Raaladesha and more

[Dominik Wujastyk]

I was surprised that there is any doubt about Rāḍhā being a region in
current West Bengal, part of Burdwan (Vardhamana); this is standard
information in Bengal sources, for example the *Ballālacarita* and the
various *Vaidyakulapañjikā* texts.

See, e.g., Dilip
Chakrabarti<http://books.google.com/books?id=OEZe-wAIiKIC&lpg=PA124&dq=Radha%2C%20Burdwan&pg=PA124#v=onepage&q=Radha,%20Burdwan&f=false>,
and other sources.

Dominik

On 19 June 2010 11:41, Arlo Griffiths <arlogriffiths at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Dear Ashok,
> I am not sure what you mean by "early sources", but I believe there is
> plenty of unambiguous evidence that Raa.dhaa was primarily the name of a
> region, or perhaps the conglomerate of two regions often specified at
> Dak.si.na- and Uttara-Raa.dhaa, and one that is associable with what we now
> know as Bengal. See the several references under this toponym in Puspa
> Niyogi, Brahmanic Settlements in Different Subdivisions of Ancient Bengal.
> Calcutta, Indian Studies: Past & Present, 1967.
> Arlo Griffiths -- EFEO/Jakarta
>
> ----------------------------------------
> > Date: Fri, 18 Jun 2010 11:00:32 -0700
> > From: ashok.aklujkar at UBC.CA
> > Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Raaladesha and more
> > To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> >
> > On 2010-06-18, at 1:08 AM, mkapstei at UCHICAGO.EDU wrote:
> >
> >> I agree that raala must be raaDha.
> >> The 11th c. play Prabodhacandrodaya
> >> unambiguously places raaDhadeza in gauDa
> >> (act 2, verse 7),
> >> so I do not think that the location in Bengal
> >> should be in question.
> >
> > Dear Matthew,
> >
> > Thanks for drawing my attention to the occurrence of Raa.dhaa in the
> Prabodhacandrodaya verse (2.7). The expression used there is raa.dhaa-purii,
> not raa.dhaa-de;sa (which would not fit the metre anyway). This gives rise
> to a new question: Did Sircar in fact have unambiguous evidence in early
> sources to suppose that Raa.dha/Raa.dhaa was a country name, as distinct
> from a city name? I keep my mind open on the issue. Perhaps Richard Salomon,
> who knows Sircar's writings better than I do, can explain why Sircar (and
> possibly others) thought of Raa.dha/Raa.dhaa as a country name associable
> with Bengal and for how long this view is current among scholars.
> >
> > Secondly, Sirkar has separate essays on Gau.da, Va:nga, Va:ngaala etc. in
> the volume I referred to earlier. On pp. 125-128, he makes a good case for a
> wider meaning of Gau.da, 'eastern countries/regions (of India),' mainly on
> the basis of post-10th century sources. The lifetime of the
> Prabodhacandrodaya author, as you note, is the 11th century. It is,
> therefore, not implausible that in his perception Raa.dhaa extended up to
> the eastern region of Kaaverii's flow (if Raa.dhaa was primarily not the
> name of that region).
> >
> > (Wikipedia: "The origin of the river is traditionally placed at
> Talakaveri, Kodagu district in theWestern Ghats in the state of Karnataka,
> flows generally south and east through Karnataka and Tamil Nadu and across
> the southern Deccan plateau through the southeastern lowlands, emptying into
> the Bay of Bengal through two principal mouths."
> >
> > a.a.
>
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