Page:Gazetteer of the province of Oudh ... (IA cu31924073057345).pdf/221

 KHE 213 then Turanian, The Cháwars colonized Kheri under the name of Alban ; their chief towns were Maholi, Bhúrwára, and Kotwára, not a pur amongst their foundations. Similarly a Chauhan colony, the Jángres, established tle towns of Bhíra and Dhaurahra, another Chauhan branch, the Jan- wárs, founded the towns of Oel, Kaimahra.* In the pamphlet above referred to there occur a few points which may be cursorily referred to, Mr. Growse declares that the terminations oli, auli, auri, aura, aula,“ were in earlier times as common a local affix as puri in modern times," and must represent some term of equally general and equally familiar signification. He derives them all from pur. But he says notlıing about eli, cri, elo, era, which are, judging from the maps I possess, just as common in Mathura; while very many of the old towns in Oudh so end ; Sandíla, Bareli, Dhaurahra, Kheri are in. stances. Nor can it be alleged that this is the final ra of the genitive transmitted in various ways, for we find the affix itself separate, both in Mathura and Oudh, airo as the name for old villages, whose origin is unknown, and from which many others have been settled. If these terminations cannot be derived from the Sanskrit, and if Tura- nian tribes, which must have passed through Northern India from Upper Asia to the Dekkan, do use the precise word for town, which is found as an affix in innumerable Oudh towns, surely the conclusion is irresistible that the affix was thenco derived. And if we find the Turanian foundation of those ending eri admitted, then the argument is strengthened, if it requires any strengthening, for the Turavian origin of those ending in wará, ui, &c., which are equally common, and belong to the same age; these terminations being the equivalents for town among other and neighbouring Turanian races which have it is known colonized India. If we admit that one Turanian race founded towns and applied its own nomenclature, why should not others who had similar opportunities not have left simi- lar traces. The obvious conclusion from all the facts as known is that the Arian race in India formed originally but a small portion of the population. It was a nation of warriors not of town builders. For many generations their progress was slow, during which time the Turanians occupied all the best sites and built all the old towns, worshipping Vithoba, Bhawáni, and the other Aboriginal deities, naming their towns from their own language. None of the sacred towns in India end in the Sanskrit affixes not Gya, or Benares, Ajodhya, Prág, Cuttack, Hardwar, Bithur, Gola, Ellora: none of the great capitals of former times Chittore, Ajmere, Dewal, Alors, Kanauj, Mahoba, Anhalwára, Amber, Gradually the Sanskrit language, the caste system, Hinduism in fact extended their influence and were adopted by all; then Chittore gare place to Udaipur, Amber to Jaipur, Márwár to Jodhpur. It is not that names ending in pur have gradually by eliding all the consonants and changing all the vowels come to eri, eli, and of but towns bearing these names always bore them and when there has been any change, it is just 28
 * Vide Ferguson's History of Architecture, Vol. II., Tudia Rajasthan, Vol. I., the l'reface,