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Kāliṅga

It is not, however, included in the list of sixteen Janapadas appearing in the Aṅguttara Nikāya (A.i.213, etc.), but is found in the extended list of the Niddesa (CNid.ii.37). A later tradition (Bu.xviii.6) states that after the Buddha’s death, a Tooth was taken from among his relics and placed at Kāliṅga, where it was worshipped. From Kāliṅga the Tooth was brought to Sri Lanka, in the time of King Sirimeghavanna, by Hemamālā, daughter of Guhasīva, king of Kāliṅga, and her husband Dantakumāra, a prince of the Ujjeni royal family. In Sri Lanka the Tooth became the “Palladium” of the Sinhalese kings. (Cv.xxxvii.92; see also Cv.Trs.i.7, n.4; the Dāthādhātuvamsa gives details, J.P.T.S.1884, pp.108ff).

The Jātakas contain various references to Kāliṅga. There was once a great drought in Dantapura, and the king, acting on the advice of his ministers, sent brahmins to the king of Kuru to beg the loan of his state elephant, Añjanavasabha, credited with the power of producing rain. On this occasion, however, the elephant failed and the Kāliṅga king, hearing of the virtues practised by the king and people of Dantapura, offered them himself, upon which rain fell. See the Kurudhamma Jātaka, J.ii.367ff, also DhA.iv.88f. A similar story is related in the Vessantara Jātaka, vi.487, where the Kāliṅga brahmins ask for and obtain Vessantara’s white elephant that he may stay the drought in Kāliṅga.

Another king of Kāliṅga was a contemporary of Aruna, the Assaka king of Potali. The Kāliṅga king, in his eagerness for a fight, picked a quarrel with Aruna, but was worsted in battle, and had to surrender his four daughters with their dowries to Aruna (J.iii.3f).

The Kāliṅgabodhi Jātaka relates the story of another ruler of Kāliṅga while, according to the Sarabhaṅga Jātaka, a certain king of Kāliṅga (J.v.135f) went with two other kings, Atthaka and Bhīmaratta, to ask Sarabhaṅga questions referring to the fate of Dandakī. There they heard the sage teach, and all three kings became ascetics. Another king of Kāliṅga was Nālikīra, who, having ill-treated a holy man, was swallowed up in the Sunakha-niraya, while his country was laid waste by the gods and turned into a wilderness (Kāliṅgārañña). The Kāliṅga-arañña is referred to in the Upāli Sutta (M.i.378); the story is related in J.v.144 and, in greater detail, in MA.ii.602ff. In the Kumbhakāra Jātaka (J.iii.376) the Kāliṅga king’s name is Karandu.

From early times there seems to have been political intercourse between the peoples of Kāliṅga and Vaṅga; Susīmā, grandmother of Vijaya, founder of the Sinhalese race, was a Kāliṅga princess, married to the king of Vaṅga (Mhv.vi.1; Dpv.ix.2ff). Friendly relations between Sri Lanka and Kāliṅga were evidently of long standing, for we find in the reign of Aggabodhi II. (601-11 A.C.) the king of Kāliṅga, together with his queen and his minister, coming over to Sri Lanka intent on leading the life of a recluse and joining the Order under Jotipāla. Aggabodhi and his queen treated them with great honour (Cv.xlii.44ff). Later, the queen consort of Mahinda IV. came from Kāliṅga and Vijayabāhu I. married a Kāliṅga princess, Tilokasundarī (Cv.lix.30). We are told that scions of the Kāliṅga dynasty had many times attained to the sovereignty of Sri Lanka and that there were many ties of relationship between the royal families of the two countries (Cv.lxiii.7, 12f). However, it was Māgha, an offspring of the Kāliṅga kings, who did incomparable damage to Sri Lanka and to its religion and literature (Cv.lxxx.58ff).

According to the inscriptions, Asoka, in the thirteenth year of his reign, conquered Kāliṅga and this was the turning-point in his career, causing him to abhor war (Mookerji: Asoka, pp.16, 37, 214). Among the retinue sent by him to accompany the branch of the Sacred Bodhi Tree on its journey to Sri Lanka, were eight families of Kāliṅga (Sp.i.96).

Asoka’s brother Tissa, later known as Ekavihāriya, spent his retirement in the Kāliṅga country with his instructor Dhammarakkhita, and there Asoka built for him the Bhojakagiri-vihāra (ThagA.i.506).

According to the Vessantara Jātaka (J.vi.521), the brahmin village Dunnivittha, residence of Jūjaka, was in Kāliṅga.

Kāliṅga is generally identified with the modern Orissa. (CAGI.590ff; Law: Early Geography, 64; see also Bhandarkar: Anct. Hist. of Deccan, p.12).

Dictionary of Pāli Proper Names • G.P. Malalasekera