28 
ANCIENT GEOGRAPHY OF KAS'MIR. [Extra No. 2, 
modern Rajauri. In Hindu times it was the capital of a small hill-state 
situated immediately to the south of the Pir Pants al range arid often 
tributary to Kasmir. AlberunI distinctly names it as the farthest place 
to which Muhammadan merchants of his time traded and beyond which 
they never passed. We have already seen what the connection was 
which enabled him to collect reliable and detailed information of the 
region beyond that barrier. As another proof of the accurate know¬ 
ledge thus acquired, we may finally mention his description of the 
Kasmir climate which is far more exact than any account available to 
us previous to the second quarter of this century. 1 
Section IV.— Indian notices. 
Deficiency of non- 
Kasmlrian texts. 
15. Nothing, perhaps, can illustrate better the lamentable lack of 
exact geographical information in general 
Sanskrit literature than to turn from the 
accounts of the Chinese pilgrims and AlberunI 
to what Indian authors, not Kasmlrians themselves, can tell us of the 
Valley. 
Were we to judge merely from the extreme scantiness of the data 
to be gleaned from their extant works, we might easily be led to assume 
that Kasmir was to them a country foreign and remote in every way. 
However, we observe the same vagueuess and insufficiency of local 
references in the case of territories immediately adjoining the old 
centres of literary activity. It is hence evident that the conspicuous 
absence of useful information on Kasmir may equally well be attributed 
to the general character of that literature. 
The name Kasmira , with its derivative Kasmira , as the designation 
of the country and its inhabitants, respectively, is found already in the 
Ganas to Panini’s grammar and in Patanjali’s comments thereon. 3 The 
Mahabharata too refers in several passages to the Kasmiras and their 
rulers, but in a fashion so general and vague that nothing more but 
the situation of the country in the hill region to the north can be 
concluded therefrom. 3 
The Puranas enumerate the Kasmiras accordingly in their lists of 
northern nations. But none of the tribal names, partly semi-mythical, 
1 See India, i. p. 211, and below, § 77. 
2 See the references in the Thesaurus of Bohtlingk-Roth, s. v. Kasmira, and in 
supplement V,, p. 1273. The references to other texts in this paragraph have also 
been taken from that work except where otherwise specified. 
3 Compare in particular Mahdbh. II. xxvii. 17. 
