r\ 



298 



P. Carnegy — The Bhars of Audh and Bandras. 



[No. 3, 





Prinsep. Here then we have proof absolute that Kanauj was the territorial 

 capital of north-east Audh 6 to 900 years ago. 



About that time, too, we arrive in the more immediate region of direct 



history, with the Muhammadan advent and conquest, A. D. 1000 1200. 



It is denied by no one that on the arrival of these invaders they found in 

 possession, and soon overthrew, the Tomars of Dihli, the Bathors of 

 Kanauj, and the Bhars, who were found to be in universal possession of the 

 soil of north-east Audh and Banaras. And it is with the last two of 

 these classes that we have any present concern. 



Literature and science have brought us so far, and up to this point 

 speculation and theory have been alike avoided ; we must now fall back on 

 tradition, and see what that may bring forth. The late Maharaja Sir 

 Man Singh, K C. S. I., himself a Brahman amongst Brahmans, was a 

 scholar and a savant as well as a politician and a soldier, and it 'was the 

 privilege of the writer to know him intimately and to receive much valuable 

 information from him connected with Audh and its peoples. The writer 

 has also had access to some of the most learned pandits of the day, includ- 

 ing Umadat of Ayodhya, and Suraj Narain of Aldemau, a former pupil of 

 the Banaras College, and the information received from such sources as 

 these, so far as it relates to the subject in hand, he now proposes to utilize 

 for the purposes of this paper. 



Centuries of Brahmanism which the want of tact of its priesthood had 

 made intolerable to the secular members of the community, had given place 

 to centuries of Buddhism, during which sway was at different times held 

 over Ayodhya, by dynasties which had Gaya (Magadh) and Sahet-Mahet 

 (Siri-Bastu) as their respective capitals. But the ardour of perverts does 

 not last for ever, and so for yet another term of centuries, came a period 

 during which the people troubled themselves but little about religion and 

 caste ; the Hindu Pantheon was forgotten and forsaken, and but little 

 attention was paid to even the well known gods in whose hands alone 

 rested the powers of creation and destruction. 



The writer has repeatedly been assured by Sir Man Singh, and Pan- 

 dit Umadat, that during the present century an inscription was discovered 

 m the mound known as the Manipardat in Ayodhya, which attributed its 

 construction to Baja Nanda Bardhan of Magadh, who is generally accre- 

 dited with the suppression of Brahmanism there, and with the establishment 

 ot the non-caste system which then became general. This inscription was 

 seen and read by both of these gentlemen, and was sent into Lakhnau in 

 Nacir-ud-din Haidar's time, but all attempts to trace it further have proved 

 abortive. ^ After this third period, the period of atheism, gleams of Brah- 

 manical light again began to appear in Ayodhya many centuries ago, and 

 with this circumstance is traditionally associated the name of Vikramaditya 



