1817.

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To the Editor of the Asiatic Journal.

SIR,-I perceive by an essay which I lately perused in one of the volumes of the Asiatic Researches, and also by an article in your last publication, that a question which I had long since considered as completely settled, namely, the situation of the Palibothra of the antients, is again revived and rendered a subject of further doubt and controversy. Having resided many years on the very spot which had till now, upon the authority of the late Sir William Jones, been considered the site of that celebrated city, it may perhaps be satisfactory to the learned and to the public to state what I know of the subject, and which I hope may have some weight in setting the question completely at rest. Not long after my arrival at Patna, in the year 1775, I became intimately acquainted with a Brahman of the name of Suboor Tewarry, who was universally considered the most learned Pundit in that part of India, and whose opinions, in all cases of difficulty in questions of Hindoo law, were received as oracles, and never disputed. This respectable man paid me a visit Asiatic Journal. — No. 26.

I

one day whilst I was in the act of
perusing Rennell's memoir to his
first map of India; this happened
sometime in the year 1777.
thought this afforded a favorable
opportunity of endeavouring to
ascertain if he could throw any
light upon a point of so much im-
portance, and I accordingly stated
the circumstance to him at length,
from that memoir. He told me
that no place under the name of
Palibothra was known to him, or
mentioned in any of their books
but that the present city of Patna,
formerly called Patalaputra, and,
as he pronounced it, Pataliputhra,
had once been the residence of a
dynasty of the supreme monarchs
of India, about the time mentioned
in our authorities. This very re-
markable coincidence of names
struck me so forcibly that I could
not but recognize this celebrated
city; yet one difficulty still remain-
ed to be cleared up before my mind
could be completely satisfied. Pali-
bothra of ancient authors is stated to
have been situated at the conflux of
a large river with the Ganges: the
city of Patna does not at present
answer that description; it does
not stand upon the conflux of two

VOL. V.

Р

[FEB rivers. It is true that the Fulgoo formation I had received, I viewunites its waters with the Ganges ed them with more minute attenat the town of Futwah, under the tion, and I found my learned name of the Futwah Nullah, a friend's declaration corroborated little to the east of Patna, and and confirmed at every step I took: Futwah itself may be considered the former course of that river as one of its suburbs; but this is could be distinctly traced in many not a large stream even in the places, and the inhabitants of the rainy season, and in the dry season country were unanimous in the is nearly a stagnant water, having traditionary history of the fact. I little or no current. My learned had traversed the whole surface in friend then acquainted me, that all directions, for a space of not though this was not the case at less than thirty miles, for many present, yet it was otherwise in years, and the reply to my quesformer times, for that the river tions wherever I went was invaSoane, which now flows into the riably the same. There is a small Ganges at Moneer, upwards of town in that part of the country twenty miles to the westward of called Decanpoor, which in EngPatna, formerly united its waters lish means a habitation upon a with that river at the present river. This place stands upon one Bankypoor Nullah; and he assured of those elevations I had remarked, me that it was not more than six I questioned the inhabitants how hundred years from the present they came to call their town by a time that it had deserted its former name so little adapted to its situabed and taken its present course: tion; the explanation was perfecthe also declared that both history ly satisfactory, for they all assertand tradition placed this remark- ed that the Soane had formerly able fact beyond all doubt. Here flowed directly below, and that the then we have a city coming up, hollow I saw, to which they pointboth in name and situation, to the ed, was its former bed. Every Palibothra of the antients, and, as traveller who has passed the city described by Pliny, standing at of Patna by water must have nothe conflux of a river of the third ticed the nature of the bank of order with the Ganges, for such is the river, which, from the suburb the Soane, which has its source in of Noongolah on the east, to the the same chain of mountains with further extremity of Bankypoor the Nerbuddah, pursuing an op- on the west, an extent of six or posite direction of several hundred seven miles, consists entirely of miles. That the Soane has changed an uniform mass of bricks, broken its course is further corroborated pottery, rubbish and ruins, from by other collateral circumstances, the margin of the water to the as I shall further briefly state, and surface on which the city now which I think places the fact be- stands, an elevation of more than yond all doubt. In the course of forty feet in many places. This those hunting excursions with circumstance proves it to have which we used to amuse ourselves been a place of great antiquity, in the cold season, in that part of and the present abrupt state of its the country to the west of Patna, banks likewise sufficiently proves which forms the angle between that it extended in former times a these rivers, I had frequently ob- considerable way into the present served numerous slight elevations, bed of the river, which still condepressions and occasional sandy tinues its encroachments, in detracts even at this day but thinly fiance of the various means made clothed with a stunted vegetation, use of by the inhabitants to counIn various parts of the plain form- teract the evil; and this will naing that angle; but after the in- turally account for the breadth of

the modern city bearing so little
proportion to its extreme length
from east to west, which I have
no doubt was otherwise in antient
times. Now, when all the above
circumstances come to be candidly
considered; namely, the testimony
of my learned friend, founded
upon history and tradition, of the
change of the course of the Soane;
the vestiges of the former bed of
that river still to be distinctly
traced in many parts of the sur-
face of the country, forming the
angle between both rivers; the
universal testimony of the inhabit
ants themselves of this remark
able circumstance; the nature of
the present bank of the Ganges,
consisting entirely of artificial ma-
terials for an extent of so many
miles, and the very striking simi-
larity of its antient name as
written and pronounced by the
learned natives themselves with
that of our authorities; I think
we cannot fail to recognize in the
Pataliputra of the Brahmans, the
farfamed Palibothra of the antients.
The late Sir William Jones has
the credit of having first made
this discovery, and I believe the
literary world has been disposed
to acquiesce in the authority of
that learned man; but it will be
seen that my attention was first
drawn to this interesting subject
several years before his arrival in
the country, from a perusal of the
memoir to Major Rennell's excel-
lent map of India, as I have al-
ready stated. I made no secret
of this; but, on the contrary, I
communicated the circumstance to
many of my most intimate friends
and I well recollect having done
to Mr. Thomas Law, the Weymouth, Dec. 13, 1817.

late Colonel Lewis Smith, and
subsequently to Mr., now Sir
George Barlow; all, long before
Sir William Jones's arrival; and
considering the importance of it
to the learned, that it should be
more generally known, I took an
early opportunity of writing an
account of it to Mr. James Harris,
a member of council under the
old government, with whom I was
in correspondence, brother-in-law
to Major Rennell, with a request
that he would make it known to
that gentleman, and it is very
possible I may yet have a copy
of that letter in my possession;
but of this I cannot speak po-
sitively, as I have long since des
troyed most of my India papers,
and my absence from town pre-
cludes an immediate reference:
however, upon my return to Eng-
land, I found, upon inquiry of
Major Rennell, the communication
had not been made to that gentle-
man. I have no wish to wrest
from Sir William Jones the credit
of this discovery; the world will
be more disposed to admit it upon
the authority of a name of such
celebrity, than upon any thing
that can be stated by so humble
and obscure an individual as my-
self. In point of fact it belongs to
neither of us, but to the learned
geoprapher exclusively, who first
suggested the idea. My sole ob-
ject is the establishment of truth,
and should you think the above
statement of circumstances has
that tendency, and deserving a
place in your miscellany, it is
much at
your service.

To the Editor of the Asiatic Journal.

SIN,-In endeavouring to trace up to their original sources the moral phenomena which the histories of various nations present, we

W. YOUNG.

cannot but be struck with the fact, that the most important changes, and circumstances the most intimately operative upon all the feelP 2