Extended from 17°49’-22 ° 34’N Latitude and from 81° 29’E-87° 29’E longitude the state of Orissa has very beautiful topography and is well equipped with all sorts of natural sources. It started its political career with the rule of the Nanda dynasty of Magadha and enjoyed the prosperous regime of the king Kharavela. After the downfall of Kharavela different dynasties ruled over the territory up to the end of twelfth century A.D. All these dynasties tried to bring more and more land under cultivation by giving grants of lands and villages to Brahmanas and religious institutions. They also grouped these villages into different units for their proper administration. Many scholars have studied these place names for tracing the historical geography of the region but these names have rarely been taken into account for tracing the cultural history of region. Present volume presents the culture of Orissa as gleaned from place names mentioned in the inscriptions of the different dynasties and gives much emphasis on the meaning of the place names. The data obtained is corroborated and supplemented wherever possible and necessary with the evidence obtained from other sources (archaeological, literary, sculptural and epigraphical) and has been arranged under different heads such as topography, flora, fauna, settlements, administrative geography under different dynasties, society, economic conditions, religion etc. Hopefully, it would prove as an important source for the study of the cultural progress of the region and found interesting and thought provoking by discerning scholars.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Malati Mahajan
Dr. Malati Mahajan who retired as lecturer from the Post Graduate Teaching Department of Ancient Indian History, Culture and Archaeology of Nagpur University, Nagpur is the student of the same department. She passed her M.A. examination in first division and was awarded Motilal Nehru centenary prize for standing first in order of merit. She was the recipient of the U.G.C. fellowship while working for her Ph.D. thesis under the guidance of Dr. S.B. Deo. After Ph.D. she worked as research assistant with Dr. S.B. Deo and completed the work of translation of the "Topographical List of Inscriptions found in Maharashtra and Goa". Again I the same capacity she worked with Dr. Ajay Mitra Shastri and completed the Project "Dictionary of Place names from Inscriptions found in Maharashtra and Goa". She has participated in some all India conferences of Place Name Society of India and presented good number of research papers on different aspects of Cultural and Historical Geography of ancient Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh which have been widely appreciated. She was elected as General President of the Thirteenth All India Annual Conference of Place Name Society held at Udupi (Karnataka) in April, 1992. She is the author of books, Development of Material Culture in India (Based on Archaeological evidence corroborated and supplemented with evidence from other sources); Cultural history of Maharashtra and Goa from Place Names in Inscriptions found in Maharashtra and Goa; Madhya Pradesh-Cultural and Historical Geography from Place Names in Inscription and Chhattisgarh- A Geography from Place Names in Inscriptions.
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