143 
1902.] S. C. Vidyabhusana —Licchavi race of ancient India. 
'Society. They were however even then regarded as a respectable 
people. In the Jataka 1 of the Sutta-pitaka, which is a most ancient Pali 
canonical work of the Buddhists, we read of a barber’s son, who desired 
to marry a Licchavi girl, but was severely reproached by his father for 
setting his mind on such forbidden fruit as a high-born lady of the 
Licchavis. - ; 
Sahang Setsen, in his history of the Eastern Mongols, says that the 
S'akya race was divided into three sections, viz., S'akya the great, S'akya 
the Licchavi, and S'akya the mountaineer. Alexander Csoma de Koros 
has recorded the same triple division of the S'akya race from Tibetan 
sources, and has said that S'akya is identical with Scythian. The Lic¬ 
chavis must on this supposition be regarded as a branch of the Scythian 
race. • • 
Samuel Beal 2 observes that the scene found at Sanchi (in the Bhupal 
State) probably refers to the Stupa raised by the Licchavis over their 
share of the relics of Buddha. The appearance of the men shows they 
were a northern race; their hair and flowing hair-bands and musical in¬ 
struments agree, according to Beal, with the account given of the people 
of Ku-che. It is stated both in the Pali and Northern Buddhist books 
that the Licchavis were distinguished for their bright-coloured and 
variegated dresses and equipages. All the evidence seems, in the opinion 
of Beal, to point to these people being a branch of the Yue-chi. 
I am inclined to believe that the Licchavis came into India imme¬ 
diately from Nisibis, which was, according to Ptolemy, one of the most 
notable towns of Aria (near modern Herat). In the Manusaiphita, the 
Licchavis are called Nicchibis which, in my opinion, correspond exactly 
to the Nisibis 3 of Ptolemy. The northern parts of Aria were, according 
to him, possessed by a people called Nisaioi or Nisibi. I further sup¬ 
pose that the same race has been called by Arrian as Nysaioi. Arrian 4 
observes that the Nysaioi were not an Indian race but descendants of 
those who came into India with Dionysos. The district in which he 
planted his colony he named Nysaia, after Mount Nysa, and the city 
itself Nysa. These stories about Dionysos are of course but fictions of 
the poets. Nysa the so-called birth-place of the wine-god has, however, 
been identified by M. de St. Martin with the existing village called 
Nysatta on the northern bank of the rivers of Kabul. Wilson identifies 
it with, Nissa north of Elburz mountains, between Asterabad and Meshd. 
1 Sigala Jataka of the Pali Jataka, edited by Dr. Fausboll, Yol. If. 
2 Beal’s Buddhistic Records, Yol. II, p. 67. 
8 McCrindle’s Ptolemy, pp. 263, 267, 306, 308, 309, 324, 328. , 
4 McCrindle’s Ancient India as described by Megasthenes and Arrian, 
pp. 178-79. - ; 0 ' 
