Published in Calcutta Review 92, no. 184 (April 1891): 305-327.
Aryavarta Map-Prepared and published by Babus Nagendra Nath Vasu and Upendra Chandra Vasu, Calcutta.
At a recent meeting of the Asiatic Society was exhibited a Map of Aryavarta, [1] on a new plan. I then made some passing remarks on the site of our familiar Kalighata, shown in the Map, under its Sanskrit form of Kalighatta, I subsequently made researches on the subject, the result of which is the following paper.
To account for the place of Kalighata in this Map, the history of its origin should, if possible, be gathered from the Sastras and from current traditions. The boundaries of Aryavarta have been developing, since the earliest notice of its name and limits, in various classes of Sanskrit works. The compilers seem to have given its extent according to the latest descriptions, and exhibited the sites of important ancient places, from such works as were available to them. Where do we find the first mention of Kalighat, and what is the approximate date of the first appearance of its name, are the starting questions. Their solution is important, not only in themselves, but as connected with the foundation of Calcutta, the name of which is generally believed to have been derived from Kalighata.
The word Kalighata, as a compound, means the Ghat of Kali, that is, the Ghat in the neighbourhood of Kali's altar, or where people land to proceed to it. In time it gave its name to the locality where the shrine of the goddess is situated. The legend of the goddess of Kalighata springs from the story of the Daksha Yajna [2]. Sati, the daughter of Daksha, consumed herself in her wrath, at the insult offered to her husband Siva, at the sacrifice, by her sire. Siva, by the power of his Yoga, reclaimed her lifeless body from the fire, flung it on his shoulders, and, in this plight, in a terrific storm of maddening agony and fury at the bereavement, tramped about, in thundering steps, over all the regions of the world. Heaven and earth tottered from their foundations; the universe was threatened with utter annihilation; the gods trembled, and, in great alarm, sought the protection of Vishnu. Vishnu came to the rescue of creation. Fast flew his flashing discus, which shivered the corpse into fragments. Every spot, where one of these fragments, or any of her ornaments, dropped, became a Pitha-sthana (or place sanctified by the fall), where the spirit of Sati, no other than divine energy, came to be worshipped, under a particular name, with a specially-named Bhairava, or Siva, in his terrific form. The Pitha-malas, or strings of names of these Pithas, with those of their presiding goddesses and Bhairavas, and a description of the particular relics that fell there, are given in various Sanskrit and vernacular works. Some of these Pithas are well-known places of pilgrimage ; others have fallen into obscurity, and there are not a few which it is now difficult to identify.
According to orthodox Hindu belief, the Dakshayajna was celebrated in the Satya Yuga, when the toes of the right foot of Sari fell in the neighbourhood of Calcutta, in the locality which has, since the manifestation of its sanctity, been named Kalipitha, Kalighata or Kalikshetra, the presiding goddess being Kali or Kalika, and the Bhairava Nakulesa. The Pitha-malas, in different works, vary as regards the names and numbers of the Pithas, the relics which originated the Pithas, and other circumstances. It is an important point of inquiry-which is the earliest work that mentions Kalighata as a Pithasthana, or names the above deities in connection with any sacred spot ?
Among the Puranas and Upa-Puranas, the latter class are admitted to be later productions, and of these the Kalika Purana, which introduces the worship of Sakti, as the wife of Siva, in her various forms, and perhaps first started the Pitha legend, is a work held in the highest esteem by the Saktas, and it might be expected to exhibit a complete list of the Pithas ; but, instead of this, we find in it, in a certain passage, mention of a very small number of Pithas only, and among them there is no mention of Kalighata. This name may occur in some one or other of the Puranas and Upapuranas, but, so far as my enquiries have extended, I have not been able to ascertain it. The Devi Bhagavata is a Purana of doubtful authority, and, although it is a Sakta Purana, and gives the names of 108 Pithas, it omits Kalighata. The Tantras acknowledged to be the latest of Sanskrit religious works, giving evidence of Sectarianism, in its extreme development, are often cited as authorities for the Kalighata Pitha. The number of these Pithas has, I believe, gone on increasing, owing to the necessity of imparting a character of sanctity to a place of Devi-worship, by identifying it with the locality where some relic of Sati had fallen in the Satya Yuga; and the ever-multiplying Tantras, or passages interpolated in authoritative works, have been appealed to for such identification. Kalighata appears to be one of these comparatively recent places.
Some highly esteemed Tantras, as the Mahanirvana, ignore this Pitha; while others of less repute, as the Brihat or MahaNila Tantra, the Acharanirnaya, and the Mahalingarchana Tantra, reckon it in their Pitha-malas; the Tantra Chudamani, in its list of 51 Pithas, mentions it as Kalipitha. As regards other particulars relating to this Pitha, the first of the four Tantras last named, calls-its presiding goddess Guhya Kali, or the unrevealed Kali ; the second gives also the name of the Bhairava of the place as Nakulisa ; while the fourth not only mentions the now popularly accepted number of Pithas, but seems to have been the fons et origo of the current Kalighata legend, inasmuch as it styles the goddess of the place Kali or Kalika, and its Bhairava, Nakulisa, and states its holiness to be due to the fall there of the toes of the right foot of Sati. Hence Kalipitha must be accepted as an alias of Kalighata. Kalikshetra, [3] also an apt name for it, as designating the field or demesne of Kali, is said to occur in some Purana, but I have not been able to trace it.
The discovery of these names in the above works does not, however, help us in the least in ascertaining the time when the goddess was first set up, or Kalighata became a generally acknowledged place of pilgrimage, because, in respect of the dates of the works, we are left to pure conjecture. There are, however, some reasons for believing that the worship of the Kali of this placeoriginated, in obscurity, sometime between the close of the fifteenth and the commencement of the sixteenth century.
The Ain-i-Akbari, it is true, does not mention Kalighata, though it notices some prominent places of pilgrimage, and, in one passage, speaking of Hindu Cosmogony, &c., alludes to the name of Maha Kali nay sets forth in the list of Mahals belonging to Sarkar Satgong (Saptagrama) Kalkatta itself. But the mere circumstance of the non-mention of Kalighata by Abul Fazl does not necessitate the conclusion that the place did not exist in Akbar's time, though, no doubt, it is presumptive proof of its not having acquired any great celebrity. The same may be said regarding the renowned Man Sing, Governor of Bengal and Behar, under Akbar, (who visited Jagannath Puri, and rescued it from the grasp of the Pathans) not having pilgrimised to Kalighata, even, when in 1589-90, while in pursuit of the Afghans, he had his cantonments at Jehanabad , not many miles from the holy spot. It is certainly most unreasonable to suppose that the great Rajput chief, whose devotion to Kali was so great as to have induced him, after his victory over Pratapaditya of Jessore, to remove thence to his own capital, as the richest prize, the image of Yasaresvari-Kali, would have failed to worship the Kali of Kalighata, if the place had then possessed any great attractiveness. Pratapaditya also, the redoubtable Bengali chief who defied the arms of Akbar, and fought for the independence of his Raj, was a distinguished Sakta, and was himself the founder of the Yasaresvari shrine; he might also be expected, if Kalighta (not at any, very great distance from his principality) had attained to any celebrity in his time, to have paid his devotions to the goddess of the place, with the eclat usual in those times; but instead of anything of this being recorded by any of his biographers, or by writers who allude to him in their works, he is said to have supplied a great want by the establishment of a Kali temple in his own Raj. [4]
In the Tantra Chudamani above-mentioned, which, owing to its giving the currently accepted list of Pithas and the fullest particulars regarding them, has been cited in the Sabdakalpadruma of Raja Sir Radhakant, in his article on Pitha, occurs the name of this Yasaresvari (the goddess of Yasara (Jessore]), as one of the Pithas sanctified by the fall there of Sati's hand. Connecting this circumstance with the fact of Pratapaditya's founding the Yasaresvari shrine, we are not only enabled to demonstrate the origin of this Pitha at a date not earlier than that of Akbar, but to fix the date of the Tantra Chudamani itself. I should notice two other Pithas named in this comparatively modern Tantra, viz., Nalahati (the site of the present Nalahati Station ?) and Bahala (Behala, seven miles south-east of Calcutta), the names of the presiding goddesses of these two places being Kalika and Bahala, respectively.
The Bengali work, known as Kavi Kankana's Chandi, was, as stated by its author, according to a certain edition of the work, written in Saka 1466, or 346 years ago, that is, twelve years before the accession of Akbar to the throne. In it, in the account of the voyages of Dhanapati and Srimanta Sowdagar, occur the names of both Kalighata and Kalikata. This would point to the recognition of the existenceof the two places at least three or four reigns before Akbar, at any rate towards the end of the fifteenth century. A shade of doubt, however, is cast upon these facts, by the circumstance of a very good edition of the work by Babu Akshaya Kumara Sarkar, published from a MS. in his house, which had been copied in Saka 1649, or 163 years ago, omitting the passages in which the names of the two villages are mentioned, and nowhere else noticing them. These passages, however, are given by Akshaya Babu, as " various readings," in the form of notes. [5]
Bharata Chandra, the famous Bengali poet of the last century, who wrote his Annada Mangala, &c., in Saka 1674 (A.D. 1752), of course, mentions, in his Pitha-mala, Kalighata, as originating from the fall there of the four toes of Sati's right foot, and speaks of the presiding goddess as Kali, and of Nakulesa, as Bhairava. This proves that in the days of the Sakta Maharaja Krishna Chandra of Nadiya (Nuddea), who was the Zamindar of "Pargana Calcutta, &c.," and whose Poet-laureate Bharata Chandra was, the current Kalighata legend had acquired maturity, and that, under some of the tolerant Nawabs of Bengal, but chiefly under British protection, even in the early days of the English period, Kalighata had reached the climax of its celebrity.
It appears, upon the authority of a Mahomedan writer, [6] Nawab Muhabbat Khan, whos peaks of Calcutta at a somewhat later time, that there was an assignment upon the Calcutta lands for the Seva of the Kalighata Kali.
Thus much for records of a historic character, showing it to be very probable, according to Kavi Kankana (if the passage, as above referred to be proved to be genuine, on reference to the holographical Chandi, said to be still available), that Kalighata existed sometime during the fifteenth century, as a Guhya-tirtha, or not very well known sacred place of worship, but that it acquired celebrity at a very much later period. Of Calcutta it may be said, moreover, that it not only existed as a Mehal at the same period, but was of sufficient importance to be reckoned by Todar Mull, in his Bengal Settlement, in 1578, as one of the important tracts of Sarkar Satgong, and to be assessed, along with Barbakpur and Bakua, at 936.215 Dams. Mythically. Kalighata may, of course, claim priority over Calcutta, but historically their comparative antiquity is uncertain.
Let us now see what tradition has to tell us about the origin of the present Kalighata. Once upon a time, it is said, a Sevayet Sannyasi, one of the Dasanamis, who had become a follower of the tenets of Yogi Chaurangi, and Jangal Gir (Giri) by name, was known devoutly to worship a certain symbol of the goddess Kali at some place on the eastern outskirts of the old site of Govindpur (now occupied by Fort William), where the Presidency Jail at present stands. The Kali image worshiped at Kalighata is made up of different members of the body, mechanically adjusted together; the real sacred object being, it is believed, the veritable stone emblem which the Sannyasi used to worship, and which is supposed to have fallen from heaven to mark the place where the toes of Sati had fallen in a former age.
To account for Jangal Gir's selecting any particular spot in Govindpur [7] for his worship, when it was thickly covered with jungle, a story runs that, when this wandering devotee was roaming there, he frequently saw herds of kine making a detour from theirbeaten-path towards a particular point, and, after a while, returning to their usual course. One day, he followed them, and found, to his surprise, that, on arriving at a certain place, they, one by one, stretched their legs over it, and allowed their milk to flow from their udders for a few minutes. He brought this to the notice of the cowherd, and, with his aid, having the ground excavated, discovered the symbol (of which he had been previously apprised in a dream).
The exact spot where the symbol was for the first time set up, is not known, but there is no question that there was a ghat I on the bank of the river, somewhere between the sites on which the Barabazar and Prinsep’s Ghats stand, at which the pilgrims and people across the river, or from the neighbouring village, used to alight for the purpose of proceeding to her worship, and which soon, acquiring the name of Kalighata, gave, in turn, its own name to the present locality so called, and the title of the religious order of her first or earliest Sevayet, Chaurangi, soon became the eponym of the splendid Maidan that now graces our city. [8]
In looking for correct information about the Yogi Chaurangi, we find his name mentioned in the Hatapradipa-a work on certain Yogis-as one of the thirty-one Yogis therein mentioned. Wilson, in his Religious Sects (p. 215), gives these names on the same authority, with various readings which he noticed in the extract in the " Berlin Catalogue," No. 647. He makes Chaurangi the sixth teacher in succession from the first Adinatha, and Goraksha, the contemporary of Kabir, the eighth. Now, as the Bhaktamala and the Ain describe Kabir as the bold defender of his faith, when summoned to the presence of Sultan Lodi (1488-1518), Chaurangi must have lived in the early part of the fifteenth century, and Jangal Gir Chaurangi must have been one of his earliest followers.
"Chaurangi," again, as a mauza or village, is mentioned in the Ferdi Sanul, annexed to the Sanad for the Free tenure of Calcutta, &c., to the East India Company, under the seal of the Chhota Nawab, or Miran, the son of Mir Jafar. It is there described as belonging in part to Pargana Calcutta and partly to Pargana Paikan. This was in 1758-59 : but it may be safely argued that it had its place, along with Govindpur and Sutanuti, in the Sanad of 1696, which, however, is not now forthcoming in the Records of the East India House, and there is no means of verification, except by evidence of earlier periods, or by the surviving records in the families of the Zamindars from whom the historic “ Villages of Calcutta, Chuttanutty and Govindpore ” were purchased, by order of Azimus-shan, Aurungzeb's grandson.
Leaving Calcutta, for the present, let us remember that it has been shown to have existed long anterior to the reign of Akbar, at least, and that Sutanuti and Govindpur, so far as records go, are traceable to the early part of the seventeenth century. Information gleaned from private family records, in respect of these last two places, sheds, however, some further light on the Kalighata question.
Some centuries ago, when the river Sarasvati, at Satgong, showed incipient signs of silting up, [9] some of the people of that place, especially the mercantile and trading classes, felt the necessity of removing elsewhere. Hughli then was becoming an important mercantile town ; but, among the great merchants, five opulent families, one of Sett and four of Bysacks, emigrated to and colonized Calcutta. They arrived at the site of Govindpur, and, having cleared the jungle, settled at the place, excavated tanks, built houses and other structures, among which was the shrine of their tutelary deity, Govindjee, to commemorate whose name they called the new settlement Govindpur. They established also a cloth market, which was named Sutanuti Hat -a mart for the sale of skeins of thread and woven cloth-and from this the village in which it was situated was called Sutanuti. In the earlier Sanads this Sutanuti Hat is mentioned. The early Sett and Bysack settlers are also said to have patronised, in some sort, the worshippers (Pujaris) of the Kali in her first obscure abode,-but did not much care for the goddess; these families being, as their successors still are Vaishnavas. [10]
These five families count now seventeen generations from the first Patriarchs who landed at the place, with their families, to the present time :-
Generations,
Ist. Makundaram Seth … 17:
2nd. Kali Das Bysack … 16.
3rd. Siva Das Bysack … 15.
4th. Barpati Bysack … 15.
5th. Basudeva Bysack … 15.
The families are endogamous as their Gotras shew :-
Ist. Sethji, Maudgalya.
2nd. Bysack (Kalidas) Agnivesma.
3rd. Do. (Siva Das) Allodri Rishi.
4th. Do. (Barpati) Amba Rishi.
5th. Do. (Basudeva) Brahma Rishi.
We find that their emigration occurred nearly 425 years ago and, allowing them three generations at least to establish their influence in their new abode, and to spread their business, we trace back the discovery of the Guhya Kali, and Kalighata, in Chowringhee, or in the purlieus of the village of Govindpur, to some period in the early part of the fifteenth century.
The first Portuguese ship that sailed up the Hughli river in 1530 is said to have transacted her business with the Setts and Bysacks at Sutanuti.
We thus arrive at some definite conclusion regarding the approximate age of the foundation of the worship of Kali of Kalighat, and hence of the place itself.
The Tantra Chudamani, by reason of its mentioning in its Pitha-mala the name of Yasaresvari of Jessore, consecrated by Pratapaditya, is placed among works written in the time of Akbar, if not later, and as it also mentions Kalipitha, or (Kalighata), we must regard it as being first mentioned in a Sanskrit work which cannot be assigned to an earlier date than between 1556-1605.
Assuming the genuineness of the passages in Kavi Kankan's Chandi in which Kalikata and Kalighata are mentioned, the earliest mention of the latter in a Bengali work would be in 1544.
The Chaurangi, or rather Jangal Giri, legend, connecting it with facts gleaned from the Hatapradipa, would point to the origin of this Kali worship somewhere between the latter part of the fifteenth and the early part of the sixteenth century. Reference to the Seets and Bysacks genealogies and the traditions of these families carry back the origin of the worship at Ieast fourteen generations, that is to about 1470.
To those who know the difficulty, and, in most cases, impossibility, of solving chronological problems in respect of events of Indian history, or occurrences of importance relating to our country, not only those of ancient period, but even such as are conjectured to be of modern date, it would certainly appear most interesting that, with reference to the origin of theKali worship of Kalighata, evidence of such satisfactory character as I have shown, should be forthcoming from perfectly independent sources, all tending to place it beyond doubt that the Kalipitha originated in Govindpur towards the end of the fifteenth, or perhaps the beginning of the sixteenth century. There is a Purana the title of which occurs in generally accepted lists of such works, but which diligent investigations have pronounced to be not available now in all its integrity, or in any very reliable form, viz., the Bhavishya, which relates, as its name imports, to future events, being, in fact, ‘a Book of Prophecies.' In a fragment of this work, called the Brahma Khanda, there has been traced a passage which refers to the Vargabhima, goddess of Tamralipti (Tamluk), and of Kali, on the outskirts of Govindpur, on the side of Suradhani (the Bhagirathi), [11] and thus remarkably confirms (in its main features) the tradition I have already mentioned, and, what is also most important, proves, so long as nothing else turns up to contradict it, the origin of the name of Kalighata, or Kalighatta, to be subsequent to that of Govindpur, and hence this proximate date of the Tantras and other Sanskrit works in which the former name occurs.
Resuming the thread of the tradition of the origin of the Kali worship in the purlieus of Govindpur, which was languishing under the cold patronage of the successors of the early Vaishnava settlers of the place, we come across a supplemental anecdote, that, the miraculous discovery of the Pithasthan gradually getting wind, people began to resort to the holy spot and a pilgrim path was, in course of time, laid out. The Sakta Savarna Chaudhuris, after their settlement at Behala, and acquisition of zamindaries [12] in the neighbourhood, in the time, it is said, of Aurungzeb (1658-1707), removed the Kali symbol from its original place to its present locality. Many years later, some representative of the family, in order to expiate the sin of having accepted a gift (princely though it was) on the occasion of a big Sraddha of doubtful purity, spent it in raising the temple which still subsists; and Kalighata, the boundaries of which had at first, with the dawning celebrity of the goddess, extended far and wide, became, under later fiscal arrangements, reduced to its present limits in the 24-Parganas. When preliminary steps were taken for constructing Fort William in Govindpur, the settlers of the place were moved out, with such compensation as was awarded to them, and with this event disappeared the works of these people, the original site of Kali worship, and the very name of the village. [13]
In 1698, the situation of the three villages-Chuttanuttee, Calcutta and Govindpur-may be thus described :-The first occupied the northern part of the native quarter of the town, and form the Taluka that was given by Lord Clive to Maharaja Nava Krishna, whose descendants still own it; the third stood on ground now known as the new Fort William ; while the second (Calcutta) intervened between the other two, including the site of the old Fort, and subsequently of the Import Godown and Custom House. Its site is now occupied by Burrabazar and the chief European houses and buildings. Though Calcutta, as already noticed, was recognised as a Mehal of some importance, in Akbar's time, it is singular that no mention of its name has as yet been found to occur in the annals of the subsequent period, for a very long time. Colonel Yule, in his diligent explorations in the East India House and other places in England, having discovered an allusion to this in the oldest papers, says this ( “16th August 1688") is the earliest surviving record in which, so far as he was aware, he found the occurrence of the name of Calcutta, and in respect of Chuttanutti, its earliest surviving mention he traced to correspondence of the 31st December 1686, which was dated from that village ; but he subsequently found mention of this place, as well as of Govindpur, in some edition of the English Pilot and Old Marine Charts of 1675, thereby, of course, leading to the presumption of their existence in olden times. It is to be noted, however, that such was the obscurity of Calcutta, not to speak of Govindpur, for a long time, after the three villages had become well known to the English, that all their old correspondence was dated from Chuttanutti.
It was at this Cottonopolis (Sutanuti) [14] that Job Charnock, at this time, took shelter, after the ruin of Hugli factory by the hostile proceedings of the Nawab. Here he entered into negotiations with the Nawab's representatives and framed those articles, or stipulations which, in a great measure, formed the basis of future agreements. Here he lived with the early factors, and a handful of soldiers, in huts and hovels, tents and boats, until they could provide proper habitations; and here, in July 1690, he pitched his tabernacle, for the third time, in the shape of a factory which held, in an embryonic state, the germ of an empire which now owns the East; and, to quote the words of Yule: "If we have a very strong imagination, we may fancy the crabbed old agent chaunting :
‘Terna tibi hac primum triplica diversa colore
Licia circumdo, terque hac altaria circum
Effigiem duco, numero deus impare gaudet.' ”
The primal elements of our city were the three sister villages of Sutanuti, Calcutta and Govindpur, the first and third in the early days taking prominence; and they were welded together in the 1698 under the Sanad of Azimasshan. Next after the Grant of Ferokhsere in 1717, out of the 38 neighbouring towns which it granted to the Company, several were added to the amalgamated villages; then others were, from time to time, brought within the Company's bounds, till these combined localities, as exhibited in the Free Tenure Grant, in 1757, formed the city of Calcutta almost as it now is.
The designation of Calcutta is now applied not only to our city, which has for its component parts many old villages, with histories of their own, but to a Pargana which comprehends the city and many villages, at various distances from it ; and this Pargana again, is one of several which pass under the name of the district of 24-Parganas.
In the Aini Akbari (1578) Calcutta, as before stated, is mentioned as a Mahal which, with 52 others, was included in Sarkar Satgong. In the Grant of Ferokhsere (1717) the three historic villages abovenamed are alluded to as belonging to Pargana, Amirabad, a name which still survives as one of 24 places which constitute our 24-Parganas. In Mir Jaffer's Parwanas and other documents is seen the name of Calcutta, as applied to a Pargana side by side with Pargana Amirabad and others, and it is there described as situated in Chuckla Hughli, Sircar Satgaum, in the Paradise of Nations, the Subah of Bengal. Lastly, about the beginning ofDecember 1758, in one of the annexures to the Grant for the free tenure of Calcutta, Mauzas Govindpur and Sootalootee reappear, with Chowrungee and other now familiarly known places in our city, as belonging to the Pargana of Calcutta, while the town of this name, as comprised in it, is mentioned under the designation of Dihi [15] Calcutta. Any person wishing to write a systematic history of Calcutta, and to cull information regarding its origin, and its relation to many of its neighbouring old villages when it was itself one of such humble places, as well as in respect of many interesting topics which should form materials for this work, but which have, in many instances, not seen the light, or been only passingly alluded to, and in others have been erroneously described, will be amply rewarded for his toil, if he diligently searches among the Government Records in the East India House and other archives in England, and especially among the vast masses of papers in the Calcutta Board of Revenue and the Collectorates of Calcutta and the 24-Parganas. In the latter (the Board) there are also certain papers in the vernacular, which have, it is believed, scarcely been handled or examined with any care, and others which are perishing from the effects of time and the ravages of worms and various other causes. Steps have already been taken by me to move the Government to see papers of such historic value duly utilised, and I hope for some favourable result.
Coming now to the ancillary question of the eponymic, or derivative, relation between Kalighat and Calcutta, it is contended by some learned friend, with whom I have discussed the question, that, whatever may have been the early date of the mere entity of the name of Kalighata, Kalipitha or Kalikshetra (its celebrity being only of a recent period), Kalkatta cannot, in the light of history or religious usage, be a corruption of the word Kalighata. Kalkatta, again, is thus pronounced by the up-country people, while the Bengalis write the word Kalikata, and hastily pronounce it Kolkata or Kolketa, It is natural to suppose that the name of our city originated in Bengal, and not in Upper India ; it is also noticed that in Urduising Bengali compound words generally, the terminal vowel of the first member is dropped, the medial of the second when long, is shortened, and the final consonant is doubled, we have, therefore, from the Bengali Kali-kata, by eliding i, shortening the medial, and doubling it, the Urdu form as pronounced, through in the Ain it is spelt Kalkatta. To suppose now that the Sanskrit Kalighatta had first passed into the Bengali form Kalighata, on the Tantrik authority of the former name, and then from the latter into Kalikata, would necessitate the shortening of the a of Kali, transmuting the gh of ghata, into k, and prolonging the terminal a. All this, with the exception of the prolongation, which is often done in respect of ghata, is, it is argued, against linguistic rules; not to mention the fact that names of places, having ghata for their terminal member, have been preserved not only in the Bengali, with only such changes as ghata and ghati, but also in Urdu and some foreign languages. This difficulty was seen by some, and they got hold of kshetra in the compound Kali-kshetra, in order, as they thought, to derive kata from it more easily; but apart from other serious objections, they should have remembered that kshetra, as an adjunct to a word, is generally preserved, as Jagannatha kshetra ; the greatest change it undergoes being in the form kshet. It is needless to dwell upon the other imaginary derivation of the word Calcutta as from Kali-kota (the fort of Kali); Kali-kutta (the destroying Kali); Kali-kartri, [16] and so forth.
No Hindu, not even the most ignorant, will corrupt, in hasty utterance, much less in writing, the name of such a universally worshipped deity as Kali into Kali or Kol. The derivation of Calcutta, therefore, from Kalighat or Kalikshetra, &c., as generally accepted, is philologically, and from a Hindu religious point of view, impossible.
It is needful to notice here that Major Ralph Smyth, Revenue Surveyor, in his Statistical and Geographical Report of the 24-Pargana District, 1857, ignores altogether the name Calcutta in his statement of the three villages of which our city consisted in 1696, and uses, instead of it, the word Kaleeghatta. Is this due to his idea that the two places were identical in that early period, and is it supported by any data ? The question is one which can be solved, like many such problems, as before observed, by an examination of records relating to the fiscal arrangement of olden times. Aitchison, in his Treaties, &c., relating to India, speaks of the Grant of 1696 as missing, otherwise reference to it would have settled the point. In that most valuable book of reference, the Bengal and Agra Annual Guide and Gazetteer for 1841, Vol. II, 3rd Ed., the compiler, in speaking of the first Grant of "Chuttanuttee, Govindpur and Calcutta," says that the latter was "dedicated to the goddess Calee, the whole taking the name of the last, Calcutta." This confirms the statement of the Mahomedan writer already cited regarding the assignment upon Calcutta lands for the expenses of the service of the goddess, and hence arises an additional temptation to derive the word Calcutta from Kali, or compounds with Kali for one of its elements.
It is, however, apparent that, though the theory of the derivation of the word Calcutta, or Kalikata from Kalighata, or any of its aliases, is repugnant to Hindu notions and linguistic rules, there subsists an intimate connection between these places in many respects, and many a historical or traditional anecdote may be pointed to in illustration of this. Kali, par excellence, is regarded, to this day, as the guardian deity of our city, and we are reminded of this fact, every evening, when the cannon booms from the ramparts of Fort William to announce a certain hour of the night-Bom! Kali ! exclaims the Bengali Hindu, and Bam Kali Kalkuttawali ejaculates, with vehemence, the Up-country Hindu. [17] This practice, however, is fast disappearing.
It thus appears that, while one of the oldest Pauranik legends has been appealed to, and Tantric authorities are cited, to impart to Kalighat a most sacred character, an obscure tradition helps us to trace the origin of the magnificent Maidan of our city to the name of the Chaurangi sect to which a worshipper of her spouse belonged.
A departure from the long prevailing practice of connecting the name of Calcutta with the goddess Kali is to be found in an incidental allusion to it by Sir William Jones, who, inone of his letters to Samuel Davis, dated off Champal Gaut, 20th October, 1792, thus writes: "We are just arrived, my dear Sir, at the Town of Cali, or contention (which is the proper name, and a very proper name of Calcutta). [18]
‘Dissension,' indeed, is one of the meanings of the word Kali () Raja Sir Radha Kant, again, in a Bengali Hymnology which he composed at Brindaban, about a quarter of a century ago, christens the town Kil-Kila Nagara, “town of joyous sounds.” Kil-Kila, in this sense, is met with in many Sanskrit writings. This name of our city is said to have been accepted by the Raja from some Tantra.
In his Cyclopaedia, however, he omits its geographical signification, and possibly he may have met with it in this sense in some work after the compilation of his magnum opus. Strange names of even European countries and nations are here and there met with in the Tantras. Some of these works give the name of the English people as, Angareja from Angles, changing l into r, according to a well-known rule of Sanskrit Grammar, or perhaps adopting it from the Mahomedans, and call London Londeje (). It would not be quite unjustifiable to suppose that, in former times, there may have existed some reasons in connecting and confusing the names of Calcutta and Culculla or Calcula. The last mentioned-place was noted by W. Schoulten in 1664.
Hamilton says the first town of any note on the river side is Calcutta, a market town for corn, coarse cloth, & c. " Above it is the Dutch Banks Hall, it has a large deep river that runs to the eastward ;” and Valentyn (p. 158) says: “ Calcula, Mondelghat, and some other places below, supply most of the wax and hemp that we require." Colonel Yule says : “ The name Calcula (perhaps Khol Khali) seems quite to have disappeared.
The creek is probably represented by that now called Vanzan creek," which, again, he says, upon a high marine authority, has now silted up, and, strange to say, this Calcula, in an old chart, says Yule, is miswritten Calcutta, an error, which he supposes “due to the engraver in 1703 having heard of Calcutta.” In a map (1770), which the Colonel saw in the British Museum, and which the compiler describes as having been "drawn from the best authorities by Thomas Kitchen, Geographer,” he found this Calcula had been made into Calcutta, and our Calcutta itself was entered in its proper place as Calicotta, [19] and he supposes this map to have been copied from some French map, because the Isle of Dogs is given in it, as Ile des Chiens.In this connection it is worthwhile to mention that the well-known place Gholghat, which the above-named Nawab Muhabbat Khan describes as the locality near Hughli where the Company's factory was mentioned, and which Orme has made Golgot, and Herron in his Sailing Pilot (1675) has called Gullgat, has been strangely transmogrified by Frenchmen and confounded with Calcutta. Lallier (1702) calls Calcutta Golgouthe, and Sonnerat, though he himself names our city Calicuta, explains in a note that it is la capital des etablissemens Anglais dans le Bengale Les Anglais prononcent et ecrivent Golgata.
Some English writers seem to have adopted this French name with a slight mutation, for we find the Gentleman's Magazine, printed in London, in 1738-39, in describing the hurricane of 1737, which visited Calcutta and was accompanied by a violent earthquake, announces that in Golgota alone, a port belonging to the English, two hundred houses were thrown down, &c. From these latter designations the transition to Golgotta (the City of Skulls) was easy; and it soon became the significant sobriquet of our city, when most parts of it were overspread with jangal, when the Salt Lake to the east was far bigger and had begun to silt up, and when, all round and within, open cloacas, of all dimensions and in all their ramifications, loaded the atmosphere with their pestiferous vapours, and the servants of the Company at the close of the rains used punctually to draw up their wills in view of the certainty of approaching death.
Suraj-ud-daula, to commemorate his victory over the English by the capture of Calcutta, changed its name to that of Alinagar, or Allahnagar, the town of Ali, or “the port of God,” according to different interpretations ; but this title subsisted only for the brief period of a year, and was dropped after the battle of Plassey.
It must now appear, from the preceding facts and reasoning, that, as the name Kalighata or Kalikshetra, could not have come into existence before that of Calcutta, the favourite theory of the word Kulkutta or Kalikata or Kolkala being a corruption of the former, or of any Kali compound, should be abandoned. It is always a fatal error to seek for Sanskrit words only as the origin of designations of places in India. Professor Oppert, who is conducting his researches in respect of the ancient non-Aryan population of India, justly observes that “the derivation of names of Indian localities from Sanskrit words, as is usually done, should be discontinued, unless where such derivations are well-supported.” Calcutta, or any of its various other forms, is a peculiar name; no other place in Bengal bears this designation or any other very similar to it; and this may also be said, with greater force, of Sutanuti, and some of its other forms. There is a hill estate in the Ganjam District called Kalicote, which, with some others, was separated from Orissa, in 1730, and brought under the Madras Presidency; and the once celebrated seaport town of Calicut, in the British district of Malabar, seem to bear a very great resemblance to the name of our city. In respect of Calicut, it is singular that even Persian writers of Indian history were misled by the sound of the word into giving it a Kali origin, and calling it Kali-kot, though the true history of the place betrays their error. Tradition derives the name from Koli-Kodu 'a cock crowing,' “as Cheranian Perumal gave his sword and all the land, within cock-crow of a small temple, to the Zamorin” (Balfour's Cyclopaedia and Thornton's Gazetteer). Kalkatta, again, having been mentioned in the Ain Akbari as a place of some importance, it has been presumed that it must have existed a long time before Akbar in order to have acquired a noticeable character in the reign of that Emperor. Fifty years back, that is, about the last decade of the fifteenth century, would be the safest minimum limit. But there is nothing now to show for, or against, the supposition of its having existed centuries before the birth of Akbar. It is only the fiscal records of Bengal of the pre-Akbar period either in the Government Khalsa Dafter, or in any other public or private archives, which, ifforthcoming, could be expected to throw any light on the subject. Geology, of course, can calculate approximately the time when the deltaic region of the Ganges, where Calcutta stands (now a hundred miles from the sea), might probably have been formed and become fit for the habitation of such rude people as are still to be met with in similar localities. From that time to Akbar's is surely a prodigiously long lapse of ages during which that region must have been inhabited (despite forests and wild beasts) by one or more tribes of human beings, or successions of them.
A theory which a very learned friend suggests, based, as it is, on philosophical grounds, and perhaps possessing a shade of historic plausibility, is, that Calcutta was derived, in its chaste Bengali form, Kalikata and vulgar, Kolkata from Koli-ka-hata (Hindi ) and Kol-ka-hata (Hindi) meaning the settlement of the Kolis or of the Kols: the aspirate h, when following a long vowel, is generally dropped in hasty utterance, and we have (chastened into ) and the one form, or other, may be Urduised into Kalkatta.
The investigation of this theory is as yet very incomplete. It seems to indicate that, after the incredible volumes of Ganges-borne Himalayan debris had mainly built up the present site of our city, and when, according to geologic laws, it became in a manner fit for human habitation, its autochthones were the Kols, or perhaps, in some later period, a tribe of Kolis had their settlement on this side of the river.
It is curious, moreover, that the deities Siva and Kali, are supposed by some, with much probability, to have been borrowed by the Hindus from the aborigines of India-in spite of their analogies in the Egyptian Osiris and Isis. Siva, as the Lord of the Daityas and Danavas, of Nandis and Bhringis, with his Ophidian ornaments, and his consort Kali, as the Mistress of Dakinis and Rakshasis, nude, and with ornaments of human skulls, have, it is said, been emblematised, allegorised and sublimated in Pauranik literature. Their myths, in one or other of their many phases, are strangely connected with Calcutta, specially through Kalighata.
End Notes:
1. This map is intended to illustrate the article Aryavarta in the Visiva Kosha, a Bengali Encyclopaedia of great value and importance at the present day. Besides the general information on all varieties of subjects which such works usually convey, it gives results of original research in certain matters, deals in Glossology, and aims at the very useful work of preserving old traditions and indigenous words and phrases which are fast disappearing. The Map seems to have been compiled as a chart of Aryavarta according to the different Sastraic authorities-the latest of which are the Tantras. The compilers indicate places mentioned in modern works by underlining them; Kalighata has this indicating mark.
Ghat[a]. - One of its meanings is a landing-place on the riverside. In an amplifying and diminutive sense it is made Ghata and Ghati, respectively. So with the word hat[a], a market. Ghat[a]. Ghata and Ghati as well as Hat[a]. Hata, and Hati are to be found in innumerable names of places in Bengal, forming their terminal members.
2. The Yajna, or sacrifice, is said to have been performed by Daksha, one of the progenitors of mankind, in Kanakhala, very near Haridwar ; this place is, therefore, held as a place of pilgrimage. The legend has been variously interpreted. It has its mythical character as a story depicting, in Sati, the keen sense of a chaste wife for the honour of her husband and devotion to his interest; and, in Siva, the indissoluble love of a husband for his faithful spouse. It has its astronomical and sectarian interpretations also. Some point to it also as an allegorical representation of a geological phenomenon of ancient days. The main features of the story of this sacrifice form the subject of some of the sculptures at Elephanta and Ellora.
3. I have consulted a Palmleaf manuscript of the work, indicated in its colophon to have been copied in Saka 1657, or 1745 A.D. The Sabdakalpadruma refers to the chapters in which the names of the Pithas are given in this Purana.
mentioned in () See Colebrooke's Miscellaneous Essays, I, 112 ; Indische Studien I, 469; Rajatarangini I. 326; II, 468,
The Tantras, as a class of works on the Saiva and Sakta systems of religion, came into vogue at the closing period of Sanskrit literature, and their authorship being veiled in the dialogue of Siva and Parvati, their multiplication, with pretentions to antiquity, has become very easy. Still, however, the systems introduced by them have been traced to an age before the birth of Mahomed, and their number, as orthodoxically fixed, is stated to be 192, divided into 3 classes of 64 each.
4. In the Indian Antiquary (July 1873) a writer says: "According to the Puranas, a portion of the mangled corpse of Sati or Kali fell somewhere within that boundary (Bahula to Dakhinesvar), whence the place was called Kalikshetra."
Gladwin's Translation of the Ain, edition 1800, page 298.
Ibid, p. 191, and Blochman's Original Text vol. I, page 408. In the latter are given two other readings of Kalkata (), as () (Kalna),() (Kalta and (), talpa, but the learned Editor has relied, for, of course, the best of reasons, on the manuscript which gives the first reading.
Stewart's History of Bengal, edition 1813, p. 182.
5. It is contended by some learned Vaishnaves, that, in the Chaitanya Charitamrita (Life of Chaitanya), no mention is made of the great Reformer of Bengal having visited Kalighata. Born in 1485 A.D., he flourished in the early part of the sixteenth century. During his peregrinations he came as far as Varahanagara, but he never thought of seeing the Kali of Kalighata. As the founder of Vaishnavism, his religious instincts might have repelled the idea of Sakta worship, but it is not unnatural to suppose that, if Kalighata had been a known Tirtha in his time, he would have made his Puja for the sake of his beloved mother Sachi, who belonged to the sect of Saktas and worshipped Kali. But this fact cannot be adduced as an argument against the existence of Kalighata at the time. Chaitanya's travels being spiritual tours for conversion, he was led to go to places where he expected to gain his object, and not merely as a random pilgrim, to places reputed for their holiness only. There may be a thousand other reasons to account for his not visiting Kali, or for the non-mention of the goddess in the Chaitanya Charitamrita.
6. It is said a holograph MS. of Mukundarama Chakravarti Kavikankana is still preserved and worshipped in the house of some descendant of his, at Jehanabad, and a reference to it should dispel all doubt in respect of the mention of Kalighata and Kalikata in his Chandi. The date of the work in the edition quoted byBabu Akshaya Sarkar is thus given :-
Sake rasa rasa veda sasanka ganita,
Abhaya mangala gita gaila Mukunda.
It is stated in the Life of Krishna Chandra that he was the constant companion of Aliverdi Khan (Muhabat Jang), and that during his trips on the river he used to read and explain the Mahabharata to him. It is also said that he succeeded in obtaining from the Nawab a remission of arrears of revenue due from him to the amount of fifty-two lakhs or so, by cleverly taking, on one of these river trips, the Nawab's party on shore on the northern side of Calcutta, where there were settlements, and leading the Nawab on towards the south, where, in the distant thickets and woods, the roar of the tiger was heard, and wild elephants were seen, pointing to him the nature of his Zamindary, and the obvious reasons of his having been a defaulter. Such a favourite of the Nawab could not but have obtained from him concessions in favour of the Kali shrine.
The celebrity of Kalighata could not have been very great even as late as the days of Aurangzebe; otherwise its shrine could not have escaped the iconoclastic fury of that fanatical monarch.
7. Nawab Muhabbat Khan wrote “A General History of India from the Time of the Ghaznivides to the Accession of Muhammad Akbar, at the close of the year 1806," which bears the title of Akhbar-i-Muhabbat. In giving the history of the foundation of Calcutta by ‘Mr. Chanak' (Job Charnock), the writer says: "Calcutta formerly was only a village, the revenue of which was assigned for the expenses of the temple of Kali Devi, which stands there. "-Elliot's History of India, &c., vol. VIII. p. 378.
Dam was a copper coin in the days of Akbar, equal to the fortieth part of the rupee. At first it was called Paisah, and also Bahloli. Blochman's Translation of the Ain., p. 31. At this rate the three towns paid into the Imperial Treasury the annual sum of 23,405 and odd rupees.
The Dutch map of Valentyn, compiled in 1656, gives Govindpur in the guise of Governapore, and Sutanuti in that of Chittanutte, and in their proper names they appear in histories, the earliest mention therein being in 1698, and in the surviving unpublished records of the East Indian House, much earlier.
8. The reason why Jangal Gir Chaurangi selected this site on the confines of Govindpur for the establishment of his Tirtha is apparent. Although situated in a belt of jungle, infested, as it was at the time, with all kinds of wild beasts, he saw that he and his goddess would be within the reach of human aid. He looked to the then few inhabitants of Govindpur for his maintenance and that of his goddess. He settled at the place, not with the object of practising austere penances, or of living in absorbed meditation, or in chronic starvation. Had it not been for the village within call, he would perhaps have settled somewhere else in a more accessible or advantageous situation.
But his goddess was destined to be shifted from one locality to another. Her shrine, if any, at Chaurangi (it is said to have been a wooden house), was demolished, when Govindpur was taken for the purpose of building the new Fort ; she was removed to Kalighata, where she was similarly housed, if not on the very site, but in the vicinity, of her present temple, till, subsequently, in 1809, the Savarna Chaudhuris of Behala erected for her the present temple.
Professor Oppert, in his original Inhabitants of Bharatavarsa, Part I, gives an anecdote in connection with the great religious reformer Ramanuja, which presents a striking analogy to the miracle by which the Kali symbol was discovered.
A poor, but pious Pariah, had observed that a cow approached every day a white ant's hole, and let her milk drop into it. He searched and discovered that the image of Celvapillai was concealed in it. In consequence, the Pariah took compassion on the cow, and supplied her daily with fodder. Ramanujacharya was at this time dreaming of this Celvapillai image, and the Pariah showed it to him. The god was enshrined, and, as a reward for the discovery by the Pariah, Ramanuja allowed him to enter the temple (low-caste as he was) in future for three days in the year. This privilege is enjoyed by the Pariahs in the neighbourhood of Melcotta, the chief seat of the followers of Ramanuja, and in other places in the south, An analogous story is related in connection with the Tarakesvara symbol of worship. The Mahalingarchana Tantra, alluded to in the text, names Tarakesvara as a Pitha-sthan in Rarha.
This ghat could not have been on the Adi-Ganga, near the present temple, a plunge into the waters of which precedes (almost as a rule, to wash away all uncleanliness) the performance of the Puja (worship), because the goddess was not removed to her present site till a much later period.
A pilgrim road ran through the place, the Old Chitpur Road, so named from the goddess Kali under the name of Chitresvari of Chitrapura (Chitpur).
This is the celebrated Goraksha Natha mentioned by Abul Fazl. He was one of the nine Nathas, or spiritual teachers, and author of several works ; and many places in India, from Peshawar and Nepal downwards, have derived their names from him. Among others there is a locality near our Dum-Dum named Gorakshavasti, where Siva and Kali and other images are worshipped, and where there are images also of Goraksha Natha himself and of some one or other of the thirty-one Yogis alluded to in the text (vide Upasaka Sampradaya, Vol. II, pp. 136-138). The late Babu Akshaya Kumara Datta, in his Upasaka Sampradaya, disputes the statement of Professor Wilson, that the thirty-one Yogis mentioned in the Hatapradipa were successive teachers, of Yoga. He gives the whole passage from the work, and shows that their names are mentioned only as so many eminent Yogis (Runphat Yogis). But even if we assume that they were not persons who followed each other in succession, as Guru and Sishya, but Yogis who lived in succession of time in the order in which they are named, the argument in the text will not be affected.
The word Chaurangi is a compound which may be split in various ways to give different significations to it, and the word has also many conventional meanings; but this is not the place to dwell upon them.
Aitchison's Treaties, Engagements, &c., Vol. I, pp. 26-27. Fara-i-sanul is explained in some authoritative Glossaries to be a petition which is annexed to a Sanad.
9. Satgong stood on the banks of the Sarasvati. It lost its commercial importance, which it had enjoyed from the most ancient times, when the river silted up, in 1520, or 1530 (Hunter).
Still worshipped in the Thakur-bari within the demesnes of Baistab Das Sett, east of the Mint. The paved compound, or yard, is several steps below the level of the road. Conservative as the families are, they prefer to preserve Govindjee's sacred Thakur-bari in its antique state. In the Bhog (menu) of this and their other deities,removed from Govindpur to their subsequent home at Barra Bazar, potatoes find no place, not only because they were not introduced into the country at the time of their settlement, but because they are exotic, and therefore not fit for divine food.
There are many localities bearing the name of Govindpur. In many of the Sircars also of Akbar's time, places with this designation are to be met with. Its name, as well as that of Sutanuti, or Chuttanutty, might have been expected to be found in the table of Sircar Satgong, in the Ain. It may be presumed, however, that at that time, as at a subsequent period, Calcutta comprehended these two villages ; or perhaps they had been changed to some temporary names now unidentifiable. Could Barbakpore and Bakua, two mahals which appear bracketed together with Calcutta in the said Table, have been these changed names ? or did the unnamed ports and markets therein mentioned comprise them?
10. This accounts for the miserable shelter the goddess originally had in the way of house accommodation. While at Chaurangi, the goddess fared badly-a wretched hut is said to have served for her temple. The earliest inhabitants of Govindpur, the Setts and Bysacks, under whose protection she and her sevayats lived during their earlier days, and for some length of time, who had built in their town of Govindpur a number of temples for their tutelary gods, could have easily, with the wealth at their command, provided her, the presiding deity of Calcutta, with a stone temple ; and if they did not, or if they suffered her to vegetate in a wooden house, it was not owing to any feeling of irreverence towards the goddess, but because their rigid faith in Vaishnavism forbade their taking part in a worship thoroughly Tantric in its rites, and in which the sacrifice of animal life is a sine qua non.
They abandoned one maritime port, to establish another down the river, probably attracted by the prospect of Western enterprise that had just dawned, or begun to dawn upon India in search of the golden fleece, in the shape of cotton and cloth.
Tamralipie pradese cha Vargabhimá virajate,
Govindapura prante cha Kali Suradhani tate.
Bhavishya Purana, Brahmakhanda, 22, 9.
11. Tradition gives some clue by which to trace the time when the Savarnas removed the Kali symbol from its original place to its present locality. There lived, it is said, four Bengalis, very able and clever men of business, three among them being Brahmanas and one a Kayastha, who, under the Mogal dynasty, held responsible posts in the Khalsa Department in Bengal, and for having rendered satisfactory accounts to the Delhi Darbar, when they had been summoned there for the purpose, received the title of Majmuadar (Majumdar), and who have since been known as the four Majumdars of Bengal. Raghava was an Uttarrarha Kayastha, the ancestor of the Zamindars of Patuli and Bansberia--the ten-anna and six-anna Mahasayas, now represented by the Sewraphuli Rajas, &c. The three Brahmans were Bhavananda Kesharkuni (Keshwar Ghani ?). Ratnesvara Vandvopadhyaya (Banerjee) and Lakshmikanta Gangopadhyaya (Ganguli); the first and second were respectively the ancestors of the Nadiya Rajas, and of the Dumurdah Babus, and the third was the predecessor of the Savarnas, who settled at Behala to enjoy the zamindaries he had received as a reward from Aurangzebe. He must have cut a figure, therefore, sometime between 1658 and 1707. Hence the removal of the symbol must have taken place between the time of Lakshmikanta and the exodus of the Govindpur settlers, when operations for the erection of Fort William had commenced.
It was during the palmy days of the celebrated millionaire of Calcutta, Ramdulal Sarkar, when Kaliprasad Datta, an ancestor of the Hathkhola Datta family, had to celebrate the Sraddha of his mother. Almost all the Hindus of rank, wealth, position, and of high caste, combined, even with his kith and kin, not only not to respond to his invitation, but to prevent Adhyapakas and other Brahmans from helping in the ceremony by their presence, and acceptance of gifts, because he was known to have had a Mogal girl of surpassing beauty under his protection. Ramdulal, in grateful remembrance of the favour he had received from Kaliprasad's predecessor (his mother was a cook in the family), whereby he had raised himself from pinching poverty to the climax of fortune, assured Kaliprasad that, so long as his iron chest remained full, he need not fear. He therefore began to bid against the combined rich men of the town, in the distribution of presents to the Brahmans, and succeeded in seeing the ceremony properly performed, with some eclat. Ten thousand rupees was the final bid of Rumdulal for the Savarnas. They received it and graced the ceremony with their presence, but disgorged the money in the pious and penitent fashion mentioned in the text. The Savarnas were not the highest Brahmans, but they had earned the position of Brahmana Goshthipati by their patronage of Kulinas. This caste conflict of the time is known to this day by the apt name of Kaliprasadi Hangama.
12. In Smyth's Report, already referred to, there is mentioned a Thana in the 24-Parganas still bearing the name of Govindpur Thana.
Chatanuti, Kalikata, and Govindpur formed the English settlement. The first is the Chuttanuti of the records, and occupied the northern quarter of the present city; the second (Calcutta) the site of the present European commercial quarter, St. John's Church and the Barabazar ; and the Gobindpur area was occupied by Fort William and its Esplanade.-Vide page lxxxviii, Vol. 2, Diary of William Hedges, published by the Hakluyt Society, and the Documentary Memoirs of Job Charnock.
13. Diary of W. Hedges, vol, iii, pp. cxx and ccxii.
Suttanattee Ghat, at present called Rathtolla Ghat (vide Map attached to the Selections from Unpublished Records of Government), is said to have been the place where Job Charnock alighted, and put up in a shed in the Nim tre grove, a part of Jora Bagan, after which the Burning Ghat (Nimtala) was subsequently called. [What a sad thing that these old names of localities-the landmarks of history-are wantonly and recklessly brushed aside to make room for mushroom celebrities ! The Bysack Digi-Kala bagan (or Garden of Plantains) - of the Bysacks, now called "Marcus Square,” is another instance of Vandalism !)
Family tradition says : Job Charnock's successors removed to Govindpur, because they found it more convenient for the transaction of their business with the Setts and Bysacks who resided there, and easier to get at the Bazar for supplies and necessaries of life. Sutanuttee, in the earliest days, was, with the exception of a small clearance (where the hat or mart used to be held, since called Hatkhola Ghat), a regular jungle, till the Setts and Bysacks gradually cleared it, improved the place, and turned it into their Suburban gardens-Sett Bagan; Jora Bagan,established by a brother Sett; Kala Bagan; Goa Bagan. They likewise established Bazars in places as they came to be inhabited :-Burra Bazar, Bow Razar, Radha Bazar, Lall Bazar and Lall Digi, Bag Bazar, Sobha Bazar and Sham Bazar.
14. Dihi (Persian deh), a village or town.
15. In his last annual address to the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Mr. Beveridge, late President, thus refers to the subject :-"I am sorry to say that he (Babu Gaur Das Bysack) has received a temporary check by his not having been allowed to examine the records of the Board of Revenue, which are believed to contain many Persian and Bengali papers relating to the origin of the native town. I trust, however, that this difficulty will one day be overcome."
16. The Mahomedan writer mentioned in the text and referred to in a previous note, thus derives Calcutta from a Kali compound. After saying that Kali Devi was the assignee of the Calcutta revenue, he proceeds to his etymological explanation : “As in the Bengali language the words Karta and Kat mean proprietor of that Kali, in course of time, by the elision of the i, it began to be called Calcutta." A note is added to this passage by the learned editor of Elliott's History, that "this is not very logical or comprehensible.” But a Bengali will easily see how this has been brought about. Kali-karta (erroneous form of Kali-Kartri), vulgarised Kali-katta ; thence by the exchange, (a violent supposition) of the medial vowels of the two members Kali-katta, then very easily Kalikata. The writer, however, wanted to get at the Hindustani form Kalkatta (Calcutta); he therefore suggests the elision of i. Objectionable as this derivation is, for some good reasons, it does not seem to be so bad as many others. Calcutta would mean, according to the above way of etymologising, the city of which Kali is the mistress in the light of her rights to its revenue.
17. Bom, or Bum.-This represents a sound which, in the course of the Siva-Puja, every Hindu makes by striking gently his blown cheeks with the thumb and fingers of his right hand-a sound which, it is said, Siva is greatly delighted with. Bam Mahadeva! Bam, Bam, Hara, Hara! Bam Kali ! are ejaculations with which visitants to the shrines of Benares, Tarakesvara, Kalighata and such other places, are familiar. Besides the explanation of its being a mere sound pleasing to Hara and Gauri, or Siva and Kali, some say that it is only B () and Om (), the B being the inevitable initial sound, while uttering om with the operation above described. Others point to the Daksha Yajna, and allude to the story of the resuscitated trunk of decapitated Daksha, with a goat's head attached to it, when Siva had forgiven him, being transformed into a grotesque being, when, in trying to breathe out a hymn, he first uttered Bom. Since which Bhola Mahesha, a popular epithet of Siva, forgetful of injuries, and always easily propitiated, has taken a fancy for the sound, and it has formed a part of the religious service in respect of him. Others urge that Siva's name, as Vyoma Kesa, abbreviated into Vyoma, might have been vulgarised into Bom. The Maha nataka describes Ravana in the disguise of a Yogy appearing before Sita, when he wanted to steal her away, ding-donging his damaru, clapping his arms against his sides, and bom-boming while striking his cheeks. The Kalkattawali of course expresses the possessory right to Calcutta which Kali is believed to have, and accords well with the historical account of Nawab Muhabbat Khan. The phrase simply means also-of Calcutta' (fem :)
Upwards of three decades ago, on the day of Chait Sankranti, when our old year closed, and the Charak, or swinging-festival in honor of Siva, used to be celebrated, as well as on the preceding, or Banphora, day, the streets of Calcutta and the road to Kalighat, what with Sannyasis for the nonce, torturing their flesh with horrid devices as penance, and what with devotees and spectators, teemed like a surging ocean of human beings.
Daily, in connection with someone or other of the domestic affairs of almost every Hindu home in Calcutta, in hopes of success, of the fruition of some fond wish, or of averting evil, in customary Pujas, in a thousand-and-one votive promises of gifts, on days of every new moon, but especially on the Kali Puja festival day, and on the closing day of our year-the Siddha Kali of Kalighat is devoutly remembered ; sacrificial offerings pour on her altars, and streams of people pass and repass to and from her shrine, bearing some tokens of the Puja accepted by her. Kali, besides receiving free-will gifts from the people of Calcutta, as from those of other parts of India, exacted a revenue from the Metropolis of India to which her original worshippers are credited with having given the name. We now know, surely, that these are the elements of this romance of the history of our City of Palaces.
18. Transactions, Royal Asiatic Society, Vol. VII, p. 23.
19. Stewart in his History of Bengal (p. 2 to p. 346) ; Sonnerat in his Voyage aux Indes, &c. (Tome I, p. 15) have spelt Calcutta almost exactly in the same way in which it has been spelt in Kitchen's map (1770) referred to in the text, in which, as well as in Stewart's, it is Calicotta, while Sonnerat makes it Calicutta, almost like the Bengali form Kalikata.
Diary of W. Hedges, Vol. III, pp. ccxii, and ccxxi.
Elliot's History of India &c., Vol. VIII, p. 379, and Hedge's Diary Vols. II, p. xlviii, and ccxix, and Sonnerat's Voyage aux Indes, &c., Tome I. p. 15
Published in Calcutta Review 92, no. 184 (April 1891): 305-327.