SOMNATH or Somanath is an ancient town situated in lat. 27° 7' N., and long. 71° 34' E., at the eastern extremity of a bay on the south coast of the peninsula of Kattyawar, in the Bombay Presidency. The western headland of the same bay is occupied by the port of Virawal, which gives to the locality its more common nanie of Virawal Pattan, also known as Deo Pattan, Pat tan Somanath, Somnath Pattan, Prabhas rattan. On the west, the plain is covered with Muham madan tombs ; on the east are numerous Hindu shrines and monuments.
The country near Somnath is full of memorials of Krishna, and at a spot to the east of the city, near the union of three beautiful streams, the body of the hero is said to have been burned. Before its capture by Mahmud of Ghazni, A.D. 1024 1026, little is known of the history of Somnath.
The country of Soreth, a province of the penin sula of Gujerat, now more generally known under the name of Kattyamar, is celebrated in the Puranas for containing five inestimable bless ings. First, the river Gumti ; second, beautiful women ; third, good horses ; fourth, Somnath ; and fifth, Dwarka. Among the many places in Soreth that are held sacred by the Hindus, Som nath Pattan has always been one of the most remarkable. It stands one or two miles from the , sea, at the junction of three rivers, the Hurna, Kuptila, and Sersutty, at a distance of three miles to the east of the port of Belawul. Somanatha or Sotneswara is a name of the type of Siva, and the worship of Siva under this type prevailed throughout India at least as early as the 5th or 6th century. The Somanath idol, in fact, was one, of the twelve great lingams then set up in various parts of India', several of which were destroyed by the early Muhammadan conquerors ; and it has been mentioned that Somnath temple was the counterpart of Baalbek ; and the idol is related to have been brought to India from the Kaba, on the advent of Mahomed. 13rahmanical records, however, refer it to the time of Krishna. Soma nath is tbe title of Swayam-nath, or self-existing., and the religion was, of old, comtnon to Arabia and India ; and there is reason for believing, what the early Muhannnadan authorities assert, viz. that the Lat, worshipped by the idolaters of Mecca, was a similar deity to the Swayam-nath of the Hindus. The idol itself, Somnath, is stated to be one of the twelve symbols of Siva, which are said by Hindus to have descended frotn heaven to the earth. The temple of the idol was supported
by 56 pillars in rows, the idol was of polished stone, about five cubits high, of proportionate thickness, and two cubits were below ground. General Cunningham says the Pattan Somnath temple of Siva enshrined a figure of the god, bearing a crescent on his head, as Sonmath, or the lord of the moon. This appellation was therefore the proper name of the temple, and not of the city, which he concludes must have been Elapura or Erawal, the modern Virawal.
The image was, according to Muhammadan authors, destroyed by Mabmud ; but. in late years, Ahalia Bhai, the widow of a prince of the Mahratta family of Holkar, erected a new temple on the exact site of that which was demolished. A symbol of Siva Mahadeo has been placed in this temple, hich is deemed peculiarly propltiotts to those who desire offspring. Not far from this, the Hindu pilgrim is shown a solitary pipal tree, on the bank of the Saraswati river, which he is assured stands on the exact spot where the Sri Krishen received the mortal wound from an arrow, that terminated his incarnation. .
Abouta cen tury after their expulsion from Balabhi, about A.D. 758, 13appa or Vappaka founded a new kingdotn at Chitore, and his son Guhila or Guhaditya gave to his tribe the new named Guhila wet or Gahi lot, by which theyare still known. .About the same time a chief of the Chaura tribe, named I3an raja, or the jungle lord, founded a city on the bank of the Saraswati, about 70 miles to the south-west of Mount Abu, called Anlodwara Patten, which soon became the most famous place in Western India. Somewhat earlier, or about A.D. 720, Krishna, the Pahlava prince of the Peninsula, built the fort of Elapura, the beauty of which, according to the inseriptiou, astonished the immortals, In it he established au image of Siva adorned with the crescent. Following this clue, General Cunning ham inclines to identify Elapura with the famous city of Somnath, which, as the capital of the Peninsula, Wa S usually called Patten Somnath. General Cunningham takes it to be the same as Elapura or Elawar, which, by a transposition that is very common in India, would become Erawal. Thus Nar-sinh has become Ran-si, and Ranod is used indifferently with Narod, and the ancient Varul is the modern Elur or Ellora.