VINDHYA or Vindhyachala, also Bind'h and Binclhya, a great series of mountain ranges separating the Gangetic basin from the Dekhan, and forming a well-marked, although not quite continuous, chain across India. The name was formerly used in an indefinite manner to include the Satpura Ilills, south of the Nerbadda ; and indeed certain of the Sanskrit Puranas apply it specially to the Satpuras. The Vindhyas are now restricted to the ranges on the north of that river. The Vindhyas occupy a considerable place in the mythology of India as the great demarcating line between tho Madliya-desha, or middle land' of the Sanskrit immigrants, and the non - Aryan Deklian. They aro still inhabited to a large ex tent by aboriginal races, and the name Vindbya in Sanskrit means also a hunter.' The range separates Hindustan proper from Southern India, and forms the northern boundary of the valley of the Nerbadda river, extending from Gujerat on the IV. to the basin of the Ganges on the E., and comprised between the 22d and 25th parallels of latitude. The average height, 1500 to 2000 feet. Chumpanir, lat. 22°34' N., and long. 73° 41' E., 2500 fect ; crest of Jam Ghat, 2300 feet; mountain in Bhopal, 2500 feet; Chindwarra, 2100 feet ; and Patehinaree, vaguely stated to be 5000 feet, but this is probably an exaggeration ;• Dokgur, stated to be 4800 feet ; Putta Sunka and Choura Doo, the highest, con jectured at 5000 feet; Ainarkantak, jungly table-land computed to be 3463 feet ; Leda, a sinninit Lanjld IliIls, lat. 21° 55' N., and long.
80° 25' E., 2500 feet ; another of the same hills, in lat. 21° 40' N., and long. 80° 35' E., 2400 feet. The chain forms the southrn buttress of the plateau of Malwa, Bhopal, etc. In the Saugor and Nerbadda territories its crest is but the brow of this table-land ; but in the western part it risea a few hundred feet above the high land on its northern side. Connected with the western limits of the Vindhya range by a curved line of hills are the Aravalli monntains, which stretch ahnost to Dehli, and aerve as a barrier between Central India and the western desert. The eastern por tion of the Vindhya chain is a spreading table land, from which spurs descend to the north and south, the latter separating the different valleys of Orissa. The table-land of Chutia Nagpur averages 3000 feet, and westwards near Sirguja is higher. Hazaribagh is about 1800 feet, and Parisnath Hill on the east is about 4500 feet ; the most easterly spurs approach the Ganges at Monghir, Bhagul pur, and Rajmahal.
Geologically, few parts of India have excited more interest and attention than the districts adjoining the Nerbrulda river ; the great thickness of sandstones and amociated beds, which form the MASS of the Vindhya range, being the most I striking- and remarkable feature in that country. 1 There is a great faulting, accompanied by much disturbance mechanically, and by much alteration chemically (more especially to the south of this fault), in the rocks which pass along the inain line of the NerbacIda valley, along the continuation eastward of this line down the valley of the Sone, and thence across Behar, where the continuation of the same rocks forms the Gorakhpur Hills. It is considered a high probability that this line of dislocation was continued to the east by north up or towards the valley of Assam ; its main direc tion being 15° E. to 18° N., corresponding with the main direction of the Vindhya range and the Khassya Hill range. South of this dis location, the great group of sandstones, shales, etc., forming the Vindhya IIills, is almost entirely absent, unless the highly metamorphosed rocks there seen be the continuation downwards of the same series, greatly altered. This great group is altogether of a different character and of a more ancient epoch than the beds associated with the coals of Bengal and of Central India,—the latter resting quite unconformably on the former. lir. Oldham gave the mune Vindhyan to this great group, being best seen in the well-exposed scarps of the Vindhyan range ; and to the subdivisions in ascending order, the names Kymore, Rewah, and Bundair; but he appliel these names only provisionally, as he thought it possible that the Rewah limestone and Bundair sandstone are only repetitions of the Sone valley limestone and sandstone, produced by faulting. Rtsting formably upon the Vindhya formation, there is a considerable thickness of sandstones, shales, and coals in Central India, much diaturbed and traversed by trap-dykes. The total thickness of this group in this district exceeds some thouaand feet. In these beds occur numerous foaail plants, which thoroughly identify these rocks with the coal-groups of Bardwan, of Hazaribagh, and of Cuttack. Taking it as proved that the strata at Kotah, from which fish and Saurian remains had been obtained, are the same with thooe of Kampti near Nagpur, the strong Permian ana logies of the Saurians (Brachyops) ought not to be overlooked.