Komedes

The Greek geographer Ptolemy uses the name Komdei for the region fed by the Jaxartes river (modern Syr Darya) and its tributaries.[2] Ptolemy refers to the people of Komdei as Komedes.[3] Ptolemy also refers to one tribal people whom he variously calls Komoi/Kamoi, Komroi/Khomroi or Komedei, and locates in the mountainous regions of Sogdiana as far as Jaxartes.[4] In fact, as per Ptolemy's evidence, "the Komedes (people) inhabited the entire land of the Sacae",[5] a name often taken to be synonymous with that of the Sakas. Julius Honorius’ Cosmography mentions a people called Traumeda and mentions a mountain called Caumedes as the source of the river Oxus (modern Amu Darya).[6] Ammianus Marcellinus too calls the Sogdian mountainous regions as Komadas.[7] To the north of the Komedes was the homeland of the Sacarauloi (or Sacaraucae) and, probably, the Pasianoi.

The Ptolemian references to Komdei or Komedes as a region probably alludes to Hindu toponyms Komdesh, Kamdesh and Kambodesh (probably originally Kamboi-desh).[8][9] They Cambothi, Kambuson and Komedon of some other Greek writings. The classical sources further indicate that the south-western section of the Komedes (people) living within "Mt Hemodos or Emode" were known as Homodotes. Thus, the Homodotes appear to have been a section of the Komedes living within a part of the Hindukush or Pamirs.

According to Hindu texts authored in the early Epic Age (from about 1000 BCE), Kumuda was the name given to a high tableland located somewhere to the north of Himavata (Hindukush or the Himalayas in general), from which the Indo-Aryan peoples may have originally pushed their way southwards into India, and preserved the name in their traditions as a relic of old mountain worship (Thompson )

The Indian literary classic Mahabharata (dating from the mid-1st millennium BCE) indicates that the southern parts of Shakdvipa were the habitat of peoples including the Kambojas – specifically the Parama Kambojas – alongside the Lohas and Rishikas.[10][11]

A Sanskrit pura from the early 1st millennium CE, the Vayu Purana uses the name Kumuda-dvipa as an alternate for Kushadvipa, one of seven dvipa ("continents" or "great lands") mentioned in Hindu topology.[12] Kumuda is also the puranic name of a mountain forming the northern buttress of Mount Meru, also known as Sumeru (possibly the Pamirs).[13] In this specific sense, Kumuda extended between headwaters of the rivers now known as the Amu Darya (Latin Oxus) and Syr Darya (Greek Jaxartes).

Thus the name Kumuda, in the topology of the ancient Hindu world, lay close to the Pamirs, north of Himavata and probably comprised Badakshan, the Alay Valley, Alay Mountains, Tienshan, Karotegin (Rasht Valley, in modern Tajikistan) and possibly extended as far north as the Zeravshan and Fergana valleys.

A Chinese equivalent name appears to have been Xiuxun. However, Kumuda is probably also the Kiumito or Kumito mentioned by Xuanzang, the Kiumiche of Wu'k ong, and the Kumi of T'ang.

Kumed or Kumadh of the Muslim writers Al-Maqidisi, in his Al-Muqhni, calls the people of this territory Kumiji, which seems equivalent to Sanskrit Kamboji (or Kambojas).[14] Numerous scholars have connected the Komedes (Komedei) of classical writings with the Kambojas of Iranian topology.[15][8][16][17][18]

The name and geographical references indicates that the Kumuda (or Kumuda-dvipa) and Parama Kambojas of Hindu tradition and ancient Indian literarure appear to be synonymous with the Komedes ( or Komedei), Traumeda (or Caumedae) of European classical sources. The same applies to the Homodotes (Homodoti or Homodontes).[19] The Komoi (Komroi or Khomroi) of Ptolemy may be linked the placename Kamboi (in modern Gujarat), itself apparently a corruption of Kamboja, Kambojika or Kamboika.[20]

Linguistic traces of the ancient Kambojas have been suggested in several modern languages of the Pamir Mountains, Khotan and Sogdiana. The Parama Kambojas appear to have originated from Central Asia and have been lumped together with neighbouring tribes, under names like Scythians in Latin, Sacae in Greek and Sakas (or Shakas) in Indo-Iranian languages.[21] Ancient Kamboja probably included the Pamir Mountains, Badakshan and other parts of modern Tajikistan extending as far as the source of the Zarafshon/Zeravshan river.[22] On the east it was probably bounded by modern Yarkand and/or Kashgar, to the west by Bactria, to the north-west by Sogdiana, to the north by Uttarakuru, to the south-east by Darada, and to the south by Gandhara.[23] Many languages of this region are said to shows the influence of an ancient Kambojan verb shvati "to go". Nirukata (II.2) of Yasaka[24] attests that verb shavati "to go" was used "only by the Kambojas".[25][26]

• The modern Pamiri or Ghalchah languages, spoken in around the Pamir Mountains use similar terms, such as shavati ("to go").[27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34]
• The Yaghnobi language, spoken in the Yaghnob Valley, also contains shavati "to go".[35] Further, the former language of Badakshan was also a Ghalchah language which has been replaced by other Iranian languages only in the last few centuries.[36][37][38]
• Wilhelm Tomaschek has stated that, of all the Ghalchah/Pamiri languages, "Munjani is most closely related to the language of Zend Avestan".[39] Other scholars connect the ethnoliguistic term Munjan to the Mujavat of the Hindu Atharvaveda and Mahabharata,[40] The Munjani for "to go" is shiya.[41] According to other version, Munjan is derived from root 'Murg' of Amyurgio Sacae (Haumavarga Saka of Persian inscriptions), which according to scholars, translates into Soma-twisting Sakas (Dr Michael Witzel). This again connects Munjan with Mujavat, the home of Haoma/Soma i.e. Pamirs/Hindukush. the land of the ancient ritual drink known to Hindus as soma and to Zoroastrians as haoma.