Ancient India as described by Megasthenês and Arrian/Frag. XX. B.

by Megasthenes

Fragm. XX.B.

Pliny. Hist. Nat. VI. 21. 9—22. 1.

The Prinas^[1] and the Cainas (a tributary of the Ganges) are both navigable rivers. The tribes which dwell by the Ganges are the Calingæ,^[2] nearest the sea, and higher up the Mandei, also the Malli, among whom is Mount Mallus, the boundary of all that region being the Ganges. Some have asserted that this river, like the Nile, rises from unknown sources, and in a similar way waters the country it flows through, while others trace its source to the Skythian mountains. Nineteen rivers are said to flow into it, of which, besides those already mentioned, the Condochates,^[3] Erannoboas, Cosoagus, and Sonus are navigable. According to other accounts, it bursts at once with thundering roar from its fountain, and tumbling down a steep and rocky channel lodges in a lake as soon as it reaches the level plain, whence it issues forth with a gentle current, being nowhere less than eight miles broad, while its mean breadth is a hundred stadia, and its least depth twenty fathoms.^[4]

Solin. 52. 6-7.

In India the largest rivers are the Ganges and the Indus,—the Ganges, as some maintain, rising from uncertain sources, and, like the Nile, overflowing its banks; while others think that it rises in the Skythian mountains. In India there is also the Hupanis,^[5] a very noble river, which formed the limit of Alexander's march, as the altars set up on its banks testify. The least breadth of the Ganges is eight miles, and the greatest twenty. Its depth where least is fully one hundred feet.

Conf. Fragm. XXV. 1.

"Some say that the least breadth is thirty stadia, but others only three; while Megasthenes says that the mean breadth is a hundred stadia, and its least depth twenty orguias.

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1. V. L. Pumas.
2. A great and widely diffused tribe settled mainly between the Mahânadî and the Godâvarî. Their capital was Partualis (called by Ptolemy Kalligra), on the Mahânadî, higher up than the site of Katak. The name is preserved in Koringa, a great port at the month of the Godâvarî.
3. V. LL. Canucam, Yamam.
4. "The Bhâgîratî (which we shall here regard as the tme Ganges) firat comes to light near Gaṅgotrî, in the territory of Garhwâl, in lat. 30° 54′, long. 79° 7″, issuing from under a very low arch, at the base of a great snow-bed, estimated to be 300 feet thick, which lies between the lofty mountains termed St. Patrick, St. George, and the Pyramid, the two higher having elevations above the sea, respectively, of 22,798 and 22,654 feet, and the other, on the opposite side, having an elevation of 21,379. From the brow of this curious wall of snow, and immediately above the outlet of the stream, large and hoary icicles depend. They are formed by the freezing of the melted snow-water at me top of the bed; for in the middle of the day the sun is powerful, and the water produced by its action falls over this place in cascade, but is frozen at night . . . . At Sûkhî the river may be said to break though the 'Himâlaya Proper,' and the elevation of the waterway is here 7,608 feet. At Devprâg it is joined on the left side by the Alaknanda. . . . . . . . From Devprâg the united stream is now called the Ganges . . . . . Its descent by the Dehra Dûn is rather rapid to Haṛĭdwâr . . . . sometimes called Gaṅgâdwâra, or 'the gate of the Ganges,' being situate on its western or right bank at the southern base of the Sivâlik range, here intersected by a ravine or gorge by which the river, finally leaving the mountainous region, commences its course over the plains of Hindustân. The breadth of the river in the rainy season. . is represented to be a full mile."—Thornton.
5. The same as the Huphasis or Satlej.