388 Legends of the Saurashtra yroup [May, 



Sdhs of Sinde must be very old, or the passages of abuse and praise 

 in these poems must yield their claim to high antiquity. At any 

 rate a departure from strict oxthodoxy is established against the 

 tribe. 



There are some other points in the reverse legend of the coins 

 before us tbat call for further explanation — first, of the word Kritrima. 

 The expression quoted above from Arrian indicates something of an 

 elective government even while the Parthians ruled at Minagara ; each 

 party as it acquired the ascendancy in the politics of the state ' chosing 

 a king out of its own body.' 



Dr. Vincent supposes that the contending parties (the whigs and 

 tories of their day) were not both Parthians, but more probably Par. 

 thian and Indian. This view is not a little supported by the coin 

 evidence, and it is only necessary to imagine that the native influence 

 of a rich mercantile aristocracy at length prevailed and excluded the 

 Parthians altogether. Of these Parthians we see the remnant in the 

 Parsees so numerously located in Guzerat and Surat, and can easily 

 imagine, from their numbers and commercial enterprize, that they 

 must have been formidable rivals to the indigenous merchant-kings. 



Something of this feudal system of government is visible to this day 

 in the fraternity of the jdrajahs or chiefs of Cattywar and Cutch. The 

 name jardjah might, without any unwarrantable license, be deduced 

 from sah-rdja, persianized to ja-rdja or local chieftain. In 1809 ther e 

 were twenty or more of these chiefs in Cutch alone able to furnish a 

 contingent of from two hundred to one thousand men*. In the 

 Guzerat peninsula the number must be much greater, since in 1 807 there 

 were estimated to be five thousand two hundred families in which the 

 inhuman custom of female infanticide was regarded as a dignified 

 distinction of their caste ! 



In the names of these modern chieftains we can trace a few of our 

 list atra, visa, and vira : and a town called Damanagar, may have owed 

 its foundation to our prince of that name. The Jah-rdjahs and Catties 

 call themselves Hindus, but are very superficially acquainted with the 

 doctrines of their faith— the real objects of their worship are the Sun 

 a nd the Matha Assapuri\ the goddess of nature, — doubtless the 

 Nanaia of more classical Bactria. They are said to impress the Solar 

 image on every written document. "We are accordingly prepared to 

 find it on their ancient coinage, where it is seen on the right hand 

 side, the moon (matha for mas or mdh) being always in company on 

 the left. 



* Hamilton's Hiadostan, I. 587. f Ditto, I. 637. 



