• Kālinga

1. Kālinga, Kalinga.An inhabitant of Ñātika. While staying in Ñātika, at the Giñjakāvasatha, the Buddha tells Ananda that Kālinga was reborn after death in the Suddhavāsā, and that there he would attain to nibbāna. D.ii.92; S. v.358f

2. Kālinga. A country: the Kālingarattha. It is one of the seven political divisions mentioned in the time of the mythical king Renu and is given first in the list, its capital being Dantapura and its king Sattabhū. (D.ii.235f; see also Mtu.iii.208; the Mtu. also mentions a king Uggata of Dantapura, iii.364f).

It is not, however, included in the list of sixteen Janapadas appearing in the Anguttara Nikāya (A.i.213, etc.), but is found in the extended list of the Niddesa (CNid.ii.37). A later tradition (Bu.xviii.6) states that after the Buddha's death, a Tooth was taken from among his relics and placed at Kālinga, where it was worshipped. From Kālinga the Tooth was brought to Ceylon, in the time of King Sirimeghavanna, by Hemamālā, daughter of Guhasīva, king of Kālinga, and her husband Dantakumāra, a prince of the Ujjeni royal family. In Ceylon the Tooth became the "Palladium" of the Sinhalese kings. (Cv.xxxvii.92; see also Cv.Trs.i.7, n.4; the Dāthādhātuvamsa gives details, J.P.T.S.1884, pp.108ff).

The Jātakas contain various references to Kālinga. There was once a great drought in Dantapura, and the king, acting on the advice of his ministers, sent brahmins to the king of Kuru to beg the loan of his state elephant, Añjanavasabha, credited with the power of producing rain. On this occasion, however, the elephant failed and the Kālinga king, hearing of the virtues practised by the king and people of Dantapura, offered them himself, upon which rain fell. See the Kurudhamma Jātaka, J. ii.367ff, also DhA.iv.88f. A similar story is related in the Vessantara Jātaka, vi.487, where the Kālinga brahmins ask for and obtain Vessantara's white elephant that he may stay the drought in Kālinga.

Another king of Kālinga was a contemporary of Aruna, the Assaka king of Potali. The Kālinga king, in his eagerness for a fight, picked a quarrel with Aruna, but was worsted in battle, and had to surrender his four daughters with their dowries to Aruna (J.iii.3f).

The Kālingabodhi Jātaka relates the story of another ruler of Kālinga while, according to the Sarabhanga Jātaka, a certain king of Kālinga (J.v.135f) went with two other kings, Atthaka and Bhīmaratta, to ask Sarabhanga questions referring to the fate of Dandakī. There they heard the sage preach, and all three kings became ascetics. Another king of Kālinga was Nālikīra, who, having ill-treated a holy man, was swallowed up in the Sunakha-niraya, while his country was laid waste by the gods and turned into a wilderness (Kālingārañña). The Kālinga-arañña is referred to in the Upāli Sutta (M.i.378); the story is related in J. v.144 and, in greater detail, in MA.ii.602ff. In the Kumbhakāra Jātaka (J.iii.376) the Kālinga king's name is Karandu.

From early times there seems to have been political intercourse between the peoples of Kālinga and Vanga; Susīmā, grandmother of Vijaya, founder of the Sinhalese race, was a Kālinga princess, married to the king of Vanga (Mhv.vi.1; Dpv. ix.2ff). Friendly relations between Ceylon and Kālinga were evidently of long standing, for we find in the reign of Aggabodhi II. (601-11 A.C.) the king of Kālinga, together with his queen and his minister, coming over to Ceylon intent on leading the life of a recluse and joining the Order under Jotipāla. Aggabodhi and his queen treated them with great honour (Cv.xlii.44ff). Later, the queen consort of Mahinda IV. came from Kālinga and Vijayabāhu I. married a Kālinga princess, Tilokasundarī (Cv.lix.30). We are told that scions of the Kālinga dynasty had many times attained to the sovereignty of Ceylon and that there were many ties of relationship between the royal families of the two countries (Cv.lxiii.7, 12f). But it was Māgha, an offspring of the Kālinga kings, who did incomparable damage to Ceylon and to its religion and literature (Cv.lxxx.58ff).

According to the inscriptions, Asoka, in the thirteenth year of his reign, conquered Kālinga and this was the turning-point in his career, causing him to abhor war (Mookerji: Asoka, pp.16, 37, 214). Among the retinue sent by him to accompany the branch of the Sacred Bodhi Tree on its journey to Ceylon, were eight families of Kālinga (Sp.i.96).

Asoka's brother Tissa, later known as Ekavihāriya, spent his retirement in the Kālinga country with his instructor Dhammarakkhita, and there Asoka built for him the Bhojakagiri-vihāra (ThagA.ii.506).

According to the Vessantara Jātaka (J.vi.521), the brahmin village Dunnivittha, residence of Jūjaka, was in Kālinga.

Kālinga is generally identified with the modern Orissa. (CAGI.590ff; Law: Early Geography, 64; see also Bhandarkar: Anct. Hist. of Deccan, p.12).

3. Kālinga.Various kings of Kālinga are mentioned either as Kālingarājā or simply as Kālinga. For these see Kālinga (2). We also hear of Culla Kālinga and Mahā Kālinga. Culla Kālinga is sometimes called Kālinga-kumāra (J.iv.230).

4. Kālinga.Son of Culla-Kālinga. See the Kālingabodhi Jātaka.

5. Kālinga. A Tamil chief, ally of Kulasekhara (Cv.lxxvi.174, 214, 217, 222). He was a brother of the wife of Tondamāna. Cv.lxxvii.40.

6. Kālinga.Another Tamil chief, conquered by Bhuvenakabāhu I. Cv.xc.32.

7. Kālinga. See Kālinga-bhāradvāja.