152 
ANCIENT GEOGRAPHY OF KAS'MlR. [Extra No. 2, 
Bridges of old Srl- 
nagara. 
# Nadavata. 1 The termination vat a ‘ garden,’ frequent in Kasmir local 
names, may safely he taken as the equivalent of vana in Kalhana’s form 
of the name. 
98. Before we continue our survey further up the river, it will be 
useful to make a brief reference to the bridges 
which connect the two river-banks within the 
city. S'rinagar lias now seven bridges across 
the Vitasta. Their number has remained unchanged for at least five 
hundred years. 
Already Sliarifu-d-din had heard that of the thirty boat-bridges 
constructed across the great river of Kasmir, there were seven in the town 
of S'rinagar. The boats were bound together by chains, and through the 
bridges a way could be opened for the river traffic. 2 Sharifu-d-din’s 
notice is of interest because it shows clearly that down to the end of the 
Hindu period permanent bridges across the Vitasta where unknown in 
Kasmir. 
I had been led to the same conclusion by an examination of the 
Rajataranginl passages bearing on the subject. 3 Kalhana distinctly 
says of the two bridges the construction of which he specially records, 
that they were built with boats. Elsewhere this inference may be 
drawn from the rapidity with which the bridges are broken at the 
approach of the enemy or in danger of fire. 4 * 
The first bridge of this kind is ascribed by Kalhana to Pravara- 
sena II. who built the ‘ Great Bridge ’ {Brhatsetu) 
in his new capital. “ Only since then is such 
construction of boat-bridges known.” 6 This ‘ Great Bridge ’ is 
subsequently mentioned in connection with a great conflagration 
which destroyed the city in the time of Sussala (a.d. 1123). This 
fire arose at the southern end of S'rinagar, and Kalhana mentions 
that the smoke first rising from Maksikasvamin: May^sumliad scarcely 
been noticed from the ‘ Brhatsetu ’ when the fire was already spreading 
over the whole city. 6 Kalhana evidently refers to the 1 Great Bridge ’ 
as a comparatively distant point from Maksikasvamin. Considering 
that the river forms an almost straight reach from this locality to the 
present Fourth Bridge, it appears to me likely that Pravarasena’s bridge 
was somewhere in the vicinity of the latter. The position is in the 
Brhatsetu. 
1 Compare Rajat. iii. 11 note. 
2 See Tdrtkh-i-Rashldt f p. 431. 
s See note iii. 354. 
* See Rajat. vii. 909, 1539 ; viii. 1182 ; S'riv. i. 308, 720; ii. 70, 122. 
6 Rajat. iii. 354. 
6 Compare Rajat. viii. 1171-72 note. 
