CDS (II) 2022 GK Q66: At the banks of which of the following rivers was the

Q: What is the answer to CDS (II) 2022 GK Q66?

C. Correct — C, Parushni. The Battle of Ten Kings, the Dasarajna, is described in the eighteenth hymn of the seventh book of the Rigveda, and it was fought on the bank of the Parushni — the river known today as the Ravi. Sudas, king of the Bharatas, with the priest Vasishtha on his side, faced a confederacy of ten tribes that included the Purus, Yadus, Turvashas, Anus and Druhyus, and won despite being outnumbered; the hymn credits the breaching of a dyke on the river, which drowned much of the opposing force. The victory mattered out of all proportion to its scale, because it left the Bharatas dominant in the Punjab plain and the name later attached to a much larger idea of the land.

CDS (II) 2022 General Knowledge · Question 66 of 120

Question text verified against the official CDS question paper.

At the banks of which of the following rivers was the Battle of Ten Kings fought in the Early Vedic Period?

(a)Sarasvati
(b)Drishadvati
(c)Parushni
(d)Shutudri

Answer

Why

Correct — C, Parushni. The Battle of Ten Kings, the Dasarajna, is described in the eighteenth hymn of the seventh book of the Rigveda, and it was fought on the bank of the Parushni — the river known today as the Ravi. Sudas, king of the Bharatas, with the priest Vasishtha on his side, faced a confederacy of ten tribes that included the Purus, Yadus, Turvashas, Anus and Druhyus, and won despite being outnumbered; the hymn credits the breaching of a dyke on the river, which drowned much of the opposing force. The victory mattered out of all proportion to its scale, because it left the Bharatas dominant in the Punjab plain and the name later attached to a much larger idea of the land.

Why the others are wrong

(a)Sarasvati — The Sarasvati is the most praised river in the Rigveda and is the setting for a great deal of Vedic ritual, which makes it the natural guess. But the Dasarajna hymn places the battle on the Parushni, not on the Sarasvati.
(b)Drishadvati — The Drishadvati appears in the Rigveda alongside the Sarasvati and later marks the boundary of Brahmavarta, but it is not the river of this battle.
(d)Shutudri — Shutudri is the Vedic name of the Sutlej. It belongs to the same group of Punjab rivers as the Parushni and is a plausible-looking option for exactly that reason, but the hymn names the Parushni.

Concept

The Rigveda uses its own names for the rivers of the north-west, and the Vedic-to-modern list is one of the most reliably examined pieces of ancient Indian history. Sindhu is the Indus, Vitasta the Jhelum, Asikni the Chenab, Parushni the Ravi, Vipas the Beas and Shutudri the Sutlej; Kubha is the Kabul and Drishadvati a river of the Sarasvati system. The Battle of Ten Kings is the one clearly narrated political event of the Early Vedic period and is the main evidence historians have for tribal conflict, alliance and priestly rivalry in that age.

The item can be answered either by remembering the hymn or by remembering the map. The battle is a Punjab event fought among tribes of the Punjab plain, and of the four options only Parushni and Shutudri are Punjab rivers in the strict sense, which halves the field before any recall of the text is needed. The second half comes from the story: the winning stroke was the breaking of an embankment that flooded the enemy, which points to a substantial perennial river of the plain. Note in passing that the rivalry of the priests Vasishtha and Vishvamitra sits behind this episode, and that the Bharatas' victory is the origin of the dynastic name that echoes through later tradition.

Key facts

The Battle of Ten Kings is described in Rigveda Mandala 7, hymn 18.
It was fought on the bank of the Parushni, the modern Ravi.
Sudas of the Bharatas, with the priest Vasishtha, defeated a confederacy of ten tribes including the Purus, Yadus, Turvashas, Anus and Druhyus.
The hymn attributes the decisive turn to the breaching of a dyke on the river.
Vedic river names: Sindhu is the Indus, Vitasta the Jhelum, Asikni the Chenab, Parushni the Ravi, Vipas the Beas and Shutudri the Sutlej.

Study next

Rigvedic geography — the Sapta Sindhava and the identification of Vedic river namesTribes and clans of the Rigveda: Bharatas, Purus, Yadus, Turvashas, Anus and DruhyusVasishtha and Vishvamitra, and what priestly rivalry tells us about early Vedic societyPolitical organisation in the Early Vedic period — rajan, sabha, samiti and vidathaThe shift from the Early Vedic Punjab to the Later Vedic Ganga-Yamuna doab

Common traps

Answering Sarasvati because it is the river the Rigveda praises most; the most mentioned river is a different question from the river of this battle.
Mixing Shutudri and Parushni, which are neighbouring Punjab rivers with similar-sounding roles in the hymns.
Placing the battle in the Later Vedic period; the Dasarajna belongs to the Early Vedic age.

As a name-the-river item, as a Vedic-to-modern river matching item, or as a statements item on the participants in the Dasarajna.

Related PYQs

UPSC_1996_GS1_Q281996Open & attempt →

The river most mentioned in early Vedic literature is

(a) Sindhu
(b) Sutudri
(c) Sarasvati
(d) Ganga

Answer(a) Sindhu

The same body of hymns read for its geography. That question is about which river the Rigveda names most often, this one about which river it places a particular battle on — and keeping the two apart is what stops a candidate from answering Sarasvati here out of habit.

Practice

practice — not a real PYQ
The Vedic river Vitasta is known today as the
- (a)Ravi
- (b)Chenab
- (c)Jhelum
- (d)Beas
Answer(c) Jhelum — Vitasta is the Jhelum, while Parushni is the Ravi and Asikni the Chenab.
practice — not a real PYQ
In the Battle of Ten Kings, the victorious king Sudas belonged to which tribe?
- (a)Puru
- (b)Bharata
- (c)Druhyu
- (d)Turvasha
Answer(b) Bharata — Sudas Paijavana led the Bharatas against a confederacy that included the Purus, Druhyus and Turvashas.