INTRODUCTION
I
A Brief Historical Sketch of Orissa
It is not true what is too often assumed in the avowed works on the history of Orissa, that the early history of Orissa merges in the history of Kalinga.The mistake is due to the fact that the sea-board districts of modern Orissa, which once formed an integral part of the ancient Kalinga Empire, constitute to-day the most important portion of Orissa, It is not taken into account that the Odras and the Utkalas, who by race, language and habits. differed altogether from the Kalinga people, poured into the sea-board tract at the complete disintegration of the Kalinga Empire, and these Odras and Utkalas did not or rather could not perpetuate the memory of the civilization of Kalinga, when they laid the foundation of Orissa. I have discussed all these facts elsewhere, and I give here only a brief sketch of this important historical situation.
Orissa, as it is now politically constituted, lies between 22°34' and 19°2' north and 82°32' and 87°11' east and has an area of 40,000 square miles. This is certainly a vast area, but the country is sparsely populated, and not less than one- third of the whole area is taken up by hills and forests. A considerable portion of the district of Ganjam has to be added to this province to get the entire land in which Oriya is the dominant language. The northern boundary line of the Oriya-speaking zone runs from a point on the sea-shore at the north-east corner of the district of Balasore to the north-west corner of the Feudatory State of Gangpur, by demarcating the southern boundary of the districts of Midnapur and Ranchi. A range of wild hills, traversed by some very narrow passes, stands on the north western boundary of the Gangpur State and separates the Oriya-speaking Gangpur from the Hindi-speaking tracts, attached to Chutia Nagpur to the north, and to the Central Provinces to the west. We are reminded here of the well-known saying that the mountains separate and the rivers unite the races of man.
To ensure easy comprehension of the history of the growth and development of the Oriya language, the ancient political and ethnic divisions of the aforesaid linguistic area have to be set out in general outlines. Now we all know that the ancient mighty kingdom of Kalinga extended along the Bay of Bengal from the mouth of the Godavari to the south-eastern border of the old Sumha country, a portion of which is now comprised in the Tamluk sub-division of the district of Midnapur. That only the sea-board tracts constituted the whole of the Kalinga Empire, and the hilly regions of Ganjam and Orissa lay outside the Kalinga country, should never be lost sight of. We may first notice that the Eastern Ghats traverse the district of Ganjam
