[INDOLOGY] Mleccha

[Fitzgerald, James]

 Dear Madhav,

I wouldn't want to hazard any conjectures about who exactly Naraka and Mura
might have been among the foreign rulers in the northwest. Perhaps some
historians have some ideas or other pertinent evidence. Were the Kushanas
ever styled as "yavana", in coins, inscriptions, or Puranic histories?

On Tue, Aug 25, 2026 at 2:06 PM Madhav Deshpande <mmdesh at umich.edu> wrote:

> Dear Jim,
>
>      This is eye-opening to me. I was not aware of the Western
> Pragjyotisha, and the identification of Naraka with the Greeks. Does this
> in some way help dating of these passages, if not of the composition of the
> epic itself?
>
> Madhav
>
>
> Madhav M. Deshpande
> Professor Emeritus, Sanskrit and Linguistics
> University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
> Senior Fellow, Oxford Center for Hindu Studies
> Adjunct Professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore, India
>
> [Residence: Campbell, California, USA]
>
> On Tue, Aug 25, 2026 at 10:10 AM Fitzgerald, James via INDOLOGY <
> indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
>
>> Dear colleagues,
>>
>> It is pertinent to this discussion that there seems to have been a
>> western locus of Prāgjyotiṣa as well as an eastern one. It is mentioned in
>> a portion of Nārāyaṇa's prophecy of future interventions in the terrestrial
>> world at MBh 12.326.82-85, which episodes have associations with western
>> India.
>>
>> I quote: “At the final juncture of the Dvāpara and Kali Ages, there will
>> be an appearance of me in Mathurā because of Kaṃsa. [82] Having killed
>> a large number of Dānavas then, who were thorns to the Gods, I shall make
>> Kuśasthalī, which is the city Dvārakā, my dwelling. [83] Dwelling
>> in that city, I shall kill that annoyer of Aditi Naraka, son of Earth,
>> and Mura and the Dānava Pīṭha.[84] Having killed the preeminent
>> Dānavas, I shall lead the delightful city of Prāgjyotiṣa, which possesses
>> prolific riches, to Kuśasthalī. [85]"
>>
>> In an endnote to Kuśasthalī, I write: "326.85. Prāgjyotiṣa was the
>> capital city of the Asura Naraka and the locus of Kṛṣṇa’s killing him (HV
>> 91.53–57). His “leading” Prāgjyotiṣa to Kuśasthalī likely refers to what is
>> described at HV 97.1: “The road to the town of Prāgjyotisha has been made
>> safe once again” (trans. Brodbeck). This entire HV śloka is identical to
>> MBh 3.13.26, though the context in the MBh is one of listing great deeds of
>> Kṛṣṇa. MBh 2.13.13 identifies Naraka (and Mura as well) as Greek rulers
>> (yavanādhipau) who were under the rule of Bhagadatta, “a king of unlimited
>> power, who ruled in the West like Varuṇa.” It seems unlikely that
>> Naraka’s Prāgjyotiṣa is the same as the Prāgjyotiṣa in the far northeast of
>> the subcontinent, in modern day Assam, which is
>> generally considered to be where the Prāgjyotiṣa governed by the
>> elephant-riding Bhagadatta was located. Bhagadatta is described at MBh
>> 5.4.11d as “dwelling by the eastern ocean.” At the same time, it was in the
>> far north that Arjuna encountered and subdued Bhagadatta in the digvijaya
>> of Yudhiṣṭhira’s Rājasūya, 2.23.13–26. It would seem that in addition to
>> the far eastern Prāgjyotiṣa, there was another one, the “home of the
>> western Asuras” (Hopkins, Epic Mythology, 257; see too 50–51), and that
>> Bhagadatta came somehow to be identified with both."
>>
>> Best, Jim Fitzgerald
>>
>> On Tue, Aug 25, 2026 at 8:55 AM Martin Straube via INDOLOGY <
>> indology at list.indology.info> wrote:
>>
>>> Dear Patrick,
>>>
>>> As usual, M. Mayrhofer, Etymologisches Worterbuch des Altindoarischen,
>>> is an indispensable source for linguistic matters (see vol. II, p. 389).
>>> Indian primary sources regarding mlecchas and other foreigners have been
>>> exhaustively compiled and discussed in K. Karttunen, Yonas And Yavanas In
>>> Indian Literature, Helsinki 2015 [= Studia Orientalia, 116]. Check the
>>> index and the searchable file which can be downloaded from here:
>>> https://journal.fi/store/issue/view/4184
>>>
>>> Best
>>> Martin Straube
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Patrick Olivelle via INDOLOGY <indology at list.indology.info> schrieb am
>>> Montag, 24. August 2026 um 14:31:
>>>
>>> > Dear All:
>>> >
>>> > A colleague in India who is not a member of this list asked me for
>>> secondary works, as well as primary sources, for the concept of “mleccha”
>>> in ancient India. The work by Parasher-Sen is well known. But are there
>>> others? With thanks and best wishes,
>>> >
>>> > Patrick
>>> >
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