2S5 
1872.] A. M. Broadley — The Buddhistic Remains of Bihar. 
piles at the foot of the precipice. Seen in the glare of the midday sun the 
Bihar hill would fail to impress the traveller, but when the shades of 
evening fall upon it, and darkness begins to gather around its caves and 
rocks, it would be difficult to describe its beauty. Before leaving the 
solitary hill, or speaking of its ruins, we must again seek for aid in the 
pages of Fah-Hiyan. I follow the -text of Mr. Beal’s translation, page 110, 
chapter 28. “ From this city [Patna] proceeding in a south-easterly direc- 
tion nine yojanas, we arrive at a small rocky hill standing by itself, on the 
top of which is a stone cell facing the south. On the occasion, when Buddha 
was' sitting in the middle of this cell, the divine Sekra took with him his 
attendant musicians, each one provided with a five-stringed lute, and caused 
them to sound a strain in the place where Buddha was seated. Then the 
divine Sekra proposed forty-two questions to Buddha, writing each one of 
them singly with his finger upon a stone. The traces of these questions yet 
exist. There is also a Sanghanima built upon this spot. Going south-west 
from this one yojana we arrive at the village of Na-lo.” 
Tlds hill is identified by General Cunningham with Giryak. “ The re- 
mains of Giryak,” he writes, “ appear to me to correspond exactly with the 
accounts given by Fah-Hiyan of the Hill of the Isolated liock.” His reasons 
are twofold, 1st, the position, and 2nd, the supposed etymology of Giryak, i. e., 
giri-eka = ek giri. I have already given several reasons for my differing with 
General Cunningham as to this identification, and I now proceed to adduce 
others. 
Firstly, at Giryak there is no solitary hill at all, nor any hill which 
can be described as resembling in any way an eminence of that descrip- 
tion. At Giryak terminates the rocky range of the Bajgir hills, which 
stretch from the neighbourhood of Gaya to the banks of the Panchana, on 
which the village of Giryak stands, and, as a matter of fact, the hill which 
rises above the village — so far from being solitary — is a mere offshoot of 
Vipulagir at llajgir, and is not less than six miles in length. 
Secondly, from the “ solitary hill” Fah-Hiyan proceeded south-west, 
one yojana, to Nala. Now Nala has been identified most satisfactorily with 
Bargaon* by position and by the aid of inscriptions, but strange to say, 
Bargaon is exactly six miles north-west of Giryak. If General Cun- 
ningham’s identification of Giryak be right, Nfilanda must have been 
situated somewhere to the south of the Bajagriha hills, in the middle of 
the Nowada valley, but he identifies it with Bargaon which is exactly 
north-west of the Bajagriha hills, in the centre of the Bihar valley. For 
this reason it is clear that “ the hill of the solitary rock” could not be Gir- 
yak. The two identifications involve a dilemma, because no amount of 
argument can make Bargaon six miles south-west of Giryak, when actually 
* ‘Ancient Geography/ p. 469. 
