Most early Indian migrants to Malaya and Singapore came from Kalinga, Bengal and Tamil Nadu, hence the common terms of keling, bengali and thambi to refer to Indians here.
Ramseth has given the right answer as to where the word Keling comes from. You may wish to refer to the following site which will give you an insight as to the origin of that word. kalinga Empire controlled what is now known as Indonesia.
Kalinga, India
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Kalinga c265 BCE
Kalinga (Odia: କଳିଙ୍ଗ, Devnagari: कळिंग) was an early state in central-eastern India, which comprised most of the modern state of Orissa/Utkal (pronounced as Odisha), as well as the Andhra region in the bordering state of Andhra Pradesh.[1] It was a rich and fertile land that extended from the river Damodar/Ganges to Godavari and from Bay of Bengal to Amarkantak range in the West.[1] The region was scene of the bloody Kalinga War fought by the Maurya Emperor Ashoka the Great of Magadha circa 265 BCE.[2]
Contents
[hide] 1 Rise of Kharavela
2 Historical accounts of Kalinga
3 Notes
4 See also
[edit] Rise of Kharavela
Kharavela was the warrior emperor of Kalinga.[3] He was responsible for the propagation of Jainism in the Indian Subcontinent but his importance is neglected in many accounts of Indian history. According to the Hathigumpha inscription near Bhubaneswar, Orissa, he attacked Rajagriha in Magadha, thus inducing the Indo-Greek king Demetrius to retreat to Mathura.[4] But this inscription doesn't mean that he merged Magadha in Kalinga. But this shows his strong ties with the Shunga ruler Pushyamitra and Agnimitra who have just started their rule after uprooting the Mauryans.
The Kharavelan Jain empire had a formidable maritime empire with trading routes linking it to Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Borneo, Bali, Sumatra and Java. Colonists from Kalinga settled in Sri Lanka, Burma, as well as the Maldives and Malay Archipelago.
[edit] Historical accounts of Kalinga
Kalinga is mentioned in the Adiparva, Bhismaparva, Sabhaparva, Banaprava of Mahabharata. Kalinga King Srutayu is stated to have fought the Mahabharat war for the Kauravas. Kalinga is also mentioned as Calingae in Megasthenes' book on India – Indica & Megasthenes states that Magadha & Kalinga were Jain Dominant Kingdoms:
"The Prinas and the Cainas (a tributary of the Ganges) are both navigable rivers. The tribes which dwell by the Ganges are the Calingae, nearest the sea, and higher up the Mandei, also the Malli, among whom is Mount Mallus, the boundary of all that region being the Ganges." (Megasthenes fragm. XX.B. in Pliny. Hist. Nat. V1. 21.9–22. 1.[5]) "The royal city of the Calingae is called Parthalis. Over their king 60,000 foot-soldiers, 1,000 horsemen, 700 elephants keep watch and ward in "procinct of war." (Megasthenes fragm. LVI. in Plin. Hist. Nat. VI. 21. 8–23. 11.[5])
The Kalinga script,[6] derived from Brahmi, was used for writing. Among the offshoots, Kalinga script had the maximum resemblance with the parent script, Brāhmī and later modified to Oriya script in the beginning of the second millennium. This makes the Oriya Script as the most distinctive and least distorted script among the Indic scripts.[7]
[edit] Notes
1.^ a b An Advanced History of India. By R.C. Majumdar, H.C. Raychaudhuri, and Kaukinkar Datta. 1946. London: Macmillan
2.^ Asoka and the Decline of the Mauryas, 1961 (revision 1998); Oxford University Press
3.^ Agrawal, Sadananda (2000): Śrī Khāravela, Sri Digambar Jain Samaj, Cuttack, Orissa
4.^ Shashi Kant (2000): The Hathigumpha Inscription of Kharavela and the Bhabru Edict of Ashoka, D K Printworld Pvt. Ltd.
5.^ a b Megasthenes Indica
6.^
http://www.ontopia.net/omnigator/models/topic_complete.jsp?tm=i18n.ltm&id=kalinga
7.^
http://www.ontopia.net/i18n/ftree.jsp?id=1576
[edit] See also
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Kalinga, India
Kalinga War
Kalinga Magha
Jaffna Kingdom
Middle kingdoms of India
Timeline:
Northwestern India
Northern India
Southern India
6th century BCE
5th century BCE
4th century BCE
3rd century BCE
2nd century BCE
1st century BCE
1st century CE
2nd century
3rd century
4th century
5th century
6th century
7th century
8th century
9th century
10th century
11th century
Gandhara
(Persian rule)
(Greek conquests)
Indo-Greeks
Indo-Scythians
Indo-Parthians
Kushan Empire
Indo-Sassanids
Kidarite Kingdom
Indo-Hephthalites
(Islamic conquests)
Shahi
(Islamic Empire)
Magadha
Shishunaga dynasty
Nanda empire
Kalinga
Maurya Empire
Sunga Empire
Kuninda Kingdom
Western Satraps
Gupta Empire
Harsha
Gurjara Pratihara
Pala Empire
Solanki
Eastern Ganga dynasty
Sena dynasty
Satavahana empire
Pandyan
Cholas
Chera
Kalabhras
Kadamba Dynasty
Pallava
Chalukya
Rashtrakuta
Western Chalukyas
Hoysala Empire
Categories: Empires and kingdoms of India | History of Orissa | History of Andhra Pradesh | History of Sri Lanka
Log in / create account
Article
Discussion
Read
Edit
View history
Main page
Contents
Featured content
Current events
Random article
Donate to Wikipedia
Interaction
Help
About Wikipedia
Community portal
Recent changes
Contact Wikipedia
Toolbox
Print/export
Languages
Català
Česky
Deutsch
Español
한국어
Italiano
മലയാളം
日本語
ଓଡ଼ିଆ
Polski
Português
Русский
தமிழ்
This page was last modified on 17 June 2011 at 21:15.
Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. See Terms of Use for details.
Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.
Contact us
Privacy policy
About Wikipedia
Disclaimers
