A very current opinion, entertained and supported by several respectable writers, makes the modern Patna to be the site of the ancient city. Thus Dr. A. Adams[77] says:—"Patna, the capital of Bahar, built along the south bank of the Ganges, an extensive and populous city, supposed to be the ancient Palibothra." Heeren[78] also says: "Palibothra must be sought in, or near the modern town of Patna, where its ancient appellation still survives in the name of a certain district called Patalputhra." Major Rennel also in some places affirms his opinion to be decidedly in favour of Patna, and in others speaks doubtingly to the same purpose,—"S'il est vrai que Palibothra ait été située où est aujourd'hui Patna, et les dernières découvertes rendent cette opinion probable."
Now Patna is situated near the confluence of the Sonus with the Ganges, in a very favourable position for a city of importance: and it appears to be pretty certain that it is the site of a very ancient city, but not that of the city of Palibothra. We must recollect that there is an Upper and Lower Ganges, the latter of which would be below Patna. Now, though the ancient kingdom of Maghada included Patna, it is not probable that there was a capital so low down. Heeren declares that the empire of the Prasii extended beyond the junction of the Jumna with the Ganges, and we may infer from this that the said junction was not much short of the limits of the empire. And, speaking of particular towns, he names Ayodhya, Kanoge, and others. Also mentioning Pataliputra (Patna) the same author says: "The scene of these fables (Hitopadesah, or Pilpay) is laid in the city of Pataliputra, by no means the most ancient in India."
Arrian tells us that Palibothra was in the confines of the Prasii. But Pataliputra was the capital of King Chundragupta, who reigned long before the kingdom of the Prasii was established. Heeren[79] says: "Compare the accounts of Chundragupta given by Wilford in the 'Asiatic Review, vol. v. p. 264.'" In the list of kings arranged by Sir William Jones[80] the reign of Nauda is placed in 1602, and of Chundragupta in 1502 B.C.; the latter, therefore, must have lived 1200 years before Sandrocottus. Will any one pretend that there was another Chundragupta?
Arrian tells us simply that the city of Palibothra is in the confines of the Prasii: he does not say that it had been thus distinguished as the capital of Chundragupta, which he would no doubt have done if the fact had been so, and the very antiquity of Chundragupta destroys the possibility of his capital being Palibothra, which was built so many years after. We conclude, therefore, that Patna, as is generally allowed, is the site of the ancient Pataliputra, the capital of Chundragupta; and that it is not the same as Palibothra, but a much more ancient city.
It has been stated by some, that Pataliputra and Palibothra are one and the same place, and that the latter name is simply a corruption of the former. But Buchanan well remarks on this subject,[81] "This city (Patna) is indeed allowed by the Pundits to be called Pataliputra; but Pataliputra has no great resemblance to Palibothra; nor can Patali be rationally considered as a word of the same origin as Pali, said to be an ancient name of this country, and of its people and language." There is no doubt that the use of the word Pali, in this connection, is derived from the Pali language of the Buddhists, who have a temple at Gya.
And further, as to the derivation of this name, we read that a Brahmin, having married Bhoom Deo (the earth-god), had two sons, one of whom, Bukshun, married Soormut, and had a son called Pootur (or son), who married Patlee, the daughter of the king of the Singhaldees. In the case of Hindoos, the men do not take their fathers' names. Supposing that these joined their names, we have Pootur-patlee, which will not answer, because the young man calls himself Patlee-pootur, taking the wife's name, which is contrary to Hindoo usage. The story states further, that Patlee-pootur planted his staff, and a beautiful city sprang out of the ground, which in honour of his wife he called Patleepoora, or Patleepooturpoora, a name truly royal in its length! The pair died, leaving a son called Puttum, and a daughter named Putnie, from whom the modern name Patna is said to have been derived. In the absence of more definite evidence we may rest a strong presumption on these traditions, and whatever part of them we may accept or reject, they certainly contain some amount of historical evidence to prove that Pataliputra must not be confounded with Palibothra.
In the eleventh century a play is supposed to have been written, the Mudra Rakshasha, the principal scenes in which are laid at Pataliputra, the capital of Chundragupta. Buchanan[82] says, that other traditions preserved in the Skund Poorana derive the name of Patna from the Sanscrit word meaning a cloth; from the circumstance of the goddess Parbuttee having dropt her mantle on the spot, in her flight to Kylas (the sky).
So much with respect to the derivation of the names Patna and Pataliputra. From what has been stated, it may be clearly seen that Palibothra cannot be a corruption or modification of Pataliputra, and that the modern name of Patna is traceable to a very remote period.
To proceed with the proof that Patna is not the ancient Palibothra:—An opinion has been expressed by one who appears to be a competent judge, Mr. E.C. Ravenshaw,[83] that the distance from Patna at which the Sone now runs into the Ganges is so great that it cannot be said to be at the point of confluence, and therefore does not answer to Arrian's description as before quoted.
But a better argument is this,—that the river Sone has no particular sanctity attached to it by the Hindoos; it does not convey sacred water to the district of Patna, such as is supposed to flow in the Ganges, and many other Indian rivers. We know that the most sacred streams issue from the Himalaya mountains, the region of the gods and of Brahma. The Ganges, the Indus, the Jumna, the Gograh, the Coosah, the Gundruk, and others, come from that holy source; but the Sone and the Nerbudda rise in the table-land of Omerkuntuc in Gundwana,—in lat. 22°, 35´ N.; long. 82°, 15´ E.[84] Now it is very certain that the Sone, lacking this sacred character, could not have been reckoned as the third river in India; superior to many streams which take their rise from the Himalaya, and inferior only to the Ganges and the Indus, both of which are regarded with the deepest reverence.