182
a spur is called Imaus (meaning in the native language snowy),[1] are the Isari, Cosyri, Izgi, and on the hills the Chisiotosagi,[2] and
- ↑ By Emodus was generally designated that part of the Himalayan range which extended along Nepâl and Bhûtan and onward toward the ocean. Other forms of the name are Emoda, Emodon, Hemodes. Lassen derives the word from the Sanskrit haimavata, in Pâtkṛit haimôta, 'snowy.' If this be so, Hemodus is the more correct form. Another derivation refers the word to 'Hêmâdri' (hema, 'gold,' and adri, 'mountain'), the 'golden mountains,'—so called either because they were thought to contain gold mines, or because of the aspect they presented when their snowy peaks reflected the golden effulgence of sunset. Imaus represents the Sanskṛit himavata, 'snowy.' The name was applied at first by the Greeks to the Hindû Kush and the Himâlayas, but was in course of time transferred to the Bolor range. This chain, which runs north and south, was regarded by the ancients as dividing Northern Asia into 'Skythia intra Imaum' and 'Skythia extra Imaum,' and it has formed for ages the boundary between China and Turkestân.
- ↑ These four tribes were located somewhere in Kaśmîr or its immediate neighbourhood. The Isari are unknown, but are probably the same as the Brysari previously mentioned by Pliny. The Cosyri are easily to be identified with the Khasîra mentioned in the Mahâbhârata as neighbours of the Daradas and Kaśmîras. Their name, it has been conjectured, survives in Khâchar, one of the three great divisions of the Kâṭhîs of Gujarât, who appear to have come originally from the Panjâb. The Izgi are mentioned in Ptolemy, under the name of the Sizyges, as a people of Sêrikê. This is, however, a mistake, as they inhabited the alpine region which extends above Kaśmîr towards the
Pliny assigns 425 miles as the distance from the confluence of the rivers to Palibothra, but, as it is in reality only 248, the figures have probably been altered. He gives, lastly, 638 miles as the distance from Palibothra to the mouth of the Granges, which agrees closely with the estimate of Megasthenês, who makes it 5000 stadia—if that indeed was his estimate, and not 6000 stadia as Strabo in one passage alleges it was. The distance by land from Pâṭnâ to Tamluk (Tamralipta, the old port of the Ganges' mouth) is 445 English or 480 Roman miles. The distance by the river, which is sinuous, is of course much greater. See E'tude sur le Géographie Orecque et Latine de l'Inde, par P. V. de Saint-Martin, pp. 271-278.
