, EHI, 31).]
^ [Chandragupta Maurya was certainly not a " Takshak " : he was probably " an illegitimate scion of the Nanda family " (Smith, EHI, 42).]
2 ]\'Ir. Bentley {' On the Hindu System of Astronomy,' As. Res. vol. viii. pp. 236-7) states that the astronomer, Brahmagupta, flourished about A.D. 527, or of Vikrama 583, shortly preceding the reign of Susarman ; that he was the founder of the system called the Kalpa of Brahma, on v/hich the present Hindu chronology is founded, and to which Mr. Bentley says their historical data was transferred. This would strengthen my calculations ; but the weight of Mr. Bentley's authority has been much weakened by his unwarrantable attack on Mr. Colebrooke, whose extent of knowledge is of double value from his entire aversion to hypothesis. [The Sunga dynasty, founded by Pushyamitra, about 185 B.C., lasted till about 73 B.C., when the tenth king, Devabhuti, was slain by his Brahman minister, Vasudeva, who founded the Kanva dynasty. He was followed by three kings, and the dynasty lasted only forty-five years, the last member of it being slain, about 28 B.C., by a king of the Andhra or Satavahana dynasty, then reigning in the Deccan. For the scanty details see Smith, EHI, 198 fr.l
VOL. I F
66 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
already decided on must be applied ; which will yield 1704 years, being six hundred and four after Vikramaditya, whose contem- porary will thus be Basdeva, the fifty-fifth prince from Sahadeva of the sixth dynasty, said to be a conqueror from the country of Katehr [or Rohilkhand]. If these calculations possess any value, the genealogies of the Bhagavat are brought down to the close of the fifth century following Vikramaditya. As we cannot admit the gift of prophecy to the compilers of these books, we may infer that they remodelled their ancient chronicles during the reign of Susarman, about the year of Vikrama 600, or a.d. 540.
With regard to calculations already adduced, as to the average number of years for the reigns of the foregoing dynasties, a com- parison with those which history affords of other parts of the world will supply the best criterion of the correctness of the assumed data.
From the revolt of the ten tribes against Rehoboam ^ to the capture of Jerusalem, a period of three hundred and eighty-seven years, twenty kings sat on the throne of Judah, making each reign nineteen and a half years ; but if we include the three anterior reigns of Saul, David, and Solomon, prior to the revolt, the result will be twenty-six and a half years each.
From the dismemberment of the Assjrrian ^ empire under Sardanapalus, nearly nine hundred years before Christ, the three consequent confluent dynasties of Babylonia, Assyria, and Media afford very different results for comparison.
The Assyrian preserves the medium, while the Babylonish and Median run into extremes. Of the nine princes who swayed Babylon, from the period of its separation from, till its reunion to Assyria, a space of fifty-two years, Darius, who ruled Media sixty [thirty-six] years [55], outhved the whole. Of the line of Darius there were but six princes, from the separation of the kingdoms to their reunion imder Cyrus, a period of one hundred and seventy-four years, or twenty-nine to each reign.
The Assjo-ian reigns form a juster medium. From Nebuchad- nezzar to Sardanapalus we have twenty-two years to a reign ; but from thence to the extinction of this dynasty, eighteen.
The first eleven kings, the Heraclidae of Laced aemon, com-
^ 987 years l^efore Christ.
^ For these and tV.e following elates I am indebted to Goguet's chrono- logical tables in his Origin of Laws.
LATER DYNASTIES 67
mencing with Eiirysthenes (1078 before Christ), average thirty- two years ; while in repubhcan Athens, nearly contemporary^ from the first perpetual archon until the office became decennial in the seventh Olympiad, the reigns of the twelve chief magis- trates average twenty-eight years and a half.
Thus we have three periods, Jewish, Spartan, and Athenian, each commencing about eleven hundred years before Christ, not half a century remote from the Mahabharata ; with those of Babylonia, Assyria, and Media, commencing where we quit the Grecian, in the eighth century before the Christian era, the Jewish ending in the sixth century.
However short, compared with our Solar and Lunar dynasties, yet these, combined Avith the average reigns of existing Hindu dynasties, will aid the judgment in estimating the periods to be assigned to the lines thus afforded, instead of following the improb- able value attached by the Brahmans.
From such data, longevity appears in unison with climate and simplicity of life : the Spartan yielding the maximimi of thirty- two to a reign, while the more luxurious Athens gives twenty- eight and a half. The Jews, from Saul t6 their exile " to the waters of Babylon," twenty-six and a half. The Medes equal the Lace- daemonians, and in all history can only be paralleled by the princes of Anhilwara, one of whom, Chawand, almost equalled Darius.^ ^
Of the separated ten tribes, from the revolt to the captivity, twenty kings of Israel passed away in two centuries, or ten years eacli.
The Spartan and Assyrian present the extremes of thirty-two and eighteen, giving a medium of twenty-five years to a reign.
The average result of our four Hindu dynasties, in a period of nearly seven hundred years, is twenty-two years.
From all which data, I would presume to assign from twenty to twenty- two years to each reign in lines of fifty princes [56].
If the value thus obtained be satisfactory, and the lines of dynasties derived from so many authorities correct, we shall arrive at the same conclusion with Mr. Bentley ; who, by the more philosophical process of astronomical and genealogical
^ [It is not clear to whom the author refers ; Chamunda Chavada (a.d. 880-908): or Chamunda Chauhikya (a.d. 997-1010), {EG, i. Part 1. 151, 162).]
68 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
combination, places Yudhishtliira's era in the year 2825 of the world ; which being taken from 4004 (the world's age at the birth of Christ) will leave 1179 before Christ for Yudhishthira's era, or 1123 before Vikramaditya.^
CHAPTER 6
Rajputs and Mongols. — Having thus brought down the genea- logical history of the ancient martial races of India, from the earliest period to Yudhishthira and Krishna, and thence to Vikrama- ditya and the present day, a few observations on the races invading India during that time, and now ranked amongst the thirty-six royal races of Rajasthan, affording scope for sonic curious analogies, may not be inopportune.
The tribes here alluded to are the Haihaya or Aswa, the Takshak, and the Jat or Getae ; the similitude of whose theogony, names in their early genealogies, and many other points, with the Chinese, Tatar, Mogul, Hindu, and Scythic races, would appear to warrant the assertion of one common origin.
Though the periods of the passage of these tribes into India cannot be stated with exactitude, the regions whence they migrated may more easily be ascertained.
Mongol Origin. — Let us compare the origin of the Tatars and Moguls, as given by their historian, Abulghazi, with the races we have been treating of from the Puranas.
Mogol was the name of the Tatarian patriarch. His son was Aghuz,'' the founder of all the races of those northern regions, called Tatars and Mogol [57]. Aghuz had six sons.^ First, Kun,* ' the sun,' the Surya of the Puranas ; secondly, Ai,^ ' the moon,'
^ [The evidence quoted in this chapter bj^ which the author endeavours 1 1 frame a chronology for this early period, is untrustworthy. Mr. Pargiter tentatively dates the great Bharata battle about 1000 B.C., but the evidence is very uncertain {JRAS, January 1910, p. 56 ; April 1914, p. 294).]
^ Query, if from Mogol and Aghuz, compounded, we have not the Magog, son of Japhet, of Scripture ?
^ The other four sons are the remaining elements, personified : whence the six races of Tatars. The Hindus had long but two races, till the four AgnOcula made them also six, and now thirty-six !
* In Tatar, according to Abulghazi, the sun and moon.
^ De Giiignes.
I
MONGOL AND HINDU TRADITIONS 69
the Indu of the Puranas. In the latter, Ai, we have even the same name [Ayus] as in the Puranas for the Lunar ancestor. The Tatars all claim from Ai, ' the moon,' the Indus of the Puranas. Hence with them, as with the German tribes, the moon was always a male deity. The Tatar Ai had a son, Yulduz. His son^was Hyu, from whom ^ came the first race of the kings of China. The Puranic Ayus had a son, Yadu (pronounced Jadon) ; from whose third son, Haya, the Hindu genealogist deduces no line, and from whom the Chinese may claim their Indu ^ origin. II Khan (ninth from Ai) had two sons : first, Kian ; and secondly, Nagas ; whose descendants peopled all Tatary. From Kian, Jenghiz Ivlian claimed descent.^ Nagas was probablj- the founder of the Takshak, or Snake race ' of the Puranas and Tatar genealogists, the Tak-i-uk Moguls of De Guignes.
Such are the comparative genealogical origins of the three races. Let us compare their thcogony, the fabulous birth assigned by each for the founder of the Indu race.
Mongol and Hindu Traditions. — 1. The Puranic. " Ila {the earth), daughter of the sun-born Ikshwaku, while wandering in the forests was encountered by Budha {Mercury), and from the rape of Ila sprimg the Indu race."
2. The Chinese account of the birth of Yu (Ayu), their first monarch. " A star * (Mercury or Fo) struck his mother while journeying. She conceived, and gave to the world Yu, the founder of the first dynasty which reigned in China. Yu divided China into nine provinces, and began to reign 2207 ^ years before Christ " [58].
Thus the Ai of the Tatars, the Yu of the Chinese, and the Ayus
^ Sir W. Jones says the Chinese assert their Hindu origin ; but a com- parison proves both these Indu races to be of Scj^thic origin. [Yadu was son of Yayati, and Haya was Yadu's grandson, not son. The comparison of Mongol with Hindu tradition is of no value.]
^ [For the Mongol genealogy see Howorth, History of the Mongols, Part i. 35. Abu-I Fazl {Akbarnama, trans. H. Beveridge, i. 171 f.) gives the names as follows : Aghuz Khan, whose sons were — Kun (Sun) ; Ai (Moon) ; Yulduz (Star) ; Kok or Gok (Sky) ; Tagh (Mountain) ; Tangiz (Sky)].
^ Naga and Takshak are Sanskrit names for a snake or serpent, the emblem of Budha or Mercury. The Naga race, so well known to India, the Takshaks or Takiuks of Scythia, invaded India about six centuries before Clirist.
* De Guignes, Sur Us Dynasties des Huns, vol. i. p. 7.
^ Nearly the calculated period from the Puranas.
70 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
of the Puranas, evidently indicate the great Indu (Lunar) pro- genitor of the three races. Budha (Mercury), the son of Indu (the moon), became the patriarchal and spiritual leader ; as Fo, in China ; Woden and Teutates,^ of the tribes migrating to Europe. Hence it follows that the religion of Buddha must be coeval with the existence of these nations ; that it was brought into India Proper by them, and guided them until the schism of Krishna and the Suryas, worshippers of Bal, in time depressed them, when the Buddha reUgion was modified into its present mild form, the Jain.^
Scythian Traditions. — Let us contrast with these the origin of the Scythic nations, as related by Diodorus ; * when it will be observed the same legends were known to him which have been handed down by the Puranas and Abulghazi.
" The Scythians had their first abodes on the Araxes.* Their origin was from a virgin born of the earth ^ of the shape of a woman from the waist upwards, and below a serpent (symbol of Budlia or Mercury) ; that Jupiter had a son by her, named Scythes," whose name the nation adopted. Scythes had two sons, Palas and Napas (qu. the Nagas, or Snake race, of the Tatar genealogy ?), who were celebrated for their great actions, and who divided the countries ; and the nations were called after them, the Palians {qu. Pali ?) ' and Napians. They led their forces as far as the Nile on Egypt, and subdued many nations. They enlarged the empire of the Scythians as far as the Eastern ocean,
^ Taulh, ' father ' in Sanskrit [? tata]. Qu. Tenths, and Toth, the Mercury of Egypt ?
* [The author seems to confuse Budha (Mercury) with Gautama Bnddha, the teacher. Buddhism arose in India, not in Central Asia, and Jainism was not a milder form of it, but an independent, and probably earher, rehgion.]
3 Diodorus Siculus book ii.
* The Arvarma of the Puranas ; the Jaxartes or Sihun. The Puranas thus describe Sakadwipa or Scythia. Diodorus (Mb. ii.) makes the Hemodus the boundary between Saka-Scythia and India Proper.
^ Ila, the mother of the Lunar race, is the earth personified. Ertha of the Saxons ; e'pa of the Greeks ; ard in Hebrew [?].
* Scythes, from Sakaiai, ' Sakadwipa,' and is, ' Lord ' : Lord of Sakatai, or Scythia [?].
^ Qu. Whether the Scythic Pali may not be the shepherd invaders of Egypt [?]. The Pali character yet exists, and appears the same as ancient fragments of the Buddha inscriptions in my possession : manj'^ letters assimilate with the Coptic.
LATER GENEALOGIES 71
and to the Caspian and lake INIoeotis. The nation had many kings, from whom the Sacans (Sakae), the Massagetae ( Getae or Jats), the Ari-aspians (Aswas of Aria), and many other races. They over- ran Assyria and Media ^ [59], overturning the empire, and trans- I^hinting the inliabitants to tlie Araxes under the name of Sauro- Matians." ^
As the Sakae, Getae, Aswa, and Takshak are names which have crept in amongst our thirty-six royal races, common with others also to early civilization in Europe, let us seek further ancient authority on the original abodes.
Strabo ^ says : " All the tribes east of the Caspian are called Scythic. The Dahae * next the sea, the Massagetae (great Gete) and Sakae more eastward ; but every tribe has a particular name. All are nomadic : but of these nomads the best -known are the Asii,^ the Pasiani, Tochari, Sacarauli, who took Bactria from the Greeks. The Sakae " (' races ') have made in Asia irruptions similar to those of the Cimmerians ; thus they have been seen to possess themselves of Bactria, and the best district of Armenia, called after them Sakasenae." '
Which of the tribes of Rajasthan are the offspring of the Aswa and Medes, of Indu race, returned under new appellations, we
^ The three great branches of the Indu (Lunar) Aswa bore the epithet of Midia (pronounced Mede), viz. Urumidha, Ajamidha, and Dvimidha. Qii. The Aswa invaders of Assyria and Media, the sons of Bajaswa, expressly stated to have multiplied in the countries west of the Indus, emigrating from their paternal seats in Panchalaka ? {Mldha means ' pouring out seed, prolific,' and has no connexion with Mede, the Madai of Genesis X. 2 ; the Assyrian Mada.]
^ Sun-worshippers, the Suryavansa.
3 Strabo lib. xi. p. 511.
* Dahya (one of the thirty-six tribes), now extinct.
* The Asii and Tochari, the Aswa and Takshak, or Turushka races, of the Puranas, of Sakadwipa [?]. " C'est vraisemblablement d'apres le nom de Tachari, que M. D'Anville aura cru devoir placer les tribus ainsi de- nommees dans le territoire qui s'appelle aujourdhui Tokarist'hpon, situe, dit ce grand geographe, entre les montagnes et le Gihon ou Amou " (Note 3, hv. xi. p. 254, Strabon).
* Once more I may state Sakha in Sanskrit has the aspirate : literally, the ' branches ' or ' races.' [Saka and Sakha have no connexion ; see Smith, EHI, 226.]
' " La Sacasene etoit une contree do I'Armenie sur les confins de I'Albanie ou du Shirvan" (Note 4, tome i. p. 191, Strabon). " The Sacasenae v.'cre the ancestors of the Saxons" (Turner's History of the Anglo -Saxons).
72 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
shall not now stop to inquire, limiting our hypothesis to the fact of invasions, and adducing some evidence of such being simul- taneous with migrations of the same bands into Europe. Hence the inference of a common origin between the Rajput and early races of Europe ; to support which, a similar mythology, martial manners and poetry, language, and even music and architectural ornaments, may be adduced.^
Of the first migrations of the Indu-Scythic Getae, Takshak, and Asii, into India, that of Sheshnag (Takshak), from Shesh- nagdes (Tocharistan ?) or Sheshnag, six centuries, by calculation, before Christ, is the first noticed by the Puranas.^ About this period a grand irruption of the same races conquered Asia Minor, and [60] eventually Scandinavia ; and not long after the Asii and Tochari overturned the Greek kingdom of Bactria, the Romans felt the power of the Asi,' the Chatti, and Cimbri, from the Baltic shore.
" If we can show the Germans to have been originally Scythae or Goths (Getes or Jits), a wide field of curiosity and inquiry is open to the origin of government, manners, etc. ; all the anti- quities of Europe will assume a new appearance, and, instead of being traced to the bands of Germany, as Montesquieu and the greatest writers have hitherto done, may be followed through long descriptions of the manners of the Scythians, etc., as given by Herodotus. Scandinavia was occupied by the Scythae five hundred years before Christ. These Scythians worshipped Mercury (Budha), Woden or Odin, and believed themselves his progeny. The Gothic mythology, by parallel, might be shown
^ Herodotus (iv. 12) says : " The Cimmerians, expelled by the Massa- getae, migrated to the Crimea." Here were the Thj'ssagetae, or western Getae [the lesser Getae, Herodotus iv..22]; and thence both the Getae and Cimbri found their way to the Baltic. Rubruc{uis the Jesuit, describing the monuments of the Comani in the Dasht-i Kipchak, whence these tribes, saj's : " Their monuments and circles of stones are like our Celtic or Druidical remains " (Bell's Collection). The Khuman are a branch of the Kathi tribe of Saurashtra, whose paliyas, or funeral monumental pillars, are seen in groups at every town and village. The Chatti were one of the early German tribes. [Needless to say, the German Chatti had no connexion with the Kathi of Gujarat.]
^ [The reference, again, is to the Saisunaga dynasty, p. 64 above.] ' Asi was the term applied to the Getes, Yeuts, or Juts, when they in- vaded Scandinavia and founded Yeutland or Jutland (see ' Edda,^ Mallet's Introduction).
SCYTHIANS AND GERMANS 73
to be Grecian, whose gods were the progeny of Coehis and Terra (Budha and EUa).^ Dryads, satyrs, fairies, and all the Greek and Roman superstition, may be found in the Scandinavian creed. The Goths consulted the heart of victims^ had oracles, had sibyls, had a Venus in Freya, and Parcae in the Valkyrie." ^
The Scythian Descent of the Rajputs. — Ere we proceed to trace these mythological resemblances, let us adduce further opinions in proof of the'position assumed of a common origin of the tribes of early Europe and the Scj^thic Rajput.
The translator of Abulghazi, in his preface, observes : " Our contempt for the Tatars would lessen did we consider how nearly we stand related to them, and that our ancestors originally came from the north of Asia, and that our customs, laws, and way of living were formerly the same as theirs. In short, that we are no other than a colony of Tatars.
" It was from Tatary those jDcople came, who, imder the suc- cessive names of Cymbrians,* Kelts, and Gauls, possessed all the northern part of Europe. What were the Goths, Huns, Alans, Swedes, Vandals, Franks, but swarms of the same hive ? The Swedish chronicles bring the Swedes * from Cashgar, and [61] the affinity between the Saxon language and Kipchak is great ; and the Keltick language still subsisting in Britany and Wales is a demonstration that the inhabitants are descended from Tatar nations."
^ Mercury and earth.
^ Pinkerton, On the Goths, vol. ii. p. 94. [All this is obsolete.]
^ Camari was one of the eight sons of Japhet, says Abulghazi : whence the Camari, Cimmerii, or Cimbri. Karaari is one of the tribes of Saurashtra. [Kymry = fellow-countrymen (Rhys, Celtic Britain, 116).]
* The Suiones, Suevi, or Su. Now the Su, Yueh-chi, or Yuti, are Getes, according to De Guignes. Marco Polo calls Cashgar, where he was in the sixth century, the birthplace of the Swedes ; and De la Croix adds, that in 1691 Sparvenfeldt, the Swedish ambassador at Paris, told him he had read in Swedish chronicles that Cashgar was their country. When the Huns were chased from the north of China, the greater part retired into the southern countries adjoining Europe. The rest passed directly to the Oxus and Jaxartes ; thence they spread to the Caspian and Persian frontiers. In Mawaru-1-nahr (Transoxiana) they mixed with the Su, the Yueh-chi, or Getes, who were particularly powerful, and extended into Europe. One would be tempted to regard them as the ancestors of those Getes who were known in Europe. Some bands of Su might equally pass into the north of Europe, known as the Suevi. [The meaning of Suevi is uncertain, but the word has no connexion with that of any Central Asian tribe.]
74 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
From between the parallels of 30° and 50° of north latitude, and from 75° to 95° of east longitude, the highlands of Central Asia, alike removed from the fires of the equator and the cold of the arctic circle, migrated the races which passed into Europe and within the Indus. We must therefore voyage up the Indus, cross the Paropanisos, to the Oxus or Jihun, to Sakatai ^ or Sakadwipa, and from thence and the Dasht-i Kipchak conduct the Takshaks, the Getae, the Kamari, the Chatti, and the Huns, into the plains of Hindustan.
We have much to learn in these unexplored regions, the abode of ancient civilisation, and which, so late as Jenghiz Khan's invasion, abounded with large cities. It is an error to suppose that the nations of Higher Asia were merely pastoral ; and De Guignes, from original authorities, informs us that when the Su invaded the Yueh-chi or Jats, they found upwards of a hundred cities containing the merchandise of India, and with the currency bearing the effigies of the prince.
Such was the state of Central Asia long before the Christian era, though now depopulated and rendered desert by desolating wars, which have raged in these countries, and to which Europe can exhibit no parallel. Timur's wars, in more modern times, against the Getic nation, will illustrate the paths of his ambitious predecessors in the career of destruction.
If we examine the political limits of the great Getic nation in the time of Cyrus, six centuries before Christ, we shall find them little circumscribed in power on the rise of Timur, though twenty centuries had elapsed [62].
Jats and Getae. — At this period (a.d. 1.330), under the last prince of Getic race, Tuglilak Timur Khan, the kingdom of Chagatai ^ was bounded on the west by the Dasht-i Kipchak, and
^ Mr. Pinkerton's research had discovered Sakatai, though he does not give his authority (D'Anville) for the Sakadwipa of the Puranas ! " Sakitai, a region at the fountains of the Oxus and Jaxartes, styled Sakita from the Sacae" (D'Anville, Anc. Geog.). The Yadus of Jaisalmer, who ruled Zabulistan and founded Ghazni, claim the Chagatais as of their own Indu stock : a claim which, without deep reflection, appeared inadmissible ; but which I now deem worthy of credit.
- Chagatai, or Sakatai, the Sakadwipa of the Puranas (corrupted by the Greeks to Scythia), " whose inhabitants worship the sun and whence is the river Arvarma." [For the Chagatai Mongols see EUas-Ross, History of the Moghuh of Central Asia, Introd. 28 if.]
JATS and GETAE 75
on the south by the Jihun, on which river the Getic Khan, hke Tomyris, had his capital. Kokhand, Tashkent, Utrar,^ Cyropolis, and the most northern of the Alexandrias, were within the bounds of Chagatai.
The Getae, Jut, or Jat, and Takshak races, which occupy places amongst the thirty-six royal races of India, are all from the region of Sakatai. Regarding their earliest migrations, v/e shall endeavour to make the Puranas contribute ; but of their invasions in more modem times the histories of Mahmud of Ghazni, and Timur abundantly acquaint us.
From the mountains of Jud ^ to the shores of Makran,' and along the Ganges, the Jat is widely spread ; while the Takshak name is now confined to inscriptions or old writings.
Inquiries in their original haunts, and among tribes now under different names, might doubtless bring to light their original designation, now best known within the Indus ; whUe the Takshak or Takiuk may probably be discovered in the Tajik, still in his ancient haunts, the Transoxiana and Chorasinia of classic authors ; the Mawaru-n-nahr of the Persians ; the Turan, Turkistan, or Tocharistan of native geography ; the abode of the Tochari, Takshak, or Turushka invaders of India, described in the Puranas and existing inscriptions.
The Getae had long maintained their independence when Tomyris defended their liberty against Cyrus. Driven in success- ive wars across the Sutlej, we shall elsewhere show them preserv- ing their ancient habits, as desultory cavaliers, under the Jat leader of Lahore, in pastoral communities in Bikaner^ the Indian
^ Utrar, probably the Uttarakuru of ancient geography : the uttara (northern) kuru (race) ; a branch of Indu stock.
2 Jadu ka dang, the Joudes of Rennell's map ; the Yadu hills high up in the Panjab, where a colony of the Yadu race dwelt when expelled Saurashtra. [The Salt Range in the Jhelum, Shahpur, and Mian wall districts of the Panjab, was known to ancient historians as Koh-i-Jud, or ' the hiUs of Jud,' the name being applied by the Muhammadans to this range on account of its resemblance to Mount Al-Jiidi, or Ararat. The author constantly refers to it, and suggests that the name was connected with the Indian Yadu, or Yadava tribe (IGI, xxi._412; Abu-1 Fazl, Akbarndma, i. 237; Elliot- Dowson, ii. 235, v. 561 ; Aln, ii. 405 ; ASR, ii. 17 ; Hughes, Diet, of Islam, 23).]
^ The Numri, or Lumri (foxes) of Baluchistan, are Jats [?]. These are the Noniardies of Rennell. [They are beheved to be aborigines {IGI, xvi. 146; Census Report, Baluchistan, 1911, i. 17).]
76 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
desert and elsewhere, though they have lost sight of their early history. The transition from pastoral to agricultural pursuits is but short, and the descendant of the nomadic Getae of Transoxiana is now the best husbandman on the plains of Hindustan^ [63].
The invasion of these Indu-Scytliic tribes, Getae, Takshaks, Asii, Chatti, Rajpali,^ Huns, Kamari, introduced the worship of Budha, the founder of the Indu or Lunar race.
Herodotus says the Getae were theists,^ and held the tenets of the soul's immortality ; so with the Buddhists.
Before, however, touching on points of religious resemblance between the Asii, Getae, or Jut of Scandinavia (who gave his name to the Cimbric Chersonese) and the Getae of Scythia and India, let us make a few remarks on the Asii or Aswa.
The Aswa. — To the Indu race of Aswa (the descendants of Dvimidha and Bajaswa), spread over the countries on both sides the Indus, do we probably owe the distinctive appellation of Asia. Herodotus * says the Greeks denominated Asia from the wife of Prometheus ; while others deduce it from a grandson of Manes, indicating the Aswa descendants of the patriarch Manu. Asa,* Sakambhari,^ Mata,' is the divinity Hope, ' mother-pro- tectress of the Sakha,' or races. Every Rajput adores Asapurna, ' the fulfiller of desire ' ; or, as Sakambhari Devi (goddess pro- tectress), she is invoked previous to any undertaking.
The Aswas were chiefly of the Indu race ; yet a branch of the Suryas also bore this designation. It appears to indicate their celebrity as horsemen.* All of them worshipped the horse, which they sacrificed to the sun. This grand rite, the Asvamedha, on
^ [There is no evidence, beyond resemblance of name, to connect the Jats with the Getae.] ^ Royal pastors [?].
^ [iv. 59.] The sun was their ' great deity,' though they had in Xamolxis a lord of terror, with aiJSnity to Yama, or the Hindu Pluto. " The chief divinity of the Fenns, a Scythic race, was Yammalu " (Pinkerton's Hist, of the Goths, vol. ii. p. 215).
* iv. 45 [Asia probably means ' land of the rising sun.'] ' Asa, ' hope.'
® Sakambhari : from sakham, the plural of sahha, ' branch or race,' and ambhar, ' covering, protecting.' [The word means ' herb nourishing.'] ' IMata, ' mother.'
* Asica and haya are synonymous Sanskrit terms for ' horse ' ; as]} in Persian ; and as apphed by the prophet Ezelciel [xxxviti. 6] to the Getic invasion of Scythia, a.c. 600 : " the sons of Togarmah riding on hojses " ; described by Diodorus, the period the same as the Takshak invasion of India.
JATS AND GETAE 77
the festival of the winter solstice, would alone go far to exemplify their common Scythic origin with the Getic Saka, authorising the inference of Pinkerton, " that a grand Scythic nation extended from the Caspian to the Ganges."
The Asvamedha. — The Asvamedha was practised on the Ganges and Sarju by the Solar princes [64], twelve hundred years before Christ, as by the Getae in the time of Cyrus ; " deeming it right," says Herodotus [i. 216] " to offer the swiftest of created to the chief of uncreated beings " : and this worship and sacrifice of the horse has been handed down to the Rajput of the present day. A description of this grand ceremony shall close these analogies.
The Getic Asii carried this veneration for the steed, symbolic of their chief deity the sun, into Scandinavia : equally so of all the early German tribes, the Su, Suevi, Chatti, Sucimbri, Getae, in the forests of Germany, and on the banks of the Elbe and Weser. The milk-white steed was supposed to be the organ of the gods, from whose neighing they calculated future events ; notions possessed also by the Aswa, sons of Budha (Woden), on the Yamuna and Ganges, when the rocks of Scandinavia and the shores of the Baltic were yet untrod by man. It was this omen which gave Darius Hystaspes ^ (hinsna, ' to neigh,' aspa, ' a horse ') a crown. The bard Chand makes it the omen of death to his principal heroes. The steed of the Seandina%aan god of battle was kept in the temple of Upsala, and always " found foaming and sweating after battle." " Money," says Tacitus, " was only acceptable to the German when bearing the effigies of the horse." *
In the Edda we are informed that the Getae, or Jats, who entered Scandinavia, were termed Asi, and their first settlement As-gard.^
Pinkerton rejects the authority of the Edda and follows Torfaeus, who " from Icelandic chronicles and genealogies con- cludes Odin to have come into Scandinavia in the time of Darius Hystaspes, five hundred years before Christ."
^ [Hystaspes is from old Persian, Vishtaspa, ' possessor of horses.' The author derives it from a modern Hindi word hinsna, ' to neigh,' possibly from recollection of the story in Herodotus iii. 85.]
^ [He possibly refers to the statement (Gennania, v.), that their coins bore the impress of a two-horse chariot.]
^ Asirgarb, ' fortress of the Asi ' [IGI, vi. 12].
78 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
This is the period of the last Buddha, or Mahavira, whose era is four hundred and seventy-seven years before Vikrama, or five hundred and thirty-three before Christ.
The successor of Odin in Scandinavia was Gotama ; and Gautama was the successor of the last Buddha, Mahavira,^ who as Gotama, or Gaudama, is still adored from the Straits of Malacca to the Caspian Sea.
" Other antiquaries," says Pinkerton, " assert another Odin, who was put as the supreme deity one thousand years before Christ" [65].
Mallet admits two Odins, but Mr. Pinkerton wishes he had abided Ijy that of Torfaeus, in 500 a.c.
It is a singular fact that the periods of both the Scandinavian Odins should assimilate with the twenty-second Buddha [Jain Tirthakara], Neminath, and twenty-fourth and last, Mahavira ; the first the contemporary of Krishna, about 1000 or 1100 years, the last 533, before Christ. The Asii, Getae, etc., of Europe worshipped Mercury as founder of their line, as did the Eastern Asi, Takshaks, and Getae. The Chinese and Tatar historians also say Buddha, or Fo, appeared 1027 years before Christ. " The Yuchi, established in Bactria and along the Jihun, eventually bore the name of Jeta or Yetan,^ that is to say, Getae. Their empire subsisted a long time in this part of Asia, and extended even into India. These are the people whom the Greeks knew under the name of Indo-Scythes. Their manners are the same as those of the Turks .^ Revolutions occurred in the very heart of the East, whose consequences were felt afar." *
The period allowed by all these authorities for the migration of these Scythic hordes into Europe is also that for their entry into India.
The sixth century is that calculated for the Takshak from Sheshnagdesa ; and it is on this event and reign that the Puranas declare, that from this period " no prince of pure blood would be
^ The great [maha) warrior [vir). [Buddha lived 567-487 b.c. : Mahavira, founder of Jainism, died about 527 B.C.]
- Yeutland was the name given to the whole Cimbric Chersonese, or Jutland (Pinkerton, On the Goths).
* Turk, Turushka, Takshak, or ' Taunak, fils de Tnrc ' (Abulghazi, History of the Tatars).
* Histoire des Huns, vol. i. p. 42.
PERSONAL HL^BITS, DRESS, THEOGONY, RITES 79
found, but that the Sudra, the Turushka, and the Yavan, would prevail."
All these Indu-Scythic invaders held the religion of Buddha : and hence the conformity of manners and mythology between the Scandinavian or German tribes and the Rajputs increased by comparing their martial poetry.
Similarity of religious manners affords stronger proofs of original identity than language. Language is eternally changing — so are manners ; but an exploded custom or rite traced to its source, and maintained in opposition to climate, is a testimony not to be rejected.
Personal Habits, Dress. — When Tacitus informs us that the first act of a German on rising was ablution, it will be conceded this habit was not acquired in [66] the cold climate of Germany, but must have been of eastern ^ origin ; as were " the loose flowing robe ; the long and braided hair, tied in a knot at the top of the head " ; with many other customs, personal habits, and superstitions of the Scj'thic Cimbri, Juts, Chatti, Suevi, analogous to the Getic nations of the same name, as described by Herodotus, Justin, and Strabo, and which yet obtain amongst the Rajput Sakhae of the present day.
Let us contrast what history affords of resemblance in religion or manners. First, as to religion.
Taeogony. — Tuisto (IVIercury) and Ertha (the earth) were the chief divinities of the early German tribes. Tuisto ^ was born of the Earth (Ila) and Manus (Manu). Ke is often confounded with Odin, or Woden, the Budha of the eastern tribes, though they are the Mars and Mercury of these nations.
^ Though Tacitus calls the German tribes indigenous, it is evident he knew their claim to Asiatic origin, when he asks, " Who would leave the softer abodes of Asia for Germany, where Nature yields nothing but deformity ? "
2 In an inscription of the Geta or Jat Prince of SaUndrapur (Salpur) of the fifth century, he is styled " of the race of Tusta " {qu. Tuisto ?). It is in that ancient nail-headed character used by the ancient Buddhists of India, and still the sacred character of the Tatar Lamas : in short, the Pali. All the ancient inscriptions I possess of the branches of the Agnikulas, as the Chauhan, Pramara, Solanki, and Parihara, are in this cha,racter. That of the Jat prince styles liim " Jat Kathida " {qu. of (da) Cathay ?). From Tuisto and Woden v.e have our Tuesdaj^ and Wednesday. In India, Wednesday is Budhwar (Dies Mercurii), and Tuesday Mangalwar (Dies Martis), the Mardi of the French.
80 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Religious Rites. — The Suiones or Suevi, the most powerful Getie nation of Scandinavia, were divided into many tribes, one of whom, the Su (Yueh-chi or Jat), made human sacrifices in their consecrated groves ^ to Ertha (Ila), whom all worshipped, and whose chariot was drawn by a cow.^ The Suevi worshipped Tsis (Isa, Gauri, the Isis and Ceres of Rajasthan), in whose rites the figure of a ship is introduced ; " symbolic," observes Tacitus, " of its foreign origin." ^ The festival of Isa, or Gauri, wife of Iswara, at Udaipur, is performed on the lake, and appears to be exactly that of Isis and Osiriain Egypt, as described by Herodotus. On this occasion Iswara (Osiris), who is secondary to his wife, has a stalk of the onion in blossom in his hand ; a root detested by the Hindus generally, though adored by the Egyptians.
Customs of War. — They sung hymns in praise of Hercules, as well as Tuisto or Odin, whose banners and images they carried to the field ; and fought in clans, using the feram or javelin, both in close and distant combat. In all maintaining [67] the resem- blance to the Harikula, descendants of Budha, and the Aswa, offspring of Bajaswa, who peopled those regions west of the Indus, and whose redundant population spread both east and west.
The Suevi, or Suiones, erected the celebrated temple of Upsala, in which they placed the statues of Thor, Woden, and Freya, the triple divinity of the Scandinavian Asii, the Trimurti of the Solar and Lunar races. The first (Thor, the thunderer, or god of war) is Hara, or Mahadeva, the destroyer ; the second (Woden) is Budha,* the preserver ; and the third (Freya) is Uma, the creative power.
The grand festival to Freya was in spring, when all nature revived ; then boars were offered to her by the Scandinavians, and even boars of paste were made and swallowed by the peasantry.
As Vasanti, or spring personified, the consort of Hara is worshipped by the Rajput, who opens the season with a grand
^ Tacitus, Germania, xxxviii.
^ The gau, or cow, symbolic of Prithivi, the earth. On this see note, p. 33.
' [Oermania, ix.]
* Krishna is the preserving deity of the Hindu triad. Krishna is of the Tndu line of Budha, whom he worshipped prior to his own deification.
COMPARISON OF RAJPUTwS WITH N. EUROPEANS 81
hunt/ led by the j^rince and his vassal chiefs, when they chase, slay, and eat the boar. Personal danger is disregarded on this day, as want of success is ominous that the Great Mother will refuse all petitions throughout the year.
Pinkerton, quoting Ptolemy (who was fifty years after Tacitus), says there were six nations in Yeutland or Jutland, the country of the Juts, of whom were the Sablingii (Suevi,^ or Suiones), the Chatti and Hermandri, who extended to the estuary of the Elbe and Weser. There they erected the pillar Irmansul to " the god of war," regarding which Sammes ^ observes : " some will have it to be Mars his pillar, others Hermes Saul, or the pillar of Hermes or Mercury " ; and he naturally asks, " how did the Saxons come to be acquainted with the Greek name of Mercury ? "
Sacrificial pillars are termed Sula in Sanskrit ; which, con- joined with Hara,* the Indian god of war, would be Harsula. The Rajput warrior invokes Hara with his trident (trisula) to help him in battle, while his battle-shout is ' mar ! mar ! ' The Cimbri, one of the most celebrated of the six tribes of Yeutland, derive their name from their fame as warriors [68].^
Kumara * is the Rajput god of war. He is represented with seven heads in the Hindu mythology : the Saxon god of war has six.' The six-headed Mars of the Cimbri Chersonese, to whom was raised the Ii'mansul on the Weser, was worshipped by the Sakasenae, the Chatti, the Siebi or Suevi, the Jotae or Getae, and the Cimbri, evincing in name, as in religious rites, a common origin with the martial warriors of Hindustan.
Rajput Religion. — ^The religion of the martial Rajput, and the rites of Hara, the god of battle, are little analogous to those of
1 ' Mahurat ka shikar.' 2 ^he Siebi of Tacitus.
^ Sammes's Saxon Ardiquities.
* Hara is the Thor of Scandinavia ; Hari is Budha, Hermes, or Mercury.
^ Mallet derives it from kempfer, ' to fight.' [The name is said to mean 'comrades' (Rhys, Celtic Britain, 116). Irmansul means ' a colossus,' and has no connexion with Skr. sfda (CTrimm, Teutonic 3Iythologi/, i. 115).]
** Ku is a mere prefix, meaning ' evil ' ; ' the evil striker (Mar).' Hence, probably, the Mars of Rome. The birth of Kumar, the general of the army of the gods, with the Hindus, is exactly that of the Grecians, born of the goddess Jahnavi (Juno) without sexual intercourse. Kumara is always accompanied by the peacock, the bird of Juno. [Kumara probably means ' easily dying ' ; there is no connexion with Mars, originally a deity of vegetation.]
' For a drawing of the Scandinavian god of battle see Sammes.
VOL I Q
82 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
the meek Hindus, the followers of the pastoral divinity, the worshippers of kine, and feeders on fruits, herbs, and water. The Rajput delights in blood : his offerings to the god of battle are sanguinary, blood and wine. The cup (kharpara) of libation is the human skull. He loves them because they are emblematic of the deity he worships ; and he is taught to believe that Hara loves them, who in war is represented with tb.e skull to drink the foeman's blood, and in peace is the patron of wine and women. With Parbati on his knee, his eyes rolling from the juice of the phul (ardent spirits) and opium, such is this Bacchanalian divinity of war. Is this Hinduism, acquired on the burning plains of India ? Is it not rather a perfect picture of the manners of the Scandinavian heroes ?
The Rajput slays buffaloes, hunts and eats the boar and deer, and shoots ducks and wild fowl (kukkut) ; he worships his horse, his sword, and the sun, and attends more to the martial song of the bard than to the litany of the Brahman. In the martial mythology and warlike poetry of the Scandinavians a wide field exists for assimilation, and a comparison of the poetical remains of the Asi of the east and west would alone suffice to suggest a common origin.
Bards. — In the sacred Bardai of the Rajput we have the bard of our Saxon ancestry ; those reciters of warlike poetry, of whom Tacitus says, " with their barbarous strains, they influence their minds in the day of battle with a chorus of military virtue."
A comparison, in so extensive a field, would include the whole of their manners and religious opinions, and must be reserved for a distinct work.'- The Valkyrie [69], or fatal sisters of the Suevi or Siebi, would be the twin sisters of the Apsaras, who summon the Rajput warrior from the field of battle, and bear him to " the mansion of the sun," equally the object of attainment with the children of Odin in Scandinavia, and of Budha and Surya in the
^ I have in contemplation to give to the public a few of the sixty-nine books of the poems of Chand, the last great bard of the last Hindu emperor of India, Prithwiraja. They are entirely heroic : each book a relation of one of the exploits of this prince, the first warrior of his time. Thej' will aid a comparison between the Rajput and Scandinavian bards, and sliow how far the Proven9al Troubadour, the Neustrienne Trouveur, and Minne- singer of Germany, have anytliing in common witli the Rajput Bardai. [For Rajput bards on horseback, drunk with opium, singing songs to arouse warriors' courage, see Manucci ii. 4'M f.l
COMPARISON OF RAJPUTS WITH N. EUROPEANS 83
plains of Scythia and on the Ganges, like the Elysium ^ of the Heliadae of Greece.
In the day of battle we should see in each the same excitements to glory and contempt of death, and the dramatis personae of the field, both celestial and terrestrial, move and act alike. We should see Thor, the thunderer, leading the Siebi, and Hara (Siva) the Indian Jove, his own worshippers (Sivseva) ; in which Freya, or Bhavani, and even the preserver (Krislma) himself, not un frequently mingle.
War Chariots. — The war chariot is peculiar to the Indu-Seythic nations, from Dasaratha,^ and the heroes of the Mahabharata, to the conquest of Hindustan by the Muhammadans, when it was laid aside. On the plains of Kurukshetra, Krishna became charioteer to his friend Arjun ; and the Getic hordes of the Jaxartes, when they aided Xerxes in Greece, and Darius on the plains of Arbela,' had their chief strength in the war chariot.
The war chariot continued to be used later in the south-west of India than elsewhere, and the Kathi,* Khuman, Kumari of
. ^ 'EXvaioi, from "HXtos, ' the sun ' ; also a title of Apollo, the Hari of India. [The two words, from the accentuation, can have no connexion.]
^ This title of tlie father of Rama denotes a ' charioteer ' [' having ten chariots.' Harsha (a.d. 612-647) discarded the chariot (Smith, EHI, 339)].
^ The Indian satrapy of Darius, saj's Herodotus [iii. 94], was the richest of all the Persian provinces, and yielded six himdred talents of gold. Arrian informs us that his Indo-Scythic subjects, in his wars with Alexander, were the elite of his army. Besides the Sakasenae, we find tribes in name similar to those included in the thirty-six Rajkula ; especially the Dahae (Dahya, one of the thirty-six races). The Indo-Scythic contingent was two hundred war chariots and fifteen elephants, which were marshalled with the Parthii on the right, and also near Darius's person. By this disposition they were opposed to the cohort commanded by Alexander in person. The chariots commenced the action, and prevented a manoeuvre of Alexander to turn the left flank of the Persians. Of their horse, also, the most honourable mention is made ; they penetrated into the division where Parmenio com- manded, to whom Alexander was compelled to send reinforcements. The Grecian historian dwells with pleasure on Indo-Scythic valour : " there were no equestrian feats, no distant fighting with darts, but each fought as if victory depended on his sole arm." They fought the Greeks hand to hand [Arrian, Anabasis, iii. 15].
But the loss of empire was decreed at Arbela, and the Sakae and Indo Scythae had the honour of being slaughtered by the Yavans of Greece, far from their native land, in the aid of the king of kings.
* The Kathi are celebrated in Alexander's wars. The Kathiawar Kathi can be traced from Multan {the ancient abode) {mtdasthcma, ' principal place '].
84 HISTORY OF THE RAJPUT TRIBES
Saurashtra have to recent times retained their Scythie habits, as their monumental stones testify, expressing their being slain from their cars [70].
Position of Women. — In no point does resemblance more attach between the ancient German and Scandinavian tribes, and the martial Rajput or ancient Getae, than in their delicacy towards females,
" The Germans," says Tacitus [Germania, viii.], " deemed the advice of a woman in periods of exigence oracular." So does the Rajput, as the bard Chand often exemplifies ; and hence they append to her name the epithet Devi (or contracted De), ' god- like.' " To a German mind," says Tacitus, " the idea of a woman led into captivity is insupportable " ; and to prevent this the Rajput raises the poignard against the heart which beats only for him, though never to survive the dire necessity. It is then they perform the sacrifice ' johar,' when every sakha (branch) is cut off : and hence the Rajput glories in the title of Sakha-band, from having performed the sakha ; an awful rite, and with every appearance of being the sacaea of the Scythie Getae, as described by Strabo.^
The Dahya (Dahae), Johya (the latter Hunnish), and Kathi are amongst the thirty-six races. All dwelt, six centuries ago, within the five streams and in the deserts south of the Ghara. The two last have left but a name. ^ The Sakae had invaded the inhabitants on the borders of the Pontic Sea : whilst engaged in dividing the booty, the Persian generals surprised them at night, and exterminated them. To eternize the remembrance of this event, the Persians heaped up the earth round a rock in the plain where the battle was fought, on which they erected two temples, one to the goddess Anaitis, the other to the divinities Omanus and Anandate, and then founded the anmial festival called Sacaea, still celebrated by the possessors of Zela. Such is tlie account by some authors of the origin of Sacaea. According to others it dates from the reign of Cyrus only. This prince, they say, having carried the war into the country of the Sakae (Massagetae of Herodotus) lost a battle. Compelled to fall back on his magazines, abundantly stored with provisions, but especially wine, and having halted some time to refresh his army, he departed before the enemy, feigning a flight, and leaving his camp standing full of provisions. The Sakae, who pursued, reaching the abandoned camp stored with provisions, gave themselves up to debauch. Cyrus returned and surprised the inebriated and senseless barbarians. Some, buried in profound sleep, were easily massacred ; others occupied in drinking and dancing, without defence, fell into the hands of armed foes : so that all perished. The conqueror, attributing his success to divine pro- tection, consecrated this day to the goddess honoured in his country, and decreed it should be called ' the day of the Sacaea.' This is the battle
GAMING, OMENS, AUGURIES 85
Gaming. — In passion for play at games of cliance, its extent and dire consequences, the Rajput, from the earliest times, has evinced a predilection, and will stand comparison with the Scythian and his German offspring. The German staked his personal liberty, became a slave, and was sold as the property of the winner. To this vice the Pandavas owed the loss of their sovereignty and personal liberty, involving at last the destruction of all the Indu [71] races ; nor has the passion abated. Religion even consecrates the vice ; and once a year, on ' the Festival of Lamps ' (Diivali), all propitiate the goddess of wealth and fortune (Lakshmi) by offering at her shrine.
Destitute of mental pursuits, the martial Rajput is often slothful or attached to sensual pleasures, and when roused, reck- less on what he may wreak a fit of energy. Yet when order and discipline prevail in a wealthy chieftainship, there is much of that patriarchal mode of life, with its amusements, alike suited to the Rajput, the Getae of the Jihun, or Scandinavian.
Omens, Auguries. — Divination by lots, auguries, and omens by flights of birds, as practised by the Getic nations described by Herodotus, and amongst the Germans by Tacitus, will be found amongst the Rajputs, from whose works ^ on this subject might have been supplied the whole of the Augurs and Aruspices, German or Roman.
Love of Strong Drink. — Love of liquor, and indulgence in it to excess, were deep-rooted in the Scandinavian Asi and German tribes, and in which they showed their Getic origin ; nor is the
related by Herodotus, to which Strabo alludes, between the Persian monarch and Tomyris, queen of the Getae. Amongst the Rajput Sakha, all grand battles attended with fatal results are termed sakha. When besieged, without hope of relief, in the last effort of despair, the females are immolated, and the warriors, decorated in saffron robes, rush on inevitable destruction.