A district in Northern India, the modern
Kashmir. In the Pali texts it is always mentioned with Gandhāra and probably
once formed part of that kingdom. (See also PHAI., p.93. The Jātakas mention the
countries separately as comprising two kingdoms ruled by a single king, e.g.,
J.iii.364, 378). At the end of the Third Council, Moggaliputta sent the thera
Majjhantika to propagate the religion in Kasmīra-Gandhāra. Majjhantika quelled
the power of the Nāga-king Aravāla (q.v.), who was a menace to the inhabitants,
and converted him to the faith, while the yakkha Pandaka and his wife Hāritā,
with their five hundred sons, became sotāpannas. The thera preached the
āsīvisūpama Sutta to the assembled multitude and won eighty thousand converts,
while one hundred thousand persons entered the Order. We are told that from that
time onwards the yellow robe was held in great esteem in Kasmīra. (Mhv.xii.3,
In Hiouien Thsang's time Kasmīra seems to have been an independent kingdom whose king was given to serpent-worship while his queen was a follower of the Buddha. Near the capital was a stūpa which enshrined a tooth of the Buddha. This tooth was soon after taken away by Harsavardhana of Kanoj. (CAGI.104ff; Beal, i.116f, etc.)
Sāgala is mentioned as being twelve leagues from Kasmīra (Mil.82).