C. The city of Nicaea in Greece
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| According to the Mahabharata, Bāhlika was situated to the northwest of Gandhara. Courtesy: By World Imaging - Own work, Public Domain. Wikimedia Commons. |
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| Kiran or Koran wa Munjan is a remembrance of Munjavat, the name of the Hindukush Range in the Puranas. Swat and Kabul are later distortions of their ancient Vedic names, Suvastu and Kubha. Courtesy: Bing Maps |
Into this frozen frontier, the icy sources of the Sapta Sindhu in the Himalaya and its western extensions, the Hindukush and the Pamirs, came Indra, the thunder‑wielding god. With his weapon, the vajra, Indra struck down Vṛtra, shattering the serpent’s grip. In myth, this was the moment the rivers were freed; in memory, it echoes the great thaw around 10,000 years ago, when glaciers in the Himalaya and Hindukush released their imprisoned waters.
Indra broke their icy enclosures and redirected the waters, ensuring their flow across the land: streams rising in Tibet and Himachal, waters coursing through Punjab—Śutudrī (Sutlej), Vipāś (Beas), Paruṣṇī (Ravi), Asiknī (Chenab), and Vitastā (Jhelum)—and currents descending from Afghanistan’s valleys as well. Among them were Kubhā (the Kabul River), Gomatī (the Gomal), Krumu (the Kurram), Suvāstu (the Swat), and Kusava (the Kunar). These rivers, born in Afghanistan’s peaks, joined their sisters to the east in converging upon the Sindhu (Indus). Indra’s triumph thus mirrors a real transformation: the uncoiling of frozen rivers into living streams, binding the Sapta Sindhu into a sacred expanse.
As Indra broke the icy enclosures, cleared away the forces of obstruction, and redirected the waters into their courses, the sages—the ṛṣis—moved in through this vast corridor of rivers and mountains, weaving hymns that bound geography to sacred order. Indra’s epithet Dalmi (दल्मि), from the root dal (दल्), 'to destroy, to shatter', underscores this role as breaker of enclosures and obstructions. The earliest grammatical tradition preserves this name: the Uṇādi‑sūtras (iv. 47) derive Dalmi as an epithet of Indra, glossed by lexicographers such as Amarasiṃha in the Amarakośa, Halāyudha, and Hemacandra as a title of the god or his weapon, the thunderbolt.
Intriguingly, the phonetic echo of dal may resonate with the Mesopotamian toponym Dilmun, remembered in Sumerian myth as a land of purity and beginnings—beginnings of fertility, of flowing waters, of a world without sickness or death—and ancient cuneiform texts describe Dilmun as “a land in the east'. The most logical connection of these descriptions would be with the cities of the Indus Valley, that is, the Sapta Sindhu, the land of Indra. The name Dilmun, also rendered in Semitic writings as Telmun, especially points towards the Harappan civilisation on the rivers of the Sindhu, for it was the most ancient known land to produce and trade in cotton, and the Sanskrit word for cotton is also tuli (तूली). It is in the Sapta Sindhu that all of these meanings converge.
In this land of Indra, each name that was uttered was a thread in a larger tapestry, with the dharmic ideas stitched into the very land. To them, this western frontier of India was a living mandala of rivers, mountains, and tribes brought under the rhythm of ṛta. In Yaska's Nirukta, a book of etymology composed between the 7th and 5th centuries BCE and regarded as the earliest surviving commentary on the Vedas, ṛta is linked to the genesis of the word ārya—those who embody rta, walk in truth, whose 'way of life' embodies order and reverence. And in this westward movement of sages and hymns, one glimpses not an invasion from outside but a reverse current of Aryan memory flowing outward, carrying the sanctity of the Sapta Sindhu into the Afghan valleys and beyond.
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| The straight-line distance between Ayodhya and Herat is about 1650 km. and about 2200 km by land. |
This time, our course bends north‑westward from the Sapta Sindhu into the northern valleys and mountain passes of Pakistan and Afghanistan. At Attock, the Sindhu receives the eastward‑flowing Kubhā (Kabul), a meeting of frontier waters swollen by the Gilgit, Hunza, and Swāt rivers. Following the Kubhā upstream, we retrace the arteries to a land once called Gandhāra, where we encounter the cities of Takṣaśilā, Puṣkalāvatī, and Candrakānta, remembered in both the Rāmāyaṇa and the Mahābhārata.
In Kabul, the Asamayī temple reveals itself not merely as a local shrine but as a Śakti Pīṭha of Kubjikā. From Kabul, the road turns to Bāmiyān, where colossal Buddhas once stood, but where older memory also recalls Garuḍa‑sthāna—the “place of the high eagle”—echoing the Purāṇic passages in which Garuḍa journeys from Bāhlika to Gandhamādana and onward to Rāmanīyaka, via Herāt, remembered in the Purāṇas as Hiraṇmaya Varṣa.
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| These cities are all mentioned in one form or another in the Sanskrit scriptures. Courtesy: Bing@Bing Maps |
Takṣaśilā, the present‑day Taxila, was once ruled by Bharata’s son Takṣa, while Puṣkalāvatī (modern Charsadda) was governed by Puṣkala, his brother. Verses 100–101 of the Uttarakāṇḍa recount an even earlier era, when Bharata, brother of Śrī Rāma, conquered Gandhāra and defeated the Gandharvas. After his victories, he established his sons in Puṣkalāvatī and Takṣaśilā.
The present‑day city of Jalālābād, situated in the Nangarhār Province along the half‑moon bend of the Kubhā (Kabul) River, one may contend, was Candrakānta (चन्द्रकान्त), the city of Lakṣmaṇa’s son Candraketu (चन्द्रकेतु). In Section 103, verse 9 of the Uttarakāṇḍa, Vālmīki states: “And in the country of Mallaya (मल्लय) he reared a city for Candraketu, named Candrakānta, highly picturesque, like the city of celestials.”
In verse 103.11, the text adds that “Prince Candraketu went northward,” providing a directional clue that places his city on the northwestern frontier. Here, Vālmīki describes the direction of Candraketu’s city as mudaṅga‑mukham (मुदङ्गमुखम्), a compound which, in the tradition of Sanskrit lexicons and commentaries, is consistently glossed as "northward.” The word udaṅga (उदङ्ग) in the compound conveys the sense of “upraised” or “upward,” and by extension denotes the northern highlands, while mukham (मुखम्) means “face, front, or direction.” Together, these terms indicate orientation toward the north.
The Apte Sanskrit Dictionary also explicitly lists udaṅga as “north.” Vālmīki’s choice of the compound mudaṅga‑mukham is therefore deliberate: it encodes geography into the very language of the epic, situating Candraketu’s city not in the Vindhyan plateau or southern Mallaya, as later scholars have assumed based on name similarity, but in the northern frontier highlands.
When the epic explicitly places Candraketu’s movement toward the north, the identification of Mallaya with the Vindhyas or with the Western Ghats, in southern Mallaya, becomes untenable. Instead, the geography points us toward Jalālābād in Nangarhār, adjacent to Gandhāra, where the Kubhā (Kabul) River’s half‑moon bend embeds the city’s name into the landscape itself.
The Greek records also support this contention. One of the major tribes that Alexander’s army encountered near Jhelum was recorded under the name Malloi. Scholars have long noted that this ethnonym is a variation of Malava, designating a tribe living in the region. The resemblance of these names to the Mallaya of the Rāmāyaṇa is striking, and this is reinforced by the epic’s directional markers, which make clear that Candraketu’s city lay in the northern frontier highlands rather than the southern peninsula. The convergence of Sanskrit epic geography and Greek ethnography thus strengthens the identification of Candrakānta with Jalālābād on the bend of the Kubhā.
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| The city of Chandrakanta of the Ramayana was located on the half-moon bend on the River Kabul. Courtesy: Google Maps |
The name of Candraketu’s capital, Candrakānta, tells the rest of the story. The name Candrakānta, recorded in the Rāmāyaṇa, appears in the Vāyu Purāṇa under two other forms: Candravakra and Candracakra. All of these names subtly reveal the shape of the river path where the city is located. Candra (चन्द्र) “moon,” vakra (वक्र) “bend,” and cakra (चक्र) “circular” describe Kubhā’s half‑rounded bend, resembling a half‑moon, exactly where the city lies, thereby embedding the name into the geography of the land. The oldest Sanskrit names are almost always rooted in landscape. The city, of course, is the present‑day Jalālābād. Kānta (कान्त) means “beautiful” and links the picturesque Jalālābād to its description in the Rāmāyaṇa as “like a city of celestials.”
Not far from Jalālābād lies the province of Laghmān, a valley whose name evokes the figure of Lakṣmaṇa. Mainstream literature has attempted to tether its etymology to Lamech (Mether Lam Baba), the father of Noah, but that claim rests on fragile ground. Read alongside Takṣa’s Takṣaśilā and Candraketu’s Candrakānta, Lakṣmaṇa’s Laghmān discloses the Indic epic geography of eastern Afghanistan with unmistakable clarity.
This testimony does more than trace names—it restores a horizon that scholarship has too often allowed to fade. Gandhāra’s cities, when read through Rāmāyaṇic genealogies, are not incidental echoes but deliberate inscriptions of epic geography. To ignore them is to permit later overlays to erase the Indic memory of Afghanistan’s eastern lands. By foregrounding Lakṣmaṇa’s Laghmān alongside Takṣa’s Takṣaśilā and Candraketu’s Candrakānta, we recover a cartography already inscribed in the Rāmāyaṇa, long before Noahic or Islamic traditions layered new identities upon the same terrain. These epic anchors remind us that these valleys were never peripheral but integral to the Rāmāyaṇic world—and their recovery is indispensable to any honest reckoning of sacred geography.
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| Jalalabad, Charsadda and Taxila are the Chandraketu, Pushkalavati and Takshashila of the Ramayana. Courtesy: Google Maps |
These are the same cities through which ancient Chinese travellers passed, recording the place‑names prevalent in their time. Fa‑Hien, for instance, recorded the name of Nangarhār as Na‑kie. This is striking, for the Chinese Na‑kie is uncannily close to the Greek name Nicaea. The region was known in Fa‑Hien’s time as Nagar‑hāra; the /g/ appears to have shifted to /k/ in his transcription, turning Nagar into Na‑kie. Such phonetic transformations reveal how Indic names were refracted through Chinese and Greek lenses, yet still preserve the underlying geography.
The name first appears in the Nadī Sūkta hymn of the Ṛg Veda, where the Kubhā is invoked alongside rivers still flowing today—the Gomatī (गोमती), now Gomal; the Krumu (कृमु), or Kurram; and the Suvāstu (सुवास्तु), or Swāt, released by Indra—binding the valleys of Afghanistan and the plains of Pakistan into the sacred geography of the Vedic world. The hymn does not treat Kubhā as a marginal or seasonal stream, as it has become today, but as part of the great procession of waters that converged into the Sindhu, the Indus itself.
A. The Kubha and the Sanglakh Range
The Kubhā rises in the Saṅglakh Range of the Hindu Kush, at a place called Sar Čašma—literally “springhead.” Saṅglakh itself recalls the Sanskrit saṅgha (सङ्ग), “a gathering of waters,” for here snowy streams assemble before dividing into two great rivers. As the Kābul River descends from its Saṅglakh cradle, it gathers the waters of the Paghmān tributary at the valley’s fertile threshold. This confluence, at the foot of the Hindu Kush, is not merely hydrological but symbolic: a hinge between mountain origin, valley fertility, and civic settlement.
The very name Paghmān, glossed as “Valley of Poppy”—from Sanskrit Pulomahī (पुलोमही), appearing in Dari and Pashto as paghmān—encodes the valley’s abundance and its poppy‑dream resonance. Geography and etymology here entwine, shaping the corridor into Kābul as both a passage of waters and a passage of crimson.
B. The River Kubha and its Journey
To the east, the Kābul flows nearly 700 kilometres to join the Sindhu; to the southwest, the Helmand—rising too in the Saṅglakh Range—runs over 1,100 kilometres into the deserts of Sīstān, the ancient Śakāsthāna of the Mahābhārata, populated by the non‑Vedic Mleccha tribes. The sources of these two rivers lie only a few valleys apart, yet they carry Afghanistan into two sacred geographies: the Sapta Sindhu of the north and the Helmand basin of the south. In the name Sar Čašma, we hear an echo of Sarasvatī, her glory resonating across these lands, binding them into the sphere of Sindhu‑Sarasvatī influence.
In Arrian’s Anabasis Alexandri (The Campaigns of Alexander), dated to the 4th century BCE, the River Kābul is referred to as the Kōphēn, a variation of its original name. Xuánzàng (Hiuen Tsang), the Chinese pilgrim, called it Kaofu. Over the centuries, the old name Kubhā evolved into Kābul. Other variations, echoing the same meaning, emerged to designate both the river and the city along its banks.
C. Vaekreta and the Goddess Kubjika
The Zoroastrians called the city Vaēkreta, a term that echoes the Sanskrit word vikṛta (विकृत), which, like kubhā, also means 'distorted' or 'crooked'. Despite the changing names, the meaning remained constant: the river was remembered as curved, bent, serpentine. Why was there such emphasis on this imagery? Mountain rivers often twist and turn, yet here the designation became central to its identity, repeated across languages and centuries. The answer lies not in geography alone, but deeper in the sacred texts, where the Kubha is more than a river: it is a symbol, a goddess, a path of descent remembered in name and myth.
D. The Shrine of Kubjika
It was on the banks of the Kubhā River, in the settlement that bore its name, less than a mile from where the Paghmān stream pours itself into the Kābul, that the temple of Kubjikā first arose. The valley itself was a cradle of confluences—mountain waters rushing down to meet the great river, their junction lying today just west of the Asamayī hillock. One can almost imagine that in earlier ages, before the Kābul’s course shifted, the two rivers clasped hands right at the foot of that sacred rise, enfolding the shrine in their embrace.
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| Perhaps once the Paghman and Kabul rivers together touched the hillock’s feet. Today they flow some metres away, while the goddess’s temple now stands at its base. |
Local lore speaks of the temple as more than four, or even five, millennia old. At first hearing, this may sound like a legend. Yet the land itself offers its own witness—in the way the rivers now flow some distance away, as if retreating from a hillock they once embraced. One can almost imagine their ancient confluence at the temple’s feet, a meeting of waters whose mingled currents once sang against the stones, making this hillock the natural place for a shrine to be consecrated. The waters are joined even now, but only as a trickle—no longer seen as they were once looked upon, their song diminished, their meaning obscured. And yet, in that faint murmur—kept alive by the devotees who remain in Kabul—the goddess’s presence lingers, a fragile whisper there that gathers strength and rises into a chorus in the lives of those beyond boundaries.
E. Traces of a Goddess Tradition in Afghanistan
The Asamayi temple did not stand in isolation. Excavations across Afghanistan reveal that its river valleys were thriving centres of Bronze Age civilisation, dated to 3300–1200 BCE. Between the Kabul and Helmand rivers, valleys still hold the ruins of fortresses from many Bronze Age settlements. At Mundigak, near Kandahar, archaeologists have uncovered a large urban settlement dating back to 3300–2500 BCE. Irrigation channels still whisper of flowing water, an organised rhythm of agriculture. On Mound G rose a monumental temple, signalling cultural sophistication, while a clay artefact identified as a 'Mother-Goddess' hints at ritual devotion. These sites were not scattered curiosities but part of a wider cultural tapestry, stitched together by names that still carry Sanskritic cadence, echoes of Sapta Sindhu and the sacred lexicon that bound Afghanistan’s valleys into the dharmic expanse.
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| Baked Clay artefacts excavated from Mundigak (left) and Deh Morasi Ghundai (right), Kandahar province, dated to 3000-2500 BCE, have been identified as Mother Goddesses or Devis by scholars. Excavated by DAFA, 1951–58. Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons. |
Mundigak, situated in the Khushk‑e Nakhud Valley of the Helmand River, has been described as 'a diamond in the desert,' an oasis in a barren upland plain. Its valley name, Khushk‑e Nakhud, comes from Dari and Pashto: 'khushk', itself rooted in Sanskrit śuṣka (शुष्क), 'dry, barren, arid'. Nearby, the town of Sangesar, along the Argandab River corridor, preserves its Indic resonance: saṅga (सङ्ग), 'a collection of streams', and sara (सर), 'spring, pond, lake'. The district name Zheray, also called Geresk, echoes Sanskrit jhara (झर), 'stream', recalling a time when water coursed through this landscape. Farther afield, Sangin, where the Musa Qala rivulet joins the Helmand, carries the same cadence, 'Qala' corresponding to Sanskrit kulya (कुल्या), 'rivulet'. From the Indic point of view, all confluences are sangama, hence the name Sangin.
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| Sangin is the sangama of the Musa Qula and the Helmand River. |
Arghandab too carries Indic resonance. Its cadence recalls Sanskrit argala (अर्गल), 'obstruction, bolt', a reference to the rugged terrain that hems in and slows its waters. Or it may echo argha (अर्घ), the ritual offering of water sprinkled at the feet of deities, a gesture alive in Puranic and Tantric texts. In either case, the name brings into relief how the land was imagined as sacred, its rivers not merely physical channels but offerings woven into cultural memory. The Arghandab falls into the Helmand at a place once called Bost, now Lashkargah. Historically, trade crossroads were named based on the Sanskrit word vasra (वस्र), meaning crossroads. Cities like Basra in Iraq and possibly Bost share this etymology. In old names, the sound /v/ often changes to /b/.
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The land around the Mundigak Valley. The artefact of the Mother Goddess was found It still abounds in Sanskrit place names. Courtesy: Bing maps |
The name Morasi may thus echo Meru, the cosmic mountain of Indic tradition. Variants of the name Meru appear across the ancient world, from Merupi in Indonesia to Gire Mirezan, the Kurdish name for Göbekli Tepe in Turkey. While this term appears in the names of mountains and massive temples worldwide, in Afghanistan, the word Meru seems to appear in the names of smaller mounds as well, as we will discover a little ahead.
Against this backdrop, the presence of goddess figurines at Deh Morasi Ghundai and Mundigak is unsurprising. These sites do not merely show external influence; they reveal that advanced Indic concepts—such as the śakti pīṭha tradition in Kabul and the cosmological mountain Meru echoed in names like Morasi—were already widespread. The sacred association of mounds with the feminine divine thus reflects a deeply rooted Indic worldview that extended across Afghanistan’s ritual landscape.
Later centuries carried this goddess tradition forward. At Tepe Sardar near Ghazni, Italian excavators uncovered a colossal clay image of Durga Mahisasura-mardini, the warrior goddess triumphing over the buffalo demon. Her preserved head, now in Kabul’s National Museum, and the demon’s decapitated body found in Chapel 23 of the excavated temple, testify that female divinities were revered in Afghanistan. This continuity—from Bronze Age mother figurines to the monumental Durga of Ghazni—shows how the feminine divine remained a vital presence across Afghanistan’s sacred landscapes.
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| The clay head of the Mother Goddess Durga was found at Tepe Sardar, Ghazni Photo Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons |
F. Kabul and Kashmir Shaktism
The Kabul temple of the Goddess Kubjika was never an isolated marvel. It stood within a wider Bronze Age and early medieval corridor of shrines, fortresses, and settlements—its rivers, mounds, and names all resonating with Indic tradition. From the hydrological memory encoded in Sanskritic toponyms to the goddess figurines of Mundigak and Morasi, and finally to the colossal Durga at Ghazni, Afghanistan’s sacred geography reveals a continuum of Indic cultural presence, woven into the land itself.
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| From Srinagar to Kabul through the The distance between Khyber Pass and the capital is 700 km. Map Courtesy: Google Maps |
The Tantras did not arise in a vacuum; they crystallised currents of goddess worship and ritual practice that had flowed since the Vedic age, giving textual form to what had long been alive in oral and ritual memory. States Alexis Sanderson, in his book, The Śaiva Exegesis of Kashmir (2007), "The Kubjikā Tantras, though preserved in Kashmir, are representative of a wider network of goddess cults whose ritual idiom is inseparable from the Vedic heritage.”
And so, sometime in antiquity, ascetics journeyed along these corridors from Kashmir and raised the shrine at Kabul, enthroned at the centre of the goddesses’ land. Here, the akhaṇḍ jyoti blazed as the eternal flame of the feminine divine, a beacon whose radiance gathered the memory of rivers, mounds, and shrines into one sacred heart, before its glory reached the annals of the Greek historians.
Chapter III.
In the Kubjikāmata-tantra, the goddess, also called Kujeśvarī, declares: “As I have flown up (oḍḍitā) here within Oḍḍīśa, therefore this place will be known as Oḍḍiyānaka.” The Sanskrit root word operative here is uddi (उड्डी), 'fly up,' of which oddita is a form. The name Oḍḍiyāna is thus aptly applied, for the Śakti of the residents of this Pīṭha is seen to be permanently 'in ascent'.
The Manthana Bhairava Tantra—a vast text devoted to the worship of Kubjikā—states, “The goddess’s primary sacred site in antiquity was known as Oddiyāna,” while the Kumārikākhaṇḍa (42.16ab) explains that Kubjikā embodies the vital breath, “the form of the breath is that of a bird (that flies upwards), and so (her seat) is Odyāṇaka.” This imagery of ascent and bird‑flight resonates with the epic memory of the Hindu Kush, where the Mahābhārata recalls the mountains and valleys as Uparisthāna or Upariśaena, the “high place” or “mountain of the bird”—another description of the land of Odyāṇaka or Oddiyāna.
Upariśaena is first attested in the Mahābhārata as the classical Sanskrit designation of the northern frontier of the Hindu Kush. Later Avestan texts preserve the cognate Upāirisaēna, derived from Proto‑Iranian upārisaina- (“juniper‑covered heights”), sometimes interpreted as “beyond the reach of eagles.” Edward Burt, in his Journey through Afghanistan (1839), was the first modern interpreter to render the Sanskrit epic term into Persian as 'argamiru bar hawā' (“soaring into the air”). Subsequent philologists recognised that Burt’s Persian gloss coincided with the Avestan 'saēna '(eagle), thereby linking the original Indic bird‑mountain to the later Iranian eagle imagery.
A. Identifying Oddiyāna
1. Odisha vs. Oddiyāna: Some scholars have attempted to connect the name Oddiyāna with the state of Odisha, but this identification is generally not accepted. Odisha is indeed renowned as the centre of twelve Śaktipeethas, both major and minor; however, a Peetha of Kubjikā Mata does not figure among them. This absence weakens the case for equating Odisha with Oddiyāna, directing our attention elsewhere.
2: Swāt Valley Identification: Most scholars instead equate Oddiyāna with the Rigvedic Suvāstu Valley—today’s Swāt River Valley in Pakistan. This identification dominates Hindu‑Purāṇic, Tibetan‑Buddhist, and modern scholarship. The Tantras themselves guide us northward, recounting the goddess’s movement through Ucchuṣmā Nadī, Sahya Mahāvana, Karala, and Hima‑Gahvara. Though not exact phonetic matches, these names resonate closely with the valleys and features of Swāt, strengthening the textual‑geographic link.
This identification dominates Hindu‑Purāṇic, Tibetan‑Buddhist, and modern scholarship. The Tantras themselves guide us northward, recounting the goddess’s movement through Ucchuṣmā Nadī, Sahya Mahāvana, Karala, and Hima‑Gahvara. Though not exact phonetic matches, these names resonate closely with the valleys and features of Swāt, strengthening the textual‑geographic link.
Most scholars instead equate Oddiyāna with the Rigvedic Suvāstu Valley, today’s Swāt River Valley in Pakistan, and this identification has become the dominant view in Hindu‑Purāṇic, Tibetan‑Buddhist, and modern scholarship. The Tantras themselves guide us in this direction. They recount the goddess’s movement through Ucchuṣmā Nadī, Sahya Mahāvana, Karala and Hima-Gahvara. Though these names are not exact phonetic matches for the various valleys of the Himalayas or the Hindukush, they echo closely with many names and features that are closely resonant with the Swat Valley.
i. Sahya Mahāvana and Mahodand: On the present-day map of the Swat Valley, which derives its name from the Rigvedic Suvastu (सुवस्तु), meaning 'abundant', we encounter a lake called Mahodand, corresponding to the Sahya Mahāvana Lake of the Puranas—one of the sacred groves visited by the Goddess Kubjika. The shift from maha (महा) in Mahāvana, to 'maho' in Mahodand, preserves the semantic resonance of 'abundance' across time.
ii. Ucchuṣmā and Usho: Tantric texts describe the Ucchuṣmā (उच्छुष्मा) river flowing through the Mahocchuṣma forest. The same prefix maho echoes in the name Mahodand, while the river name itself resonates with the present‑day Usho River. This phonetic continuity anchors the goddess’s itinerary in Swāt’s geography.
iii. Symbolism of Ucchuṣmā: The Ucchuṣmā is a river that the Goddess visits in her sojourn to her abode. The river name resonates with the present-day Usho River that flows through Swat, hence anchoring the geography.
iv. The Etymology of the name Ucchuṣmā: Etymologically, Ucchuṣmā (उच्छुष्मा) is best understood as a compound word with ud (उद्) meaning 'up', 'out', or 'forth', and uṣma (उष्म) meaning 'heat, 'warmth', and 'vital energy'. Together, ucchuṣmā means 'the rising warmth, the crackling heat that manifests upward'.
v. Ucchuṣmā in Tantric texts: In the tantric texts, Ucchuṣmā carries the sense of 'the rise of energy or fire, and the crackle of vital force', and as Uṣā (उषा), the goddess's name means 'dawn'. She embodies the radiant morning light, standing in contrast to Kubjikā’s hidden, coiled energy. Yet, as the goddess whose fiery energy bursts forth, she complements Kubjikā’s hidden, coiled force, hence completing all her aspects.
vi. Persian Influence: With time, and in the present‑day landscape of Swat, the resonance of Ucchuṣmā shifted into another linguistic register. Through Persian influence, Ucchuṣmā seems to have taken the form of 'chashma', meaning “spring” or “water source.” This semantic evolution is visible in the present‑day Kala‑Chashma on the Usho River. This is a folklore correlation, not a philological one.
We may take a moment here to define 'chashma'. The Persian 'chashma', meaning 'spring' and 'spectacle', derives from čashm or 'eye', itself ultimately a simplified derivation of Sanskrit cakṣu (चक्षु), 'eye' or 'sight', where the Sanskrit resonance remains clear. In the Rigveda, cakṣu is repeatedly invoked as a divine faculty, most memorably in Rigveda 1.115.1: "citraṃ devānām ud agād anīkaṃ, cakṣur mitrasya varuṇasya agneḥ' which translates as, 'The wonderful host of rays has risen. The sun is the eye of Mitra, Varuṇa, and Agni."
vii. The significance of ancient Suvastu: Philosophically, Ucchuṣmā embodies the surge of vital fire that becomes manifest—dawn’s flame rising into sight—so that the Rigvedic cakṣu (vision) and the Tantric uṣma (heat) converge, completing the circle of sight, source, and radiance, uniting Vedic vision, Tantric energy, and the cultural memory of springs in the landscape of Swat. Suvāstu, whose very name resounds with the abundance of energies and natural wealth, became the chosen abode of the Goddess — for in its fertile valleys and radiant currents, the śakti of Oḍḍiyāna found a dwelling worthy of her visitation
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| The Mahodad Lake, the Usho River Forest and Kala Chashma seem to be a reflection of the Puranic Mahochussma Forest, and the Usha River of the land of Suvastu. Map Courtesy: Google Maps |
viii. The confluence of Suvastu, Vajrasthana and Barikot: The valley of Swāt reveals yet another dimension of its sanctity. Here, the Usho River meets the Paloga River to form the Suvastu, creating a sangama. Completing this tableau, Falak Sar, the valley’s loftiest peak, rises sentinel‑like above the confluence. Paloga itself recalls the Sanskrit pālāga (पालाग), ‘running, flowing,’ a name that mirrors the restless course of its waters. And perhaps the Falak Sar is the mountain of Vajra that the scriptures speak of, an idea we explore ahead.
The mountains of Swat rise high, encircling the valley, with Falak Sar, the highest, rising to 5900 metres. In the Tantric texts, the mountains encircling Oddiyāna are described as vajraprākāra (वज्रप्राकार), or 'gleaming ramparts'. The word itself is layered, with vajra (वज्र), which in poetic texts is taken to mean 'diamond', or 'thunderbolt', and prākāra, which means 'rampart', and 'enclosing wall'. Vajra also has the meaning of 'fortification', and when fused, they create a polyvalent image: the Swāt valley as a fortress of light, a citadel of indestructible truth, and a mandala bounded by vajra walls.
In the valley lies a settlement. The Kathāsaritsāgara, which is a later adaptation of the older Guṇāḍhya’s Bṛhatkathā text and dated to the 6th century CE, states that this settlement is named Vajrakūṭa (वज्रकूट), meaning 'the diamond city'. In chapter 44, Vajraprabha, the King of the city states, says, "There is a city in this earth on the ridge of Himavat, called Vajrakūṭa, and rightly so called, as being all made of diamond. There I dwelt, as a king of the Vidyādharas named Vajraprabha, and my name too was rightly given me, because my body is framed of diamond.” The vajra or the diamond construction here describes the gleam of the snowy peaks, symbolises purity and divinity, as well as the secure placement of the city.
Today, the Swat Valley is home to the town of Barikot. Rising above the Suvastu river, Barikot could well be the Vajrakūṭa of the old Sanskrit texts. The Greeks, when they marched with Alexander, recorded the same citadel and Arrian in the Anabasis (IV.27) calls it Bazira. Curtius Rufus in the Historiae Alexandri (VIII.34) names the city Beira. These forms stem directly from vajra (वज्र), the Sanskrit /v/ shifting to /b/ in Greek transcription. Bazira is Vajra, carried across languages, preserved in memory. Centuries later, after the Greeks left, an inscription dated to the 10th century, carved in Śāradā script, was discovered at Barikot, which preserves the toponym vajrasthāna (वज्रस्थान). This inscription establishes the authenticity of the contents of the Sanskrit scriptures, which have long been dismissed as myth. The stone inscription states:
“… śrī jayapāladevarājye śrī vajira(sthā)ne …”
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| The Doorgah Valley near the Usho Forest and Mahodad Lake, Swat Valley Map Courtesy: Google Maps |
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| The only thread that ties the names Mahodand, Ushu and Doorgah are the Sanskrit scriptures. Suvastu, or Swat Valley, Pakistan. Courtesy: Google Maps |
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| Sanskrit names abound in the Gilgit-Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa regions. Courtesy: Map data © Mapcarta |
To the southwest, in the plains of Punjab, lies Jalandhar, the fertile corridor between the Vipāśā (Beas) and Śutudrī (Sutlej). Here, the goddess is remembered as Tripurmalinī, and the Shakti Peetha of Jalandhar marks the spot where Sati’s breast is said to have fallen. The city’s very name, Jalandhara—“held by waters”—echoes its geography, lying between rivers that descend from Himachal’s high ranges.
Thus, Karala, as remembered in the Tantras, encompasses both the hill sanctuary of Kangra and the river‑fed plains of Punjab. Later traditions blurred them under the single epithet, but the texts preserve their cadence—Jālaśaila and Jalandhara, hill and plain, sangama and sanctuary, both held in the fierce embrace of Karala.
The above are the Goddess's known abodes, but her name flickers across other forgotten sanctuaries. In Kashmir, near the Shankaracharya Hill of Srinagar—where a venerable Śiva temple crowns the summit—an ancient spring-temple at its foot bears the name Durga Nag. Yet older still is a peak remembered as Sangari Karala. Sangar (सङ्गर) signifies a 'conflict', or 'battle'—the fierce aspect of Śakti—while Karala is Durga herself in her Tantric form. The hill thus enshrines her dread epithet, a reminder that the goddess makes her abode throughout the Himalayan range, where sanctuary and struggle are inseparably bound.
This site carries profound significance. Kashmir is the very land from which the Kubjikā Tantra emanated, yet traces of her presence here are scarce. The Karala Sangari Mountain, rising only to 1,650 meters, stands as one of the few surviving markers of her cultic memory. Its modest height is itself symbolic: Karala never claims the loftiest summits, but chooses middling elevations where human vision and devotion can still converge with the divine. In this quiet peak, her presence endures—not in grandeur, but in the subtle power of remembrance, a silent witness to the Tantric goddess who once emanated across the Himalayas.
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| Durga Nag Temple near the Karala Sangari Mountain. The abode of the Tantric Goddess Karala. |
b. Hima Gahvara, the Cave of Snow: The Tantras recount that before Kubjikā incarnates at her chosen seat, she traverses ten mountainous sanctuaries—Kaumāraparvata, Trikūṭa, Kiṣkindha, a few among them—before she arrives at Hima‑Gahvara, the cave of snow. This obscure Tantric name in itself is a treasure‑house of meaning. Hima‑Gahvara is not a single peak but an expanse, a landscape of recesses and hidden hollows, where the goddess once descended and which later became the track of kings and expeditionists.
The name itself is evocative: hima (हिम) snow, and gahvara (गह्वर) 'cave', or 'deep recess'. It conjures a sanctuary that is both inaccessible and womb‑like, a place where energy is invoked in secrecy and power. In present geography, this resonates with the snowy ranges between Kabul, Ghazni, and Kandahar—a corridor of about 145 miles. Within these ranges lies Koh‑e Gowarah at 33.23N, 67.78E in Ghazni, its name stemming from Sanskrit gahvara and echoing across languages. In Pashto and Dari, Gowarah means 'cradle', mirroring the Tantric sense of a hidden womb. Nearby, at 33.13N, 67.61E, a place called Ghara preserves the same phonetic kinship.
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| Koh-e Gowarah, not far from Kabul in Afghanistan seems to have derived its name from Hima-Gavarah of the Tantric tradition Map Courtesy: MapCarta |
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| Jaghatu in Ghazni is the Jagadu of the Mahabharata. Qarabagh is the Land of Hima Gavarah of the Tantras. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
The entire valley that we now call Ghazni first enters Sanskrit memory as Jāguḍa. In the Mahābhārata, we come across the verse 'agādratho avaniṃ jāguḍa-kuṅkumā-bhitāmrām' —“Agadratha went to the land of Jāguḍa, reddened with saffron.” Here, the country is named for its jaguda-kuṅkuma, its saffron fields glowing like fire across the ridges. The epic thus fixes Ghazni’s earliest identity as a land of fragrance, its people remembered for cultivating saffron.
Later, when Xuanzang walked into this same valley, he confirmed the epic’s memory. He wrote: “The country of Jāguda is more than seven thousand li in circuit, and its capital city, named Hexina (Ghazni), is over thirty li in circuit… The soil is good for growing aromatic turmeric, and it produces the hingu herb (Ferula asafoetida), which grows in the Rama‑Indu Valley.” His words echo the Sanskrit verse: saffron, turmeric, hingu—the valley was a treasury of fragrance and fertility.
The record of the Rama‑Indu Valley is unique, for it does not appear in any scripture and is therefore a precious fragment of memory. On today’s map, as one travels south from Bagram and Jagatu toward Ghazni, one crosses Ramak—a valley settlement whose name plausibly preserves the Rama‑Indu of Xuanzang’s account. In his Great Tang Records on the Western Regions (Da Tang Xiyu Ji), when describing the country of Jāguda (modern Jaghuri in Ghazni Province), Xuanzang notes that its fertile soil yields turmeric and the hingu herb, “which grows in the Rama‑Indu Valley.” The survival of Rama-Indu as Ramak on Afghanistan’s map thus offers a striking continuity: a phonetic echo of the Sanskrit name, binding Xuanzang’s textual geography to the living landscape.
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| On today’s map, the path from Kapisa (Bagram) and Jagatu into Ghazni crosses Ramak, plausibly preserving the name 'Rama‑Indu Valley' of Xuanzang’s account. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
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| James Rennell (1742–1830), the English geographer known as the Father of the Indian Geographical Survey, identifies a location called Naggur near Bamiyan. |
In Chinese transcriptions of Sanskrit, the initial consonant written as /f/ in Chinese texts regularly corresponds to the Sanskrit /p/, a systematic sound-shift comparable in principle to the correspondences codified in Grimm’s Law for Indo‑European languages. Pushkulavati was recorded by Fa Hien, the 4th-century Chinese traveller, as Po-lu-sha, with the vati suffix left un-transliterated. Once this rule is applied, /p/ changes to /f/ and therefore Fulishisatangana emerges as the derivation of the original Pushkala. The suffix vati seems to have been changed to angna; vati means 'laden with' and 'angana' in Shaktism means 'to be a member of'. The Jaina monks have been called Pushkalaka (पुष्कलक) since the 9th century BCE, and later the Buddhist monks also adopted the same designation. This meaning is attested in the Monier-William Monier's Sanskrit Dictionary.
For Xuanzang, who was a monk, the name Fulishisatangna would mean to be 'a member of the Pushkala sangha in the city of Pushkalavati. The city of Vrijisthana, which Xuanzang records, is none other than the Vajrasthana of the Tantras, and as mentioned earlier, is now known as Barikot, the capital of the Swat valley.
The sequence of these cities follows the geographic path on the map in perfect order, confirming the accuracy of Xuanzang’s record and its harmony with the Sanskrit tradition.
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| The Journey of Chinese traveller Xuanzang, from Ghazni to Barikot, connects the land of Charsadda (Pushkalavati of Ramayana), Jaghuri or (Jaguda of Mahabarata) and Barikote, the (Vajrasthana of the Tantras). Map Courtesy: Google Maps |
In the Kubjikāmata Tantra, the four sacred seats (pīṭhas) are enumerated, each defined by its sthāna. The Sanskrit verse reads:
Oḍḍiyānaṃ tu uparisthānaṃ, Kāmarūpaṃ tu nābhisthānaṃ, Jālandharaṃ tu jalasthānaṃ, Pūrṇagiriṃ tu parvatasthānam.-Kubjikāmata Tantra, ch. 18
In this verse, Oḍḍiyāna is described as Uparisthāna, 'the higher place', Kāmākhyā as Nābhi-sthāna, 'the navel place', Jālandhara as Jala-sthāna or 'the water place', and Pūrṇagiri as Parvata-sthāna or 'the mountain place'.
This verse makes the Indic logic explicit. Oḍḍiyāna is not vaguely 'the place of flight', nor just 'the mountain of the eagle', but precisely uparisthāna—the high place, from root oḍḍi (उड्डी) 'flown'. The designation is part of a coherent system in which each seat is mapped to a geographic and symbolic category. We have already seen in the previous section that Oddiayana was the centre of Kubjika Mata, the Asamayi temple of Kabul, hence anchoring the legend in real life.
By contrast, the Avestan Uparisaēna is simply a mountain name, with bird imagery attached through 'saēna', translated as 'eagle'. It has no developed framework of four seats, no systematic mapping of geography into symbolic categories.
Thus, while the word Uparisaina appears in the Avestan corpus, the source of its meaning lies in the Indic tradition. Only in the Sanskrit texts—especially the Kubjikāmata Tantra—do we find the fully developed context of the shaktism and shakti peethas that associates Oḍḍiyāna with the Hindu Kush as uparisthāna, 'the high place'. This Indic framing, rather than the Avestan echo, establishes the true source of meaning—a fact that mainstream historiography must finally acknowledge.
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| The Puranic centres of Shakti, from the sacred site of Qarabagh (Koh-e Gowarah) in Ghazni, to Jalandhara and Kangra, from Purangiri in Uttarakhand to Kamrup in Assam, are the sites of Goddess Kubjika. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
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| The name Jayani Devi Sthaan survives in the name Joysheer or Joisheer Bazaar, at the foot of the Asamayi Hill. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
In 326 BCE, Alexander advanced eastward from Kabul to confront King Porus, who ruled the land between the rivers Jhelum, then called Vitastā, rendered by the Greeks as Hydaspes, and the Chenab, known in the Rig Veda as Asiknī, which the Greeks called Acesines. As Alexander prepared to cross the Jhelum and meet his adversary, a settlement is said to have arisen on its left bank, where his army had encamped. Tradition holds that it was here that a city called Nicaea, or the 'city of victory', came up.
Unlike the Greek city 'Alexandria of the Caucasus' in Afghanistan, also called Kapisa, now called Bagram, where stones still speak of the Greek presence, the supposed foundation of Nicaea dissolves into silence. Its precise location has never been identified. Perhaps its existence was only a myth. The king's name Poros, conjectured to derive from Paurava, also finds no echo in Indian annals. Neither the Puranas nor later texts record him. No coins, no inscriptions, no ruins mark his reign. All that survives are Greek voices, weaving elephants and magnanimity into Alexander’s march. Perhaps Poros was never a monarch of cities and palaces, but a tribal chief of scattered settlements. Perhaps no battle thundered as the texts proclaim, but a weary army struck a deal, and the story was cooked into legend.
The silence of the land is testimony. A city that ever stood could not have vanished without a trace. A king imagined may be only a foil. What remains is the Greek need for grandeur: a noble adversary, a phantom city, a victory inscribed upon the imagination—so that the weary return of an army might echo as triumph, not compromise.
If we look at the geography, a more plausible setting for the location of 'Nicaea' also emerges. After marching from Alexandria (Bagram)—a distance of roughly 60 km—Alexander’s forces would have reorganised in Kabul before proceeding east toward Purushapura (modern Peshawar) or sailing through Pushkalavati (modern Charsadda), before the battle with the King.
The most logical encampment site for the troops would have been along the Paghman valley, where the river provided abundant water, the plains offered flat ground for tents and cavalry, and the route opened naturally into the Kabul basin, as the Paghman meets the Kabul River near the hillock of Kubjika's Temple.
The locals of Kubha would have referred to the Greek settlement as nikāya (निकाय), for that is the word for 'encampment' in Sanskrit and its derived languages. The memory of this encampment survives even today in Kabul, in the name Nikpay Alley—a broad and level ground at the western edge of the city, watered by the Paghman River and lying not far from the Temple.
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| Nikpay Alley, a level ground just outside Kabul city, about 20 km from the Asamayi Temple was perhaps the Nicaea of the Greeks. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps: Google Maps |
The summit temple, rising above the valley, perhaps became a commanding landmark for them—a shrine elevated in geography and in spirit, marking the frontier where Indic and Hellenic worlds met, and the site of their encampment gave rise to the myth of the city of Nicaea. It never came into existence in Afghanistan in reality.
C. The city of Nicaea in Greece
Instead, sometime after the Greeks returned to their homeland, there appeared a city called Nicaea in Greece. It looks like the Greeks who had marched into Afghanistan with Alexander in 327–326 BCE carried back more than tales of conquest. They took with them the folklore of their encampment in the town of Kubha, the impressions of spiritual practices at the Jayantī Devi Sthāna, and their settlement on the Beas or Hydaspes, near Dhalyalah, before their legendary final battle with Poros. The impact was lasting. In 1801, scholar Francis Wilford (1761-1822), writing in Asiatic Researches (Vol. IV), observed that the Greeks had renamed, not one, but two cities in their own land in memory of their 'victories' in Afghanistan—named Nicaea and Daedala.
A later story claimed that Nicaea in Greece was dedicated to the 'Greek goddess of Victory'. Yet, as Wilford pointed out, there was no such goddess in the Greek pantheon until the Punic Wars, beginning in 264 BCE. The association of Nicaea with victory only emerged after the Greeks had encountered India, where the goddess of victory was already venerated.
D. Kubjika in Greek Mythology
In Greek mythology, Nicaea emerged as a nymph of springs and fountains, and as the goddess presiding over Lake Ascanius. Nicaea is first mentioned as the name of a nymph in late antiquity, specifically in the 'Dionysiaca' by Nonnus of Panopolis, a 5th‑century CE Greek poet. In that work, Nicaea is described as the daughter of Sangarius, the River‑God of Greek Mythology, and Cybele, the mother Goddess.
What is striking here is the uncanny echo of an Indic environment. The name Sangarius, though explained in various ways, appears cognate with Sanskrit sāgara — a word that encompasses both 'ocean' and 'river'. Likewise, the name Cybele, in mainstream literature, traced to the Phrygian goddess Kubileya or Kebeleya, meaning 'Mountain Mother', is none other than Kubjika, for the epithet 'Mountain Mother' aligns seamlessly with the Tantric goddess of Kubha, whose original seat was in Oddiyana. Thus, Nicaea’s lineage and associations reveal not a local Anatolian myth, but a layered continuity that resonates with Indic cosmology, especially with the sacred geography of Kubha, or Kabul. And thus, it is the temple of Jayantī — the Hindu Goddess of victory, and an avatara of Kubjika — that inspired the Greeks to associate it with their own goddess of victory, Nike, later enshrined in the name Nicaea.
The Plate of Cybele and Kubjika: In Afghanistan, near the northern border in Takhar province, lies a site called Ai-Khanoum, where the celebrated artefact, the Plate of Cybele (Ai-Khanoum disc), was unearthed. Dating to the 2nd century BCE, it portrays Cybele enthroned upon a lion-drawn chariot, ascending a mountain toward an altar, accompanied by Nike and the sun god. Scholars often interpret this as a Hellenistic rendering of the Phrygian Mother. Yet its Afghan provenance reveals something deeper: the imagery resonates with the Indic cult of Kubjikā in the Kubhā valley, where the goddess was enthroned upon her lion at the summit shrine of Asamai.
From Afghanistan, this cultic memory appears to have travelled westward along Greco-Bactrian corridors of exchange, crystallising in Anatolia as Cybele. The Plate of Cybele is not contemporary with Alexander’s visit.
It was created about 150 years later, during the Greco‑Bactrian period. The lion-throne motif on the Ai-Khanoum disc is thus not evidence of importation but of exportation—a local Indic goddess whose throne and mountain seat radiated outward, shaping Mediterranean iconography while preserving her Vedic-Puranic origin.
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| National Museum of Afghanistan, Kabul, Plate of Cybele Public domain image: Wikimedia Commons |
Other names recorded in 1801 include Asbana and Asvana (spoken as Ashaban), derived from Sanskrit āśā (“hope, desire”). Wilford noted: “Numerous are the legends in the Purāṇas relating to this place, which is called Asavana and in the spoken dialect Asbana. There are two places of that name; one is the lower (Asbana), and the other is Urdh A’sbana or A’sbana‑the‑upper.” This Urdh A’sbana—the “upper Asbana”, a variation of Oddiayan, retains a scriptural link to Kubjikā, the Tantric goddess of Kubha.
The temple of Kubha thus became a vessel of layered memory. Kabul’s shrine has remained alive under shifting names: Jayani‑devi sthana, Ashcan‑arfan, Asbana, Asamayi. Each name reflected the tongues and hopes of those who came to its hill: victory for warriors, desire for pilgrims, fulfilment for devotees. Two thousand years after Alexander, Wilford still heard these echoes, proof that the temple was not forgotten but continually reborn in speech. In its endurance, the Asamayi temple stands as Kabul’s own witness to history — a place where language, faith, and geography have conspired to keep the goddess of Kubha present across ages.
This insight gains force when we consider that Alexander had stationed his troops at a town called Dhalyalah, near the confluence of the Kunhar and Jhelum rivers. Downstream from here, it is said, the Battle of the Hydaspes was fought between Alexander and King Porus.
The origin of the name lies at the dramatic gorge where the Kunhar (the Vedic Kusava) collides with the Jhelum (the Vitastā of the Vedas, the Hydaspes of the Greeks). Locally, Dayadala described this jagged cleft, derived from the Sanskrit root dal (दल्) meaning “split, cleft, fragment.” In monsoon conditions, the same root shaded into daladala (दलदल), 'marshy ground', evoking the sodden plains that hindered Porus’s elephants and chariots. By contrast, Daedala in the Greek language carried no intrinsic meaning. The linguistic shift from the Sanskrit-influenced Dhalyalah to the Greek-friendly Daedala was a natural evolution of 'Hellenizing' the exotic east.
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| Dalyalah Town, in Mirpur district, is located on the Jhelum River, not too far from where the Kunar River flows into the Jhelum. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
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| Gangah Khel is situated to the south of Gandamak, and east of the Surkhab, a tributary of the Kabul River. Courtesy: Mapcarta Maps |
Gangah Khel was not naturally fertile. The Kabul River, though close, often runs in deep channels that cut through the terrain without irrigating the surrounding fields. Its waters bypass much of the land unless deliberately diverted. This aridity demanded ingenuity. From the nearby Sping Ghar range, snowmelt fed the Surkhab tributary of the Kabul River, and here ancient engineers — heirs to the Indus Valley’s mastery of water — devised simple but effective stone‑lined channels, diversion embankments, and seasonal weirs to capture the meltwater and direct it into fields. Archaeological parallels from Gandhara and the wider Indus basin show that such early hydraulic works were already in use by the first millennium BCE, long before the later karez and qanat systems of the Islamic period. By harnessing the flow, they transformed a dry landscape into one sustained by water, creating pockets of cultivation where none should have existed. The Harappan masters called the place the 'Gangah', a centre of water and life in a desert of dust.
The name 'Gangah Khel' thus becomes more than a toponym; it is a memory of abundance created by human skill. The Kabul valley’s irrigation traditions link back to Gandhara’s hydraulic culture, where Vedic-Purāṇic shrines alike depended on carefully managed water. The paradox of a settlement defined by the Ganga in an arid zone is resolved when we see that the sanctity of water here was not natural but engineered — a sacred geography sustained by human hands.
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| Vakshu, the Rig Vedic name of the Panj River, survives in the name of a tributary called Vakhsh in Tajikistan. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
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| Shortugai lay along the corridor that extended northward from Kabul into the Bactrian heartland |
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| Chinese monks such as Xuanzang passed through Kapisa (Bagram) and Gardez. |
The same naming logic extends northward to the Salang Pass, which lies at the crest of the Hindu Kush about 90 kilometres north of Kabul. Its name originates in Sanskrit samlangha (संलङ्घ्) meaning 'to leap across'. There is a river here that bears the same name. It rises near the pass and flows southward, mirroring the 'flowing down' of Pravana.
Beyond Salang, the descent opens into the Shomali Plain, where the steep slope finally eases into fertile level ground. If Salang embodies the sharp fall of Pravana, Shomali is its gentler continuation. Its dark green fertility gave rise to its Sanskrit name, Shyamali (श्यामली)—'dark, rich, fertile'. Though history has made Shomali a battleground, its name predates conflict, carrying the memory of 'abundance' instead.
The ancient settlement of Bagram was built exactly at this transition point - the toe of the slope to control the flow of the trade coming down from the Salang Pass. The capital city of Parwan, till today, bears an ancient name. It is located on the Silk Route and is called Charikar, which stems from the Sanskrit root char (चर्) meaning 'journey', 'road', or 'a wanderer'.
B. The Sun City of Kapisha
Bagram, just a few miles from Kabul, was a key station on the Silk Route connecting Kabul with Bamiyan. Classical sources identify it with the ancient Kapisa, its name derived from the Sanskrit kapisha (कपिश), meaning 'sun' and evoking a coppery radiance.
The earliest references to Kapisa appear in the writings of the 5th‑century BCE grammarian Pāṇini, who calls the city Kāpiśī (कापिशी), a term that can also be interpreted as 'that which is praised by the wise'. In Chinese records, the name appears as Jabishi. Across these traditions, the etymologies converge on a single impression: Kapisa was remembered as a place of brilliance and renown, a city whose glory shone across languages and cultures.
Scholars, however, often equate the name Kapisa with Kambhoja (कम्बोज), regarding them as two forms of the same designation. The etymology of Kambhoja is said to derive from kāma (काम), meaning “desirable,” first invoked in the Mahābhārata to describe the tribes dwelling near Balkh—a reference to the handsome race of that land. Yet such interpretations, while evocative, risk narrowing the vision of Kapisa’s legacy. The glories of the region emanated not only from its people but also from its role as a nexus of trade, culture, and sacred memory, radiating prestige far beyond its frontiers.
In 329 BCE, Alexander the Great founded the city of Alexandria of the Caucasus at the same location, marking the valley that stands at the crossroads of civilisations. Yet its culture remained essentially Indic. In his influential work On Yuan‑Chwang’s Travels in India, 629–645 A.D., the British sinologist Thomas Watters cites Xuanzang’s account of Kapisa. Earlier, Samuel Beal had translated Xuanzang’s Buddhist Records of the Western World (1884), which first brought these descriptions into English scholarship.
Xuanzang recorded, “There were numerous Deva temples and over 1,000 dedicated followers, including the Digambaras and Pāśupatas, along with those who don skull‑wreaths as bead ornaments.” The Pāśupatas represent the oldest of the Śaivite sects. Their adherents, renowned for rigorous ascetic practices: covering their bodies in ashes, wearing skulls as symbols, and using them in ritual, were seen in large numbers at Bagram, establishing the presence of the Śaivite tradition there.
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| Ivory Carvings of Hindu Goddesses from Kapisa, Bagram, Afghanistan. Dated to the 1st-3rd century AD Courtesy: KLOTZ - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 |
In the neighbouring region of Nuristan, referenced as Kambhoja in ancient scriptures, the pre-Islamic pantheon featured fierce protector gods associated with mountains and storms, similar to the deities Rudra and Shiva. Certain cult practices involved skull imagery and ascetic rituals, which Watters and Beal compared to the Pāśupata sects described by Xuanzang in his writings.
The Kalash people of Pakistan’s Chitral Valley, culturally related to the Nuristanis, still practice a Rig‑Vedic‑like religion. Their pantheon includes Mahandeo, a deity often compared to Śiva. The name, of course, stems from Mahadeva. This reiterates that Nuristan once shared similar Śaiva‑like cults, echoing the Indic substratum that persisted across the Hindu Kush frontier.
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| An idol of Shiva at Mes Aynak, Logar province, Afghanistan. |
The very name Logar carries the memory of metal. The river that gives the province its name recalls Sanskrit Lohita (लोहित), 'reddish, copper‑colored'—a word that holds two truths at once: the hue of iron‑bearing soil and the gleam of copper coursing through the land. In older usage, loh (लोह) and lohaja (लोहज) both meant 'metal', anchoring the province’s identity in its mineral wealth. Thus, the Logar River must once have been known as the Lohita, a river of red earth and copper light.
A smaller stream flows south of Mes Aynak. It is known as Siso Khwar. The name appears to be a remnant of an ancient, sophisticated mapping system. In Sanskrit, sṛ (सृ) means “to flow,” while khvāri (खवारि) can be read as “rainwater." The confluence‑point of the Kabul River and Siso Khwar is today called Surobi — a term that resonates with the Sanskrit surbhas (सुरभस्), meaning “fast‑flowing.”
The flow at the confluence of Siso Khwar and the Kabul River near Surobi is fast and forceful. The Kabul River here runs through a narrow gorge, accelerating its current. Siso Khwar comes down steeply from upland slopes, so when it meets the Kabul River, the inflow adds momentum. Today, the Surobi Dam nearby regulates water, but natural flow in this stretch is rapid due to the gradient and confined valley walls. Hence, the original name would have been either Sarabhas (सरभस) or its variation, such as Surabhi (सुरभि), which brings in the feminine element. and denotes 'abundance'.
The name Mes Aynak itself translates in Pashto as 'copper well'. In Pashto, the word for copper, meso, is a truncated echo of Sanskrit tāmra (ताम्र), preserving the Indic memory of copper in the local tongue. Another tributary of the Kabul flowing here is the Surkhab. Its modern Persian name preserves only the surface meaning—'red'—but the deeper Indic resonance points again to Lohita, the older identity of the land, tied to copper mines and metallurgical wealth.
Though today remembered chiefly as a Buddhist site, its deeper strata reveal a far older story. Beneath the monasteries and stupas lie the remnants of a Bronze Age settlement, with a 5,000‑year‑old copper smelter uncovered by archaeologists. This proves Mes Aynak was a metallurgical hub as early as 3000 BCE. Later, the wealth of copper mining and trade funded the grand Buddhist temples and monasteries, even sustaining a mint that struck copper coins. Yet beneath these layers of Buddhist devotion, the soil itself whispers of Śiva and Durgā, guardians of fire and transformation, whose presence lingers in the statues that survive.
From this ancient wonder, we pass now towards the other parts of Afghanistan, where we see an earlier Vedic imprint. The Vedic Pakhta tribe has left its imprint, not only in the names Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Pushkalvati, but also in the provinces named Paktia and Paktika, whose capitals are Gardez and Sharana. The name Sharana, in both Dari and Pashto, carries the same meaning, 'protection', a direct borrowing from Sanskrit śaraṇa (शरण).
Gardez, though commonly explained in mainstream Pashto literature as 'fortress', invites a deeper etymological inquiry. It is unlikely that the settlement was always known by this designation; rather, the name seems to have crystallised after the rise of the Bala Hisar citadel, constructed around the 12th century CE, which came to dominate the plateau. Before the fortress lent its identity to the town, Gardez must have carried other appellations, perhaps tied to its rivers or valleys. By the same logic, the stream now associated with Gardez may once have borne a different name, only later subsumed under the identity of the fort.
The oldest known site in Gardez is the Kushan‑era settlement remains, dating back to the 1st–3rd century CE, when the region was part of the Gandhara–Kushan cultural sphere. Archaeological finds—coins, pottery, and trade relics—show that Gardez was already a crossroads long before the Islamic fortifications.
The most famous Kushan coins found here are the gold-coin issues of kings like Kanishka and Huvishka, which typically show the king on one side and a deity on the other—often a fire altar scene or Greco‑Bactrian‑style gods such as Shiva, Buddha, or Iranian deities. In the most ancient records, Kanishka's name appears as Kanika. The two names have one common Sanskrit root, which explains their names. Kush (कुष्) means 'shine', Kushaku (कुषाकु) means 'gold' and 'fire' both. Kan (कन्) also has a similar meaning of 'shine.
The story of the Kushan Dynasty, which ruled from Kapisha in Afghanistan to Mathura in India, and its founder Kujula Kadphises begins with the Yuezhi tribes in Gansu (northwestern China). For a long time, historians assumed Kujula was a Buddhist, largely because later Kushan rulers—especially Kanishka—became famous patrons of Buddhism. Yet a closer study of the Mathura Lion Pillar Inscription revealed an undeniable association of Kujula with Śaivism and identified him as a devotee of Śiva. His name itself may be analysed for Sanskrit resonance. Most scholars agree that the original form of his name, Kujula, was a variation of Kushala (कुशल), meaning 'prosperous', 'benevolent', 'clever', and 'able'.
Kujula Kadphises styled himself Maharaja Rajarajasa Devaputra Kujula Kara Kadphises, 'Great King, King of Kings, Son of God', a title that fused Indic, Iranian, and Hellenistic traditions, but in its Indic stratum carried the auspiciousness of Śiva because of his belief in Shaivism. Like they say, "In India, the conquered conquered the conqueror."
Though Kujula's coins often show Greek motifs such as that of Herakles and Zeus, later Kushan rulers such as Vima Kadphises and Kanishka explicitly depict Śiva with the bull Nandi. If Kujula was associated with Śiva, it would explain why his successors so confidently adopted Śaiva imagery on coinage and inscriptions.
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Obverse: 'King of Kings Bazodeo Kushan'. Bazodeo is a corruption of the Sanskrit Vasudeva. The reverse of the coin shows two-armed Shiva holding a trident and diadem with his bull Nandi 227-247 CE |
In the picture above, a coin dedicated to Vasudeva I, the last of the great kings of the Kushan dynasty, has the inscription of Shiva, with his trident and the bull Nandi. The coin is dated to 227-247 CE.
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| Obverse: Bactrian legend: King of Kings, Kanishka the Kushan Reverse: Bactrian legend in Greek script: Ardoxsho, 227-247 CE |
A gold coin dedicated to Kanishka, the greatest of the Kushan kings, has an inscription on the reverse dedicated to the Bactrian Goddess Ardoxsho. Mainstream scholars generally agree that this is a derivation of the name Lakshmi. However, from a purely Sanskrit point of view, the name Ardoxsho seems to be a variation of Dakshaja (दक्षजा), another name of the goddess Durga, rather than of Lakshmi.
A. The Snake Spring of Gardez, Paktia Province
The Kushan kings, who proclaimed themselves devotees of Śiva, left traces of their worship not only in coins and inscriptions but also in the sanctuaries they frequented. In Gardez, one such sanctuary survives—today little known, yet remembered as Cheshme Maran, the “spring of Maran', located at 33°35'03.7"N 69°14'48.6"E near Aslat.
Overlaid by the mosque‑shrine of Shah‑e‑Mardan, the site still preserves its older sanctity: water bursting from the earth in serpent‑like coils beside a ritual Hill called Naderiyah, which stands 725 metres above the river surface at its foot. There is a riverside garden here too, called Namuri. These features evoke the layered sanctity of a Śaiva shrine, later absorbed into Islamic devotion but echoing Kushan Shaivite patronage. This spring site lies on the way from Gardez to Ghazni via the Ramak Valley, the Rama-Indu valley that Xuanzang recorded.
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| Chasme Maran is located near Gardez on the way to Ramak after crossing a valley called Rama-Indu by Xuanzang. |
The name Cheshme Maran preserves the Persian mar (snake), itself derived from the Indo‑Iranian root 'mar', 'to kill', ultimately from Sanskrit mṛ (मृ), meaning 'kill'. In the Avestan myths, serpents such as Aži Dahāka embody this lethal force, guardians of springs and thresholds. Yet the name is likely a later overlay; the original designation may have been linked to nāga, Sanskrit for 'serpent'. Afghan toponymy preserves this older stratum in names like Naguman Ghar (“Serpent Mountain”), with 'ghar' from Sanskrit giri (“mountain”), situated near waterbodies called Sarawbi and Surobi, themselves derived from sara, 'lake' or 'pond'.
Taken together—the spring, the serpent fountain, the earthen rise, and the riverside setting—these features evoke the layered sanctity of a Śaiva shrine, later absorbed into Islamic devotion but still preserving echoes of its deeper antiquity. Thus, Gardez’s serpent‑spring stands as a frontier shrine where Kushan kings could inscribe their devotion to Śiva upon the landscape.
On the iconography and identity of Kushan Manaobago
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| Naghuman Ghar is a mountain peak in the Kabul region, near waterbodies named Sarawbi and Surobhi, the names akin to the Sanskrit surabhi. Courtesy: Google Maps |
The earthen hill beside the fountain, modest yet enduring, perhaps a miniature representation of Meru, rises from Gardez’s high plain at 2,300 m, marking the union of earth and water that so often defined early Śaiva shrines. And connecting the word Maran (snake) and meru (cosmic mountain) appears to be a long shot, but it really isn't, for ultimately both of these words derive from the same Sanskrit root, mri, 'to kill', 'to grind' or 'crush'.
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| A fish or nagini-shaped flask used for water-offering from Afghanistan. Courtesy: Kabul National Museum |
The survival of Vedic names and toponymic echoes across the northwest frontier—rivers such as Kubhā and mountains like Mūjavant—attests to a deep Indic stratum that endured in the landscape of Badakhshan. Though geographically close to the lands that became flourishing Buddhist centres, such as Parwān, Badakhshan itself shows only limited traces of Buddhist presence. Its rugged mountains and high passes made it more a corridor of transit than a locus of monastic settlement. While lapis lazuli and salt drew traders into the region, the archaeological record suggests that Buddhism did not take deep root here.
By contrast, the Vedic presence seems to have survived in a more lasting way, relatively untouched by later influences. In Badakhshan and its adjoining valleys, Indic memories endured, sanctifying the terrain long before Buddhist or Islamic layers reshaped the cultural map. Traditions of Vedic worship appear deeply entrenched, with the very geography bearing the imprint of divinity. In the Wakhan district especially, the Sanskrit–Vedic–Purāṇic presence remains unmistakable: the name Wakhan itself resonates with the ancient river Vakṣu, remembered in the Ṛgveda and Purāṇic texts as a civilizational frontier alongside the Sindhu and Sarasvatī.
In the scriptures, the Vakṣu (वक्षु) is counted among the great rivers of the northwest, alongside the Sindhu and Sarasvatī, marking the civilizational frontier. Varāhamihira’s Bṛhat‑Saṃhitā lists it among the rivers of the northern lands, while the Mahā‑Māyūrī Vidyārājñī explicitly identifies Vakṣu with the Oxus. This mighty river—known today as the Amu Darya, or as the Panj within Afghanistan—rises in the high valleys of the Wakhan Corridor, where the glaciers of the Pamir and Hindu Kush converge. The corridor’s very name, Wakhan, thus etymologically resonates with the ancient Vakṣu.
The Vakṣu lends its identity to Badakhshan as well. Mainstream etymologies often trace the name Badakhshan to Sasanian administrative titles such as bēdaxš or badaxš. Yet such explanations begin with bureaucratic terminology and overlook a more elemental truth: these are ancient lands, and they must have carried names long before imperial offices were imposed upon them.
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| Lake Shiva and Mt. Mandaras of Badakhshan Province. Manadara was the name of the mountain where Shiva meditated. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
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| The highest peaks of the Hindukush derive their names from Sanskrit scriptures. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
The names themselves preserve Sanskrit echoes. Zorkul resonates with sara and kulya, both meaning water or stream. Ak Su recalls the phonetic memory of Vakṣu. Pamir may derive from Paramīra or Paramita (पारमित) — 'that which is traversed'—names appearing in Varāhamihira’s Bṛhat Saṃhitā and the Brahmāṇḍa Purāṇa alongside Pārasika, with the same meaning.
The very geography of the land bears the imprint of divinity: the name of Śiva embedded in the terrain, with Lake Shiva in the Wakhan district of Badakhshan province serving as a living reminder. At over 3,100 meters, it is regarded as Afghanistan’s highest lake — a sign that Śiva’s name itself occupies the loftiest waters of the land. Likewise, the mountains echo this hierarchy: Tirich Mir or Titits Meru as the crown, Mandaras as the cosmic counterpart, Noshaq as śṛṅga, Shakhwr as śikhara. In each summit, Śiva’s epithets rise to the highest peaks of the Hindu Kush. And flowing nearby, the Vakṣu/Panj as Soma’s river, carrying the resonance of Vedic hymns into the valleys of Badakhshan. To revisit their Sanskrit etymology is to uncover how, in the Wakhan region of Badakhshan, the highest waters, peaks, and rivers still speak in Śiva’s name.
As one moves along the Vakshu River, one arrives at Panjshir Province, named after the name that the Vakshu River took in later times. The name Panjshir itself reveals obvious Sanskrit roots: pañca (पञ्च ) 'five', and śirṣa (शीर्ष), 'peaks', literally 'the five peaks'. This decoding not only restores Indic echoes to the valley’s nomenclature but also situates Panjshir within the broader sacred geography of Afghanistan, where mountains, rivers, and settlements carried layered meanings across traditions.
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| Gorvana on the Bamiyan River is a memory of the ancient Sanskrit name Girivana or Girivanta. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
A. BĀMIYĀN
Purāṇic legends abound across Afghanistan. Among the Hindus of this land, an ancient tradition held that Bāmiyān was sanctified by Viṣṇu himself. They revered the Band‑e Amīr lakes as the Bindu‑sarovara of the Purāṇas—the sacred reservoir where the teardrops of Viṣṇu fell upon the earth. In this vision, Bāmiyān was not merely a valley of stone but a consecrated kṣetra, a terrain marked by Viṣṇu’s insignia and eternal seal. The very soil was imagined as bearing the imprint of the divine, making Bāmiyān the land of Viṣṇu, or of his Vāmana avatāra, in the era before Buddhism.
a. Band-e Amir and the Puranic Lakes: In Bamiyan, there is a string of five lakes, collectively known as Band-e Amir, a stunning chain which reflects elements of Vedic and Puranic geography, and which caused the Hindus of Afghanistan to link them with Puranic theology. According to Puranic theology, there are five sacred lakes known collectively as the Pancha Sarovar. These lakes include Manasarovar, Bindu Sarovar, Narayan Sarovar, Pampa Sarovar, and Pushkar Sarovar. They are mentioned in the Shrimad Bhagavata Purana and are situated in various locations throughout India, with Manasarovar located in Tibet.
Bamiyan also carries its own tradition of Tantric goddess worship. In her ugra (उग्र), or fierce manifestation, Śakti assumes the form of Kālī, iconographically represented with her tongue extended. In this aspect, she is invoked as Vāmikā, a name derived from the Sanskrit root vāmi (वामि), connoting 'to eject' or 'to expel', here understood as the emission of fire or energy from the mouth. In the Ardhanareshvara form of Shiva, she appears on the left side, and is hence vama (वाम) or 'the one who adorns the left side'.
This varied etymology reveals Bamiyan’s antiquity and its layered sanctity. At a very early period, it was considered the metropolis of the feet of Buddha, hence emphatically called Buddha-Bamiyan. Later, Muslim chroniclers distorted this venerable title into But-Bamiyan—'Bamiyan of the idols' or 'of the evil spirit'. Yet Wilford reminds us that 'Para', signifying 'pure and holy', is also one of the thousand names of Vishnu.
Archaeological evidence reinforces this Vishnuic aura. The celebrated Vishnu Nicolo Seal, discovered in Gandhara (in neighbouring Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), depicts a four-armed deity, probably Vishnu or Vāsudeva, being prayed to by a royal devotee. The deity holds Vishnu’s classical attributes: the gada (club), chakra (discus), and lotus. Dating to the 4th century CE, this seal demonstrates that Vishnu worship was active in the Gandhara-Bamiyan corridor, and that Hindu devotional iconography was integrated into the broader artistic milieu of the region.
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| The Vishnu Nicolo Seal from Gandhara (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 4th century CE), depicting a four-armed Vishnu, being prayed to by a royal devotee. British Museum. Image by World Imaging, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons. |
Thus, Bamiyan emerges as a palimpsest: first as a land of Śakti, then as Vishnu-Bamiyan sanctified by the tears and insignia of Vishnu, later Buddha-Bamiyan, the metropolis of the feet of the Enlightened One; and finally reframed in Islamic chronicles as But-Bamiyan. The Vishnu Nicolo Seal provides the archaeological anchor that confirms Bamiyan’s Vedic-Puranic identity as a land of Vishnu, along with his mount, the Garuda.
In the present day, the accepted etymology of Bamiyan is linked to Old Persian Bamikan. Old Persian Bamikan derives from Avestan 'bamim', where it means shining or radiant. Avestan, like always, itself derives from Sanskrit, where bhamin (भामिन्) means 'shining'. It derives ultimately from the root bha (भा), which means 'to shine'. It is the same bha which appears in the name Bharata.
B. Garuda's flight through Bāhlika
“And Garuda, that foremost of birds, leaving the northern countries and Bāhlika and the mountains of Gandhamadana, flew towards Ramanaka, the abode of the serpents…”
This passage situates Bāhlīka as the point of departure from which Garuḍa’s shadow spreads across the northern frontier before he soars toward Gandhamādana and finally Rāmanaka. The precise location of Gandhamādana remains uncertain, but in this context, we align it with the region described in Jaina texts adjacent to the Nīla Mountains and in the Puranas as Nilagiri. This identification will gain further clarity when we examine the Hari Rud region of Afghanistan. As for Rāmanaka, its placement will also be established toward the conclusion of this journey, when we anchor it on the present‑day map.
2. Garuḍasthāna and Uparisaena: Garudasthana is simply another rendering of Uparisaena, the name of the Hindukush Range in the Sanskrit scriptures. Upari (उपरि) means 'high up', a form that survives in almost all Indo-European languages, including English, where it appears as 'up' and 'upper'. Sanskrit syena (श्येन) means 'eagle' or 'falcon', just as garuda does. Sthāna (स्थान) means 'place'. Hence, Uparisaena and Garudasthana have the same meaning, 'the high place of the eagle', making Hindukush the abode of Garuda.
3. Garuda and the Vedas: The Vedas also speak often of śyena, in relation to garuda. In the Rigveda, the divine eagle ascends to heaven to bring down Soma, the nectar of immortality (RV 9.68.6, RV 10.144.4):
śyenena somaṃ divo ā jahāra — “The falcon brought Soma from heaven.”
The Rigveda also speaks of this bird as Garutmat, where the prefix garut is an earlier form of the name Garuḍa. In Indo‑European phonetics, the dental consonants /t/ and /d/ are interchangeable, so the transition from garut to garud follows a standard pattern in which /t/ softens to /d/. Garut (गरुत्) means 'wing of a bird'.
Thus, Garuḍa is not a new name but is the same as Garutmat, with the addition of the suffix ‑mat, meaning 'possessing' or 'endowed with'. In Sanskrit, Garutmat translates as 'possessing wings', and it is from here that the name Garuda also gets its meaning.
We must therefore note that the Rigveda already contains a variety of designations related to this celestial bird: śyena, the falcon or eagle who wrests Soma from the heavens, and Garutmat, the winged one whose name anticipates the fully personified Garuḍa of the later epics. The two terms coexist in the earliest textual layer, showing that the eagle archetype was not an invention of later scriptures but part of the Vedic literature itself.
It must be noted that the land, equated in the epic tradition with Uparisaena, is never conflated with the geography of Persia; its identity remains purely Indic. Thus, Afghanistan's description as 'the high place of the eagle' or 'Garuḍasthāna' is not a fanciful projection but a motif deeply embedded in the earliest Indic texts—Garuḍa was the entity of Uparisaena, the bird of the summit. If we accept one rendering, we must accept the other: Wilford’s Garuḍasthāna and Edward Burt’s Uparisaena converge upon the same archetype, the eagle at the heights, guardian of thresholds between earth and sky. For the Hindus of Bāhlika or Uparisaena, their homeland was Garuḍasthāna, the land of Garuḍa.
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| Garuda head from the ancient site of Tapa Sardar near Ghazni (6th–8th century CE). Courtesy: Wiki Commons |
B. Finding Garudasthana
When Francis Wilford recorded the memory of Garuḍasthāna in his writings, he described a cave‑temple—a den—dedicated to the great bird. With no Hindus remaining in Afghanistan, the memory of Garuḍa’s cave has faded into obscurity. What may once have been a living tradition, orally preserved among Afghan Hindus, has dissolved into silence. Even in Wilford’s day, the location of the site proved elusive, and scholars dismissed the testimony of the Varanasi pundits—who had relayed the account from the Purāṇas and through their exchanges with Afghan Hindus—as wholly inaccurate. Yet the clues Wilford preserved remain detailed enough to warrant close examination. They are fragments, but fragments that glimmer not only with possibility, but—as we shall soon discover—with truth.
1. Onomastic clues (name‑based): To trace Garuḍa’s den, we must follow these scattered hints with patience. Wilford notes that the city of Bamiyan itself was situated in the forest of Garutman, the domain of Garuḍa. That pinpoints our search in the vicinity of Bamiyan town.
Wilford also identifies the site with the name, Goracshavan, which he interprets as 'forest of the protected cows'. At first glance, this may seem a doubtful or imaginative rendering, yet Wilford may have had reason to consider its validity. If that land was sacred to the Hindus, then perhaps the cows there were indeed protected. Cows were symbols of wealth in a godhana economy. In Sanskrit, go (गौ) means 'cow', while dhana (धन) means 'wealth'. To invoke cows in this context was to invoke prosperity, sanctity, and the very fabric of social order.
Wilford further notes that the local Muslims of his time referred to the site as Ghorband. This name is not difficult to situate, for even today, a district of that designation exists in Parwan Province, lying in the southern foothills of the Hindu Kush. The Ghorband Valley is located roughly 100 kilometres east of Bamiyan, and its fertile basin has long been recognised as a distinct geographic unit. Wilford appears to have interpreted the name etymologically from Pashto—deriving ghwa (cow) and band (to enclose, to protect)—and on this basis conjectured that the older Sanskritic form must have been Gorakṣavana, 'the forest of cow‑protection'.
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| Gorvana, on the River Ghorbhand, now called the Bamiyan River. Map Courtesy: Bing Maps |
In Purāṇic lore, śabaras are forest‑dwelling tribes, often grouped with hunters, ascetics, and communities beyond the mainstream fold that Garuda devoured. Among them are included Shiva's attendants called the Pramathas, whose name translates to 'protector', and other marginal groups such as the nāgas and niṣādhas.
The imagery of Garuḍa devouring the śabaras resonates with wider mythic patterns. The Greek myth, where the Eagle eternally devours Prometheus’ liver as punishment for stealing fire from the gods, may preserve a refracted version of this Purāṇic motif.
The connection deepens when we recall that in the Ṛg Veda, Pramatiḥ is also an epithet of Agni, the fire‑god. In Greek myth, Prometheus is the bringer of fire to humankind. Though the name Prometheus, a cognate of Sanskrit pramati (प्रमति) or 'protector', is traditionally glossed from Greek as 'forethought', the myth of him stealing fire from the gods and gifting it to mortals may in fact preserve a memory of the Vedic fire-bringer. The gift of fire—understood as wisdom and philosophical teaching—was intended for the wider benefit of humanity. In this light, Prometheus stealing fire from the gods and giving it to mortals can be read as a transmission of Vedic knowledge into the Greek world.
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| Second-century Gandhara schist relief depicting Garuda with serpents clenched in his beak, echoing the Mahabharata’s account of his enmity with the Naga clan. Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons. |
Wilford’s account, though striking, on first glance appears to be problematic. He equates the name Shibar (शबर) with the myth of Garuḍa devouring śabaras and Pramathas, when the Purāṇas consistently describe Garuḍa as devouring serpents (nāgas). This, according to critics, was a forced conflation, and hence the criticism erupted. Yet even in its distortion, Wilford’s testimony preserves fragments worth reconsidering: the echo between Śabara and Shibar, the interplay of Garuḍa and fire‑bearing attendants, and the uncanny parallels with Prometheus. One must observe that Wilford could have just as easily linked the name Shibar with that of Shiva himself, but he does not. He insists on the Shibara-Garuda link. Local explanations claim Shibir/Shabar derives from the Dari word Shibighan, 'place of the shepherd'. This is little more than a superficial sound-match, the very practice mainstream scholars criticise in amateur etymologists.
Therefore, mainstream scholarship is equally guilty of forcing etymologies. Local explanations claim Shibir/Shabar derives from the Dari word Shibighan, 'place of the shepherd'. This is little more than a superficial sound-match, the very practice mainstream scholars criticise in amateur etymologists.
By contrast, Sanskrit decoding operates on a different plane. Vedic etymologies root themselves in the geography of the land; Purāṇic etymologies transmit that same geographic truth through legend and tale. Therefore, Sanskrit names also almost always represent dual means, but both in sync with one another, depicting the Sanskritic meaning and the Puranic anchoring.
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| The Shibar Pass, Afghanistan By František Řiháček – Original prints. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons. |
Sanskrit thus reveals the truth embedded in the land: Shibra is not a shepherd’s pasture as mainstream and folklore etymology says, but a connective artery, a passage joining lower and upper routes, geography and myth, Kabul and Bamiyan. The Shibar Pass was a vital artery of the Silk Road, linking Indian and Chinese trade with the Mediterranean, and in epic memory, a corridor through which Gandhāra’s warriors may once have marched to lands beyond.
B. At Gandhamadana and Garuda's Den
Garuda's Den, according to Wilford, lay in the vicinity of Gorbhand and Shibar Pass. A little exploration in the area reveals that less than a mile from Gorvana lie the caves, now known as Foladi Valley Caves. They lie in the Foladi Valley of Bamiyan Province, on the Foladi River—a tributary of the Surkhab, at the threshold where waters turn east toward the Indus, giving them a natural sanctity, contrasting with the neighbouring Bamiyan Valley, whose river flows westward into the Amu Darya.
The Foladi Caves comprise nearly fifty chambers, long regarded as prehistoric dwellings inhabited for thousands of years. Archaeological traces within them suggest that they once sheltered Homo sapiens during the Stone Age. Artefacts and cave paintings from that era provide valuable insights into the survival strategies and lifeways of early communities. In later centuries, the caves became sanctified as a monastic retreat for Buddhist ascetics, though their history reaches back much further. In the pre‑Buddhist era, they were revered by the followers of Viṣṇu, and tradition held that Garuḍa, the divine mount of Viṣṇu, had his abode in this vicinity.
Francis Wilford recorded this layered history. He noted that the Hindus of the region called the land Vamiyan and regarded it as the domain of Viṣṇu’s Vāmana avatāra. According to legend, Viṣṇu first appeared in dwarf form as Vāmana, before expanding into his cosmic giant aspect, Trivikrama, who measured the universe in three strides. Some scholars have argued that the Buddhist culture of Bamiyan was built upon this older veneration of colossal forms. The two massive niches that later housed towering Buddha figures may originally have contained representations of Viṣṇu in his dual aspects—Trivikrama the giant and Vāmana the dwarf.
At the Foladi Caves, we see traces of Vedic worship in one of the surviving carved ceilings of the caves, which depicts the Vedic 'shatakona' representing the union of Shiva and Shakti.
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| A pencil sketch of a decorated Foladi Cave Ceiling depicting a shatkona, a Vedic Yantra. Original picture owned by Sahai Travels, Islamabad, Pakistan. |
Wilford records that Hindus of his time still visited the Foladi caves, preserving the memory of their sanctity. Beyond the Foladi caves was an ascent. We now know that this was the climb route to the highest peak of the Kuh-e Baba Range. Wilford himself did not attempt the ascent beyond the caves, remarking upon the difficulty of the climb. In his words: “I was not fortunate enough to meet with pilgrims, who had seen this place, which I understand is seldom visited on account of its being difficult of access, and because few and trifling indulgences only are to be obtained there.”
From the Foladi caves, a path rises upward to the highest point of the Koh-e-Baba Range. The valley’s contours lift gradually from the Foladi River’s banks first towards the foothills of Koh‑i‑Baba. Then the terrain begins to swell into rounded ridges and limestone escarpments. This threshold marked the beginning of the pilgrim’s ascent. Step by step, devotees would have moved from the river’s edge, past the cavern sanctuaries, and into increasingly forbidding terrain, and finally to the highest point of the Koh-e Baba range.
The highest mountain of the Koh-e Baba Range rises like the beak of an eagle, the Garuda. From the pointers left to us, we may deduce that this is Mt. Shringa of the Puranas. In Sanskrit, the word shringa (शृङ्ग) means a 'peak', a 'horn' or any 'curved weapon'. When you put the multiple meanings of the name Shringa together, one sees in it the description of the highest point of Koh-e-Baba. The Afghans call it Shah Foladi, for it is also the highest peak of Bamiyan. To the Hindus of Wilford's time, the whole region was Garudasthana.
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| Shāh Folādī, the highest peak of the Koh‑e‑Bābā range, rises in Bamiyān like Garuḍa’s beak above the Folādī caves. It is the Purāṇic Mount Śṛṅga, where myth preserves a truth. Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons |
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| This is the highest point of the Koh-i-Baba Range,,The Hindus called the dark cavity Garudasthana, or Garuda's Den. Source: Google Earth (Imagery ©2026 Maxar Technologies) |
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| The blue-hued mountains that surround Firoze Kuh in Ghor Province are likely the Nilagiri of the Puranas. |
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| Nawur appeared as Naggur in the 18th-century map of Captain Renell. Both names are a distortion of the Sanskrit 'Nagar'. |
Says Sabha Parva 27.1, "Arjunaḥ pratigṛhya diśaṃ pratīcīṃ mahābalaḥ “Arjuna of great strength accepted the western direction.”
gandhārān bāhlikān caiva jitvā śvetagiriṃ tathā (Sabha Parva 28.10)
sa śvetagiriparyantaṃ jitvā rājānam āhave (Sabha Parva 28.6)
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| Saidan is a variation of Siddha, Sangesar is named after the waters of the Helmand, and Mundigak was the site where the ancient artefacts of the Mother Goddess were found. |
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