Page:The Indian Antiquary Vol 2.djvu/102

 88 THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY. [March, 1873. out. Figure 30 is much harder, and looks more like steel than anything I have yet found. Professor J. Oldham, ll.d., when President of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, delivered, in Septem¬ ber 1869, a most interesting lecture on the results of my excavation on the Muribetta bill in North Kurg, and compared the cromlechs of Kurg with the Pandu kolis in Malabar. From the descrip¬ tion given in his suggestive notes on the subject, it would appear that the Pandu kolis of Malabar are chambers purposely excavated in the rock below the surface, generally in the laterite, which abounds in that district, and are merely covered with a mushroom-shaped rock. The cromlechs of Kurg and Maisur, however, are not excavations, but actual structures, consisting of a large flagstone of granite at the bottom, with four similar slabs (all hewn and made to fit) forming a stone- cist, the superincumbent stone being a large unhewn block of granite. This block is gene¬ rally found in the centre of the circle of stones, with the top just visible above the surface, or about a foot below it. The stones forming the circles are buried from 1 to 3 feet below the surface, and project above from 1 to 2 feet. In a few of the circles I have come across, no stone-cists or chambers have been found, though I have dug down to a depth of 8 feet; but remnants of vessels have been found, apparently buried without the usual stone receptacle for them. The circles on the Muribetta hill were of this description, and the miniature vessels were found buried, as far as I remember, at the foot of a large stone opposite the entrance, and the two up¬ right slabs arched above, alluded to by Dr. Old¬ ham, were apparently the entrance to the enclosure formed by the circles of stones, and not to any chamber. On that occasion was discovered the only metallic object yet found, consisting of a peculiar shaped disc of copper, covered with a thin plate of gold. I may here remark that the same traditions existed amongst the people here as in Kurg. Some declared that these structures had formed the resi¬ dence of the pigmy race known as Pundarus ; whilst others asserted that they had been the tombs of the PAndavas, whose exile and wars with the Kauravas are so graphically described in the great Hindu epic poem of the Mahabharata. The Kurgs lay claim to their country having been the original “ Matsyades'a,” or M r&j of VirAt,” and point out a site near the tombs of the rajAs of Kurg at Merkara as that of the palace of Virata Raj A, in whose capital the PAndavas took refuge in the thirteenth year of their exile, as narrat¬ ed in the Mahabharata. I have heard the expres¬ sion in Maisur of the Kurgs being imbued with “ the essence (or spirit) of the PAndus.” I am aware that the districts of DinAjpura in Bengal and Gujarat in Bombay both claim the same distinction, the modern town of Dholka in the latter being de¬ clared to be on the site of Matsya Nagara or Virata- pura ; but it is a strange coincidence that the raj As of Kurg have borne, even up to the time of our conquest of the province, the name of Vira Raja. It is impossi¬ ble, however, to fix the exact geographical positions of many of the localities depicted in those ancient poems, which have doubtless received embellish¬ ments at the hands of their Brahjnanical compilers. In each country and in each dynasty it became of importance to trace some connection with the incidents narrated in their great poem ; and I may mention that the village of KaivAra in the Sidala- ghatta tAluk of the KolAr district, is here said to have been the site of the town of Yekachekra, in the vicinity of which Blnina is said in the poem to have had his mortal combat with the A sura Baka ; and local tradition asserts that the adjoining hill of KaivAra, or RhaimAngarh, as it is styled by the Mu¬ hammadans, was thrown on the top of the giant, and that his blood oozes out to this day. It is a remark¬ able fact that a reddish, bituminous matter oozes out from a fissure near the top of the hill, and flows down the side of the rock for a few days in each year,—I believe in February. Local tradition ascribes the name of Hidimba, the man-eating A'sura, to the giant buried below the hill ; but this episode in the life of Blnina occurred before the five brothers went to the city of YGkachekra, which Mr. Wheeler has shewn, in his great work on the Maha¬ bharata, to have been the modern city of Arrah in Bengal. I trust that these remarks may not be coa- sidered out of place, but they are offered in the same spirit as led the poet Warton to remark on our own great Druidical remains of Stonehenge— Studious to trace thy wondrous origin, We muse on many no ancient tale renowned. Bowringpete, 18fA July 1871. Rob. Cole. THE ASIATIC SOCIETIES. Journal cf the Asiatic Society of Bengal, No. 180—1872. The first paper in this part is on the ‘ Buddhist Remains of BihAr’ by A. M. Broadley, and may be regarded as an amplification and continuation of his papers in vol. I. of this journal, with lengthy ex¬ tracts from Julien’s Hiwen Thsang, Beal’s Fah- Hian, Bigandet’s Gaudama, &c. The second paper is on * the Tfrthas of Vrin- dAvana and Gokula' by F. S. Growse, M. A.— and may also be regarded as a companion paper to those by the same author which appeared in the Indian Antiquary last year. Of VrindAvana he writes,— “ At the present time there are within the limits of the municipality about a thousand temples, in¬ cluding of course many which, strictly speaking,* are merely private chapels, and fifty ghAts constructed