Page:The Ancient Geography of India.djvu/18

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viii PREFACE.


able, as it belongs to a period just midway* between the date of Alexander and that of Hwen Thsang, at which time the greater part of North-west India had been subjected by the Indo-Scythians.

With Ptolemy, we lose the last of our great classi- cal authorities; and, until lately, we were left almost entirely to our own judgment in connecting and arranging the various geographical fragments that lie buried in ancient inscriptions, or half hidden in the vague obscurity of the Purânas. But the fortunate discovery of the travels of several Chinese pilgrims in the fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries of the Chris- tian era, has thrown such a flood of light upon this hitherto dark period, that we are now able to see our way clearly to the general arrangement of most of the scattered fragments of the Ancient Geography of India.

The Chinese pilgrim Fa-Hian was a Buddhist priest, who travelled through India from the banks of the Upper Indus to the mouth of the Ganges, between the years 399 and 413 A.D. Unfortunately his journal is very concise, and is chiefly taken up with the de- scription of the sacred spots and objects of his reli- gion, but as he usually gives the bearings and dis- tances of the chief places in his route, his short notices are very valuable. The travels of the second Chinese pilgrim, Sung-Yun, belong to the year 502 A.D., but as they were confined to the Kabul valley and North- west Panjâb, they are of much less importance, more

  • Campaign of Alexander, B.C.330, and Ptolemy's 'Geography,' A.D.

15C, or 480 years later. Beginning of Hwen Thisang's travels in India, A.D. 630, or just 480 years after Ptolemy.

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