What are the ancient Sanskrit or Indian names for other countries?

Question

What are the names of countries outside India, mentioned in Vedas and Puranas ? Example: Yadava = Greek

Answer 1

From Tamil Literature
EElam- Sri Lanka
Kadaram- Malaysia
Yavana - Romans
Other sources-
Kandharam- Afghanisthan.

Answer 2

Ancient Sanskrit Names

Answer 3

bhotiya for tibet
udayana for afghan region
in general, I would bet that mlecchadeza covers a lot of it
lanka for sri lanka

The yajurveda uses videza as a term for foreign land.

suvarNadvipa was used for Indonesia in Buddhist literature.

THough whether any of these are mentioned in the Vedas and Puranas is another story altogether. Yauna/Yavanas appears in the Asokan rock edicts, and probably not in the Vedas, though perhaps in the Puranas, and probably refers to persians a/w/a greeks. Good question.

Answer 4

Bhārata, sometimes Bhāratavarsha (Bhārat or Bhāratvarsha in Hindi) is the name in Sanskrit and many languages of India for India. The Hindi form is also an official name of the Republic of India, and possibly the earliest name given to the nation. (Article 1 of the Constitution of India - 'India that is Bharat shall be a Union of States.'). In Sanskrit, it is pronounced as [bʱaːrət̪ə] while in Hindi as [bʱaːrət̪].

[edit] Mythological Origins

The Sanskrit word Bhārata (Sanskrit: भारत has several meanings. In Vedic Sanskrit, the primary meaning of the word Bhārata was the epithet of Agni (the Vedic demigod of fire). There could be two etymologies for this epithet:

1. It may come from the Sanskrit root bhr- (Sanskrit: भृ), which means to bear / to carry. As Agni was believed to carry the offerings of the Vedic fire-sacrifices to the Heavens, he was given the title of Bhārata, as the bearer of sacrificial oblations.
2. It may come as a linguistic derivative of the term Bharata (Sanskrit: भरत, note the short vowel in the first syllable). The term Bharata again refers to Agni or to the fire-priests of the Vedic Age, and is again derived from the same root bhr, but here under the sense of to maintain.

The root bhr is cognate with the English verb "to bear" and Latin "fero".

However, the term Bhārat was also the proper name of several other people in the Early and Later-Vedic Ages.

The Bharatas are a tribe mentioned in the Rigveda, defeated in the Battle of the Ten Kings.

The name "Bhārata" (in the sense of India) is derived from either of two ancient Hindu kings named Bharata, though it is more commonly accepted that the name derives from that of the son of Dushyanta, whom the Mahabharata credits with bringing the whole of Bharatavarsha under his rule and securing the title of an emperor. He was said to have first conquered all of the known world, which was duly named after him in his honor. Hence his descendants were called as the Bhāratas. In all the classical and religious works of Hinduism, such as the Mahabharata, the Ramayana and the Puranas, Bhārat is the name used for what is today known as the Indian subcontinent.

The Vishnu Purana (2.3.1) defines Bharata as follows: "The country that lies north of the ocean and south of the snowy mountains is called Bharata [Bharata-varsha]; there dwell the descendants of Bharata [Bharati santatih]."

[edit] In History

Historical Bharata extends to what are today Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh and even by some accounts, portions of eastern Afghanistan. The Maurya Empire, under Emperors Chandragupta Maurya and Ashoka the Great, Mughal Empire and the Maratha are the other times the similar extent of land and peoples have been united under a single political entity, but the social, cultural and economic links are complex and originated nine thousand years ago. This expanse has variously been reduced and increased, and was at its largest under Emperors like Chandragupta Maurya, Ashoka the Great, Samudragupta, Chandragupta Vikramaditya, Alauddin Khilji, Akbar the Great, Aurangazeb, Maratha and lastly under the British.

[edit] Hindustan

To the Western world, Bhārat has always been known under the name of Hind or its variants. In Vedic Sanskrit, the word Sindhu meant the river Indus in particular and any river or water body in general. The Ancient Indo-Aryans called their expanse Sapta Sindhu, meaning the land of seven rivers (including the Indus) —attested several times in the Rig Veda. The /s/ of the Indic branch (as represented by Sanskrit) is linguistically cognate with the /h/ sound of Iranian (as represented by Avestan and Old Persian). Hence the term Sapta Sindhu became Hapta Hindu in Avesta, the supreme scripture of the early Iranians (Vendidad: Fargard 1.18). In Persian, stān means a land (cognate to Sanskrit's sthāna: place, land) . Hence India, the land to the East of the Indus, soon came to be known as Hindustan by the Persians and the Arabs. Its shortened form was Hind, which became Hindia in Ancient Greek and India in later Greek and Latin. The Arab, Turk, and Mughal invasions started in India from 11th century onwards; the rulers in the Sultanate period and Mughal period called their Indian dominion Hindustan, which centred around Delhi — whether it swallowed almost the whole of the Indian subcontinent (as during the time of Alauddin Khilji and Aurangazeb) or had shrunk to only Delhi and the adjoining areas (as during the rule of Bahadur Shar Zafar II). Some people interpret Hindustan to be the region of India between Indus and Brahmaputra and between the Himalayas and the Vindhyas. Others [citation needed]call the whole of the Indian subcontinent as Hindustan. In modern India, Hindustan is almost exclusively used by all Hindi-speakers and the Hindi media in informal contexts (South Indians prefer their local variants of Bhārata, such as Bhāratam) for the Republic of India. India is now called Al-Hind in the Arabic language and Hind in Persian.

The word Hindu (हिन्दु), due to Iranian influence — in the sense of dwellers of the Indian subcontinent — is used in some early-medieval Sanskrit texts like Bhavishya Purāna, Kālikā Purāna, Merutantra, Rāmakosha, Hemantakavikosha and Adbhutarūpakosha.

[edit] Āryavarta

Āryavarta is yet another name which refers to India. It is no longer in common usage, but does occur with some frequency in ancient texts. Āryavarta refers to the Land of Āryas. Ārya in Sanskrit means "noble" and is related to the term Āryan.

Āryavarta once covered only the Yamuna-Ganga doab, so it is also debatable if this name could apply to all of ancient India. Āryavarta was also a collection of city-states, not a political entity by itself.