146 Memorandum on the Ancient bed of [No. 158. 



the different mohullas, or divisions of the old Hindoo city, which 

 have been preserved under altered designations to the present day. 



The Grom Deota, or tutelary divinity, is now Putnee Devee, to 

 whom a small temple is dedicated, and to whom worship is still offer- 

 ed. Buchanan remarks, (p. 42, vol. I.) " The Goddess is said to have 

 been placed in her present situation by Patali, daughter of Raja 

 Sudarson, who bestowed the town now called Patna on his daughter, 

 and she cherished the city like a mother, on which account it was 

 called Patali-putra, or the son of Patali." According to the Brihud- 

 kutha, Putnee was the daughter of Patlee or Patali, but other tradi- 

 tions preserved in the Skunda Pooran, derive the name of Patna from 

 a Sunscrit word meaning " a cloth," the goddess Parbuttee, the wife 

 of Siva, having dropt her mantle on the spot during her flight to 

 Kylas. In the " Pali Buddhistical annals" of Ceylon, translated by the 

 Honorable G. Tumour, (p. 998 vol. vn. of Journal of Asiatic Soci- 

 ety) Patali is mentioned as having been a mere village in the time of 

 Buddho, (i. e. 541 B. C.) Buddho is said to have rested here on his 

 way to Benares from Rajgeer, the capital of the king of Magadha, 

 whose ministers were then employed in building a citadel for the pur- 

 pose of checking the inroads of the warlike tribe of Wajjions. Bud- 

 dho predicted, that the village of Patali was destined to become a great 

 city, and that it was destined to suffer under the calamity of fire, of 

 water, and of treachery. 



It is worthy of remark, that in the memoir of the Emperor Baber 

 no mention whatever is made of the city of Patna. The residence of 

 the Put'han rulers of this part of the country seems to have been at the 

 fort or town of Behar. Patna, therefore, must have ceased to be a 

 place of importance prior to the sixteenth century. It appears from the 

 Girnar* inscription, and also from the life of Shokya, extracted from 

 Tibetan authorities (p. 317, vol. XX. Asiatic Researches) that Asoka, 

 the grandson of Chundragupta, continued to reside at Patalipootra, 

 but after the extinction of the Maurya dynasty, the capital of the 

 Gangaridse, and of the Prachya (Prasii), seems to have been trans- 

 ferred to Canoge, which under the Gupta dynasty became a city of 

 great splendour and renown for many ages. This transfer of the seat 



* Asiatic Journal, Vol. vn. page 268. 



