154 
Antiquities of Jajpur in Oris a . [No. 2, 
Jajpur. The palace stood on the site of the present sub-divisional 
buildings, and old inhabitants of the place still remember to 
have seen it standing; one of these, Qadir Shah, an octagenarian, 
supplied me with the following information :— 
“I remember when a boy at play how the British soldiers, 500 
gord and 2000 Icdld, under General Hawket and Mil-mil Bani (Com¬ 
mandant Mil man ?) came from the south, fought and took the 
Barobati Fort. I was sixteen years old then, and looked at the 
cannonade, which lasted about two hours, on the eastern gate, 
from a tree near Katak chancli. I remember also when this large 
Bdpi (well, opposite Jajpur catchari) was dug at the expense of Baja 
Bapuji. Bapuji was one of the Marhatta ’amildars. The house 
of Muhammad Taqi I saw. Its gates stood here. It would have 
stood up to this time, but for the vengeance which one of the 
Marhatta ’amildars took upon us. This was Gauranga Bai, a 
Bengali. He greatly oppressed us, ruined some of our mosques, 
and removed the stones from Taqi Khan’s palace, to build his own 
mansion and the temple of Gobindji at Bhog Madhava.” 
1 Bhog Madhava’ is one of the seven Sasanas , or royal grants, 
in Jajpur, and within a mile of the town. The temple of Gobind¬ 
ji is standing still within the compound known as 1 Gaurang 
Deori.’ Two stone buildings of the old solid style, a stone gate 
with a pointed arch, a small tank within, enclosed with thick per¬ 
pendicular layers of stone, are all that now remain of the buildings 
of Gauranga. There is also a classic Tamala tree standing in the 
middle of the compound. 
Jajpur also ranks high as one of the four holy places of pilgrimage 
in Orisa. It would be out of place to reproduce the elaborate account 
which the Kshetra Purana gives of the gods and goddesses. Its 
sanctity is derived from the circumstance, that at the great sacrifice 
of ‘ Dasasvamedha’ (ten horses), the great mother (the creative 
energy of god) assumed the holy form of Biraja at this place. The 
Baitarani,^ which flows by Jajpur and the identity of whose name 
with that of the river (the Indian Styx) which the dead are supposed 
* The Kshetra Purana mentions that the source of the Baitaranf lies in the 
Go-nashika (cow-nose) Hill in Keonjhar. The rock is so named from its re¬ 
semblance to the nose of a cow from which the water flows down. 
