Names for India

India has two main official short names: India and Bharat. Both names are important because of history. Some North Indians also call it Hindustan when they talk to each other. People use "India," "Bharat," or "Hindustan" based on the situation and language they are speaking.

India

The English term is from Greek Indikē (cf. Megasthenes' work Indica) or Indía (Ἰνδία), via Latin transliteration India.[1][2][3]

The Old Persian word for "Síndhu" was "Hindu." When King Darius I conquered Sindh around 516 BCE, the Persians called the region "Hinduš." Scylax of Caryanda, an explorer working for the Persian emperor, likely introduced this name to Greek. In Herodotus’s *Geography*, the words "Indos" (for the Indus River) and "Indian" appear. The Greek dialects spoken in Asia Minor may have caused the loss of the /h/ sound. Herodotus also used "Indian" to describe all people east of Persia, even though he didn’t have a precise understanding of the geography.[4]

Indies

The term "Indies" originally referred to land east of the Indus River and was another way of saying "India." When the Portuguese explored new regions, they called them the Indies. The Caribbean islands were first called the "Indies" because explorers thought they had reached India. Later, when they realized these islands were in the western hemisphere, they renamed them the "West Indies," meaning "India in the west." Indonesia was once called the Dutch East Indies, meaning "India in Southeast Asia." This is different from "Dutch India," which referred to the trading posts of the Dutch East India Company in the Indian subcontinent.

Bhārat

Bharat is another name for India, officially recognized in Article 1 of the Indian Constitution, which was adopted in 1950. The Constitution states in English: "India, that is Bharat..." The name Bharat was commonly used in Sanskrit and later became a self-chosen alternative name for India, embraced by many people in the Indian subcontinent.[5][6]

Bharat comes from the name of the Bharatas, a Vedic community mentioned in the Rigveda. They were one of the original groups in Āryāvarta and played a significant role in the Battle of the Ten Kings.

The earliest known use of "Bhārata-varṣa" as a geographical term appears in the Hathigumpha inscription of King Kharavela from the first century BCE. In this inscription, the name refers to a limited region in northern India, specifically the part of the Ganges west of Magadha. It also states that Bharat was named after Bharata, the son of Rishabhanatha, the first Jain Tirthankara.[7][8]

Hind/Hindustān

The name "Hindush" was recorded in the Old Persian cuneiform script, used in Achaemenid inscriptions. It was written as "𐏃𐎡𐎯𐎢𐏁" (H-i-du-u-š). This script was used in various regions, including Egypt, where references to Hindush were also found in inscriptions from the Achaemenid era.
(H-n-d-wꜣ-y) on the Statue of Darius I, circa 500 BCE.[9][10][11]
Emperor Babur of the Mughal Empire described India’s geography, saying, "On the East, the South, and the West it is bounded by the Great Ocean." The word "Hind" was adapted into Arabic as "Al-Hind" (الهند) to refer to India, as seen in historical works like the 11th-century *Tarikh Al-Hind* ("History of India"). The term still appears in India today, such as in the patriotic phrase "Jai Hind" (जय हिन्द) and in "Hind Mahāsāgar" (हिन्द महासागर), the Hindi name for the Indian Ocean.

Jambudvīpa

Jambudvīpa (Sanskrit: जम्बुद्वीपम्, romanized: Jambu-dvīpam, lit. 'berry island') was an ancient name for India before "Bhārat" became widely used. It may indirectly refer to Insular India. The term "Jambu Dwipa" was historically used in many Southeast Asian countries to refer to India before the English word "India" was introduced. Even today, it is sometimes used in Thailand, Malaysia, Java, and Bali to describe the Indian subcontinent, though it can also refer to all of Asia. Maurya Emperor Ashoka used this name in his inscriptions to describe his empire.

Gyagar and Phagyul

Gyagar and Phagyul are old Tibetan names for India. In ancient times, Tibetan Buddhist writers and travelers used the word Gyagar to talk about India, especially the southern part. They used Madhyadesa for the middle or holy part of India.

From the 1200s, Tibetans also started using the word Phagyul, short for Phags yul, which means "land of noble or enlightened people."

The Tibetan scholar Gendun Chopel said that Gyagar comes from the Sanskrit word vihāra, which means a Buddhist monastery. Ancient Tibetans used Gyagar mainly for north and central India, from Kuru (now Haryana) to Magadha (now Bihar). The famous story Epic of King Gesar called India many names like "Gyagar, the land of Buddhist teachings," "Gyagar, the land of medicine," "Gyagar, the land of pearls," and "Gyagar, the land of golden vases."

The Central Tibetan Administration says that Tibet and India have strong ties in history, culture, and religion. It calls India Gyagar Phagpay Yul, which means "India, the land of noble ones." The Dalai Lama calls India his teacher and says Tibet is its student. He also calls himself a "Son of India" and follows Mahatma Gandhi’s ideas. He continues to share India’s old wisdom, especially the Nalanda tradition of learning.[13]

Tiānzhú

Tiānzhú (Chinese: 天竺) is an old Chinese name for India. The name comes from the Sanskrit word Sindhu, which changed into Hindu in Persian and was later written as Tiānzhú in Chinese.[14]

Other East Asian countries also use similar words:

  • In Japanese, it is called Tenjiku
  • In Korean, it is Cheonchuk (천축)
  • In Vietnamese, it is Thiên Trúc


Buddhists in China and nearby countries used the word Tiānzhú to talk about India as a holy place, because Buddhism started there. They saw India as their "heavenly center" or sacred land.[15][16]

Other Chinese names for India appear in history books. Juāndú (身毒) is found in the Shiji by Sima Qian. Tiāndǔ (天篤) is used in the Book of the Later Han (Hou Hanshu)

Another name is Yìntèjiā (印特伽), which comes from Indaka, an old form of the word Hindu used by the people of Kucha.[17]

Hodû

Hodû (Hebrew: הֹדּוּ) is the name for India in the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. It appears in the Book of Esther, chapters 1:1 and 8:9.[18]

In this book, King Ahasuerus (usually identified with Xerxes I of Persia) is said to have ruled over 127 provinces, from Hodû (India) to Ethiopia.[19]

The word Hodû probably comes from the Sanskrit word Sindhu, which means "great river", this refers to the Indus River. It came into Hebrew through the Old Persian word Hindu. So, Hodû and India are the same in meaning and origin.[20]

Historical Definitions of India

Year Name Source Definition
944 Al-Hind Al-Masudi

Muruj adh-dhahab wa ma'adin al-jawhar

The Hindu nation (*Al-Hind*) stretches from the mountains of Khorasan and Baluchistan (*es-Sind*) to the Tibetan Plateau (*et-Tubbet*).
982–983 Hindistān Author Unknown

Hudud al-'Alam

Hindistān is bordered by China and Tibet to the east, the Great Sea to the south, the Mihran (Indus River) to the west, and the region of Shaknan in Vakhan along with some parts of Tibet to the north.
1205 Hind Hasan Nizāmī The entire land of Hind stretches from Peshawar in the north to the Indian Ocean in the south, and from Sehwan (on the west bank of the Indus) to the mountains in the east that separate it from China.
1298 India the Greater

India the Minor Middle India

Marco Polo India the Greater stretches from Maabar to Kesmacoran (Coromandel to Mekran) and includes 13 great kingdoms. India the Lesser extends from Champa to Mutfili (Cochinchina to the Krishna Delta) and has 8 great kingdoms. Abash is a large province and is considered Middle India.
c. 1328 India Friar Jordanus Catalani What can I say? The greatness of India is impossible to fully describe. But this is enough about India the Greater and Lesser. As for India Tertia, I have not seen its wonders, as I have never been there.
1404 India Minor Ruy González de Clavijo On Thursday, the ambassadors reached a big river called the Oxus and crossed to the other side. That evening, they arrived in a large city named Tenmit (Termez). In the past, this city was part of India Minor, but it now belongs to the empire of Samarkand after being taken over by Tamurbec.
1590 Hindustān Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak

Ain-i-Akbari

Hindustan is said to be surrounded by the ocean on the east, west, and south, but its territory includes several islands, such as Sarandip (Sri Lanka), Achin (Indonesia), Maluk (Indonesia), and Malagha (Malaysia), along with many others.
16th century Indostān Ignazio Danti The region of India beyond the Ganges stretches all the way to Cathay (China) and includes many provinces with remarkable features. Among them are the Kingdom of Kamul near Campichu (Cambodia), Erguiul, the Ava Mountains (Burma), the Salgatgu Mountains, Caindu, and the territory of Carajan.

References

  1. ↑ Harris, J. (2012), Indography: Writing the "Indian" in Early Modern England, Palgrave Macmillan US, p. 8, ISBN 978-1-137-09076-8
  2. ↑ Mukherjee, Bratindra Nath (2001), Nationhood and Statehood in India: A historical survey, Regency Publications, p. 3, ISBN 978-81-87498-26-1: "Apparently the same territory was referred to as Hi(n)du(sh) in the Naqsh‐i‐Rustam inscription of Darius I as one of the countries in his empire. The terms Hindu and India ('Indoi) indicate an original indigenous expression like Sindhu. The name Sindhu could have been pronounced by the Persians as Hindu (replacing s by h and dh by d) and the Greeks would have transformed the latter as Indo‐ (Indoi, Latin Indica, India) with h dropped..."
  3. ↑ "Etymology of the Name India". World History Encyclopedia. 13 January 2011.
  4. ↑ Arora, Udai Prakash (2005), "Ideas of India in Ancient Greek Literature", in Irfan Habib (ed.), India — Studies in the History of an Idea, Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, p. 47, ISBN 978-81-215-1152-0: "The term 'Indians' was used by Herodotus as a collective name for all the peoples living east of Persia. This was also a significant development over Hekataios, who had used this term in a strict sense for the groups dwelling in Sindh only."
  5. ↑ Article 1 of the English version of the Constitution of India: "India that is Bharat shall be a Union of States."
  6. ↑ Clémentin-Ojha, Catherine (2014). "'India, that is Bharat…': One Country, Two Names". South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal. 10.
  7. ↑ Dwijendra Narayan Jha, Rethinking Hindu Identity (Routledge: 2014), p.11
  8. ↑ Upinder Singh, Political Violence in Ancient India, p.253
  9. ↑ National Museum of Iran notice
  10. ↑ Yar-Shater, Ehsan (1982). Encyclopaedia Iranica. Routledge & Kegan Paul. p. 10. ISBN 9780933273955.
  11. ↑ "Susa, Statue of Darius – Livius". www.livius.org.
  12. ↑ Inscriptions of Asoka. New Edition by E. Hultzsch (in Sanskrit). 1925. pp. 169–171.
  13. ↑ Thank you India, Central Tibetan Administration, published: Jan 2018, accessed: 19 Dec 2022.
  14. ↑ Cheung, Martha Pui Yiu (2014) [2006]. "Zan Ning (919–1001 CE), To Translate Means to Exchange". An Anthology of Chinese Discourse on Translation: From Earliest Times to the Buddhist Project. Routledge. pp. 179, 181. ISBN 978-1-317-63928-2.
  15. ↑ "An Invitation to Indian Architecture". Archived from the original on 2020-08-07. Retrieved 2025-05-22.
  16. ↑ How the Japan-India alliance could redraw the political map
  17. ↑ Cheung, Martha Pui Yiu (2014) [2006]. "Zan Ning (919–1001 CE), To Translate Means to Exchange". An Anthology of Chinese Discourse on Translation: From Earliest Times to the Buddhist Project. Routledge. pp. 179, 181. ISBN 978-1-317-63928-2.
  18. ↑ Esther 1:1 and {{{3}}}
  19. ↑ "THE BOOK OF ESTHER". Uskojaelama.net. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 10 August 2017.
  20. ↑ Brown–Driver–Briggs Hebrew and English Lexicon at BibleHub
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