Memoir of a map of Hindoostan Author:James Rennell Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: INTRODUCTION. TTINDOOSTAN, has by the people of modern Europe, jm been underftood to mean the tradt fituated between the rivers Ganges and Indus, on the eaft ... more »and weft; the Thibetian and Tartarian mountains, on the north ; and the fea on the fouth. But ftriclly fpeaking, the extent of Hindooftan is much more circum- fcribed, than thefe limits convey an idea of: and the name ought to be applied only to that part of the above traft, which lies to the north of the parallels of 21 or 22. The Nerbudda river, is indeed, the reputed fouthern boundary of Hindooftan, as far as it goes ; and the fouthern frontiers of Bengal and Bahar, compofe the remainder of it. The countries on the fouth of this line, according to the Indian geographers, go under the general name of Deccan : and comprile nearly one half of the tracl generally known by the name of the Mogul empire. But as the term Hindoostan has been applied in a lax fenfe to this whole region, it may be neceflary to- diftinguifli the northern part of it, by the name of Hindooftan proper. This tra5l has indeed the Indus, and the mountains of Thibet and Tartary, for its weftern and northern boundaries: but the Ganges was improperly applied as an eaftern boundary; as it inter- fedls in its courfe, fome of the richeft provinces of the empire: while the Burrampooter, which is much nearer the mark, as an eaftern boundary, was utterly unknown. In this circumfcribed ftate, the extent of Hindooftan proper, is about equal to France, Germany, Bohemia, Hungary, Switzerland, Italy, and the Low Countries, collectively: and the Deccan and peninfula, are d. abouabout equal to the Britim Iflands, Spain, and Turkey in Europe. I have here called the tract which lies on the fouth of the Kiftna river, the peninfula; in conformity to general practice ; al...« less