Before we jump into the full list, I need to clear up a few things, starting with a short explanation on terminology and how the small states were governed. The states of Kathiawar (and Gujarat in general), were arranged in a hierarchical manner from first class to seventh class, with first class states being the most important, while seventh class made up the majority of the Thana estates. First class states were the big or important ones; they were generally in direct relations with the British government, and had a wide degree of administrative and judicial freedoms. Period sources thus term them Jurisdictional States. As you went down the class rankings, freedoms decreased, with intermediaries from either the British government or nearby higher-class states taking care of many matters of government. These states were termed Semi-Jurisdictional. Finally, there were the seventh class states. All of the latter were tiny states under the administrative purview of a wider Thana, and as such most aspects of governance were decided by British administrators at the Thana level. These states were the non-jurisdictional states, often alternately referred to as Talukas, in contrast with the full states. Sidenote, this wasn't a clear-cut line. Some notable Thana states were sixth or even fifth class states in their own right, and possessed some autonomy to match even though many policies were still decided at the Thana level.
In terms of administration, in 1914, the states of Kathiawar were subdivided into four districts, or prants; Jhalawar prant up in the northeast, Halar prant in the northwest, Gholewar prant in the southeast and Sorath in the southwest. These were abolished in 1924, with a dozen or so major states remaining in relations with the British government while the hundreds of lesser estates were grouped into two new Agencies; the Western Kathiawar Agency and the Eastern Kathiawar agency. These later developments are important to mention as they represent the situation described in later sources.
While I'm on the subject, a quick note outlining said sources. While I've used plenty, the main period sources are the
Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency VOL. VIII Kathiawar (1880),
The Imperial Gazetteer of India (1909),
Memoranda on Native States in India, 1915 (1916),
The ruling princes, chiefs and leading personages in the western india states agency (1928) and the
Memoranda on the Indian States (1939). The main modern resource used are the lists provided by
worldstatesman, that lists the states of the Eastern Kathiawar Agency and the Western Kathiawar Agency in two PDFs
here and
here.
The main cartographic sources were twofold. Firstly, the various
archived maps produced by the
Survey of India that I've linked to previously covering Kathiawar from the 1880's to the 1940's. While you have to download every map yourself from those sources,
here's a link to one of the more useful of those maps digitised elsewhere. Secondly, the two maps of Raj-era Gujarat produced by Hisatlas; an older, slightly obsolete version
that can occasionally be found floating around on the web, and the newer, much more detailed version (follow the links to the India sub-folder in the folder
here). Oh, and
Leading Princes (1928) features
another map that would've been an inset in the original book, provided on the first page of the PDF.
These sources are generally pretty good, but as mentioned each has their pros and cons. The 1880
Gazetteer is useful as the latter half of the text
is devoted to a list of States and notable places. Even the smallest Taluka gets at least a mention, which is extremely useful, as in many cases this was the only detailed description I could find for these petty states besides an entry in a table. I've already cited the 1909
Gazetteer a tonne, so it needs no introduction here. The 1916
Memoranda is actually one half of a pair alongside a
similar publication from 1911. The 1916 version is largely a reprint of the 1911 version, with corrections and additions, so I've used it as the main citation in the text except in a few cases where an earlier source that says the same thing is necessary to prove a point. Both sources describe the situation the year before they were published; the 1911 version describes the states as they were in 1910, while the 1916 version describes the situation to the best of its ability in 1915. Both sources also provide two tables,
the first listing all Kathiawar states alphabetically, and a second table,
listing the jurisdictional and semi-jurisdictional states followed by the seventh class states arranged by Thana. These two tables do not line up; some states appear in one table but not the other, several states are double-counted if they were both semi-jurisdictional and part of a Thana, and some states are referred to using two variant spellings of their names between the two tables (e.g. calling a state Derdi-Janbai in the first table and Janbai-ni-Derdi in the second). Before you ask, yes, I've already double checked, their lists of states are exactly the same between both sources.
Ruling Princes (1928) is both extremely useful and infuriating at times. The whole source is lousy with terrible re-edits; someone appears to have tried to update an old edition of the book with new information at some point after publishing, but in most cases ended up over-writing other sections to add the corrections. It doesn't happen often, but it does overwrite important information I would otherwise really want to know often enough to be annoying. Unfortunately I've not been able to find another full version of that source without the annoying re-edits freely available on the internet, so I've had to grin and bear the terrible edits for now. The 1939
Memoranda is very similar to the other two
Memoranda mentioned previously, with the difference that it describes things as they were in the year it was published. It is useful as it provides a later frame of reference that details in the past tense changes that were ongoing and incomplete in 1914.
Final note, I have reason to believe that the
worldstatesman lists are at least partially cribbing from the 1939
Memoranda, largely because I think both sources made the same mistakes no other sources make. Both states have three Lodhika states when there should only be two, both have six Bagasra states when there should only be four, and they have an almost identical list of post-Jetpur states (more on that below). The lists of non-jurisdictional Talukas are however different, with worldstatesman missing a few small states from the
Memoranda list, leading me to think worldstatesman used a different source for the Thana estates.
Seeing as I'll be referring back to these sources regularly, I thought it was a good idea to note them all at the beginning while highlighting their good points and pitfalls before we get cracking. The explanations themselves are a little rough around the edges, and I may tweak my list of states further if I dig up more sources while trying to finish Gujarat, but it's been long enough without an update that I'm posting it now. With all that said, time to get on with the explanations ...
Special Notes on Kathiawar;
- Jafrabad was considered a State in many sources, but as it was governed in personal union under the monarchs of Janjira (one of the small Deccan states down in Maharashtra, the only one with a coast), I decided to show it as part of that state and not count it separately in the final total.
- There were three branches of Anandpur State, but annoyingly they weren't governed together. Two of these states (
Anandpur II &
Anandpur III) were in direct relations with the British government, while the third (Anandpur I) was part of Chotila Thana. Thus the region labelled Anandpur in the key only contains two of the three branches of that state. It's not that notable, but I found this mildly annoying.
- I think there were two branches of Dedan in relations with the British government. The problem is, literally every map I've seen just shows one Dedan, even though multiple sources (the 1916 and 1939
Memoranda,
worldstatesman,
this list) list two dynasties. Confusing the matter further,
the entry for the second Dedan line in Leading Princes (1928) appears to have been mostly overwritten by an entry for Kotda Pitha, which is deeply annoying (see the discussion on the quality of that source above). All things considered, I'm listing two Dedan states; the 'no maps show the division' problem can be circumvented as the combined state is only just big enough to get a single pixel at this scale, so they got merged. This is one of the ones I'm uncertain on though.
- Speaking of Kotda Pitha, it might have been part of Babra thana. The 1880
Bombay Gazetteer lists it as "
under Babra talukah" (which incidentally, doesn't make sense; remember, Taluka was the name for small states, not groups of states), while the 1916
Memoranda lists it in Babra Thana,
but also double-counts it in a different section of the same table (that source does that a lot). Meanwhile, the
old hisatlas map lists it as a state in Babra Thana, but doesn't colour it as such, the state instead being shown administered separately. The new hisatlas map similarly displays the state separate from Babra Thana, while worldsatesman lists it as a separate minor state. I'll come down on separate minor state for now, but will note that there's some uncertainty to this assessment.
- There is some confusion over how many branches there were of Lodhika state.
Both sources I've found that go into detail state that there were only two states, Lodhika Senior (
AKA the Mulwaji estate) and Lodhika Junior (
AKA the Vijaysinhji estate). However both
worldstatesman and
the 1939 Memoranda list three Lodhika states, the two aforementioned branches as semi-jurisdictional estates and an extra non-jurisdictional state under the name "Lodhika Majmu". I think the discrepancy is because the town of Lodhika and its immediate environs (labelled as Lodhika Majmu on period maps) was also the seat of an eponymous thana, which may have confused things.
- Random minor point. Later sources put Mulia-Deri in Lodhika Thana, but earlier sources (
the 1880 Gazetteer, the
1915 Memoranda) put it in Dhrafa thana. It must've been transferred between thanas at some point between 1916 and 1928, as
Leading Princes puts it in Lodhika thana.
- The Bantwa States were an absolute mess. The territory was initially split between two brothers (relatives of the Nawab of Junagadh, who had granted them the tract) in 1760.
The elder brother set up in Manavadar, with his line following primogeniture and remaining undivided up to Indian independence. The lands of the younger brother were further subdivided between his two sons,
with one setting up in Gidar (by 1914 renamed Sardargarh)
and the other remaining in Bantwa. It should be noted that even at this stage things were more complex than they appeared, as there were apparently multiple co-dominions between the three states. Both Bantwa and Sardargarh further subdivided their territories as time went on, and I honestly haven't been able to keep track of all the splinters and branch lines. There are hints however if you know where to look. To give just one example, the 1939
Memoranda lists Zabardast Khanji as a non-jurisdictional estate in Eastern Kathiawar, but I've found no mention of that entity in other sources apart from on the new hisatlas map, where it is labelled as a vassal of Sardargadh.
Thus for the sake of simplicity I'm calling it that there are only four Bantwa states; Manavadar, Sardargarh plus splinters/vassals, and the two Bantwa major lines plus splinters/vassals. I can get away with this as I've seen oblique references to the main lines Sardargarh and Bantwa being considered paramount over their subsidiary branches, which allows me to simplify things under the 'no vassals of vassals' rule.
- If the Bantwa states were purgatory, the Jetpur estates were hell.
Over the course of about three centuries, what started as a single unified state was subdivided and partitioned repeatedly (the old, "each son gets a part of the inheritance" problem) until what was left could best be described as a fractal mess. It is incredibly telling that no single source is entirely sure just how many Jetpur states there were; aside from the main lines (whose territory, while more extensive than the lesser branches, was still invariably fragmented between multiple enclaves) there were dozens of subsidiary dynasties, and that's not even accounting for co-dominions or areas of joint rule, sometimes shared between multiple shareholders. Several tracts were administered jointly by two or more states,
while the town of Jetpur itself was under the administration of the 'Jetpur Taluka Court'; a collective body in which all branches of the ruling family had a say.
As I said, an absolute, impenetrable mess. As mentioned, estimates of the number of states and estates in the complex vary widely. The 1880
Gazetteer notes the three most important entities, and glibly states that there are a total of sixteen estates but provides no further information. The 1916
Memoranda apparently agrees, listing 16 semi-jurisdictional Jetpur estates across
three pages of tables in addition to the co-ruled Taluka Court. The 1909
Gazetteer on the other hand puts the figure a little higher at 20, while the 1939
Memoranda is more vague,
putting the figure at somewhere between 20 and 30.
The latter source also details the fate of the Jetpur mess; in an extended process starting before the First World War, individual dynasties divested themselves of the complex co-ownership deals in order to be recognised as full states. The first shoots of this process are actually noted in the 1909
Gazetteer,
which lists the four estates that had completed the process at that time separately from the rest. By the time of Indian independence things had mostly ironed themselves out; it was still a messy enclave complex (see the new hisatlas map, set in 1947, for all the gory details), but at least the two dozen or so dynasties had defined borders.
The Jetpur Taluka Court was abolished only in 1937, with the old state of Pithadia taking the city under its sole administration and shifting its capital there.
But what of the situation in 1914? At that time, much of the standardisations and territorial exchanges had yet to take place, so I can only assume that the area was even more of a mess than it would end up in 1947 (seriously, take a look at that map, it's still hideous even after substantial improvements). For this and other reasons, it was an obvious decision to merge the many petty estates into a single unit for the map, as showing them separately would be straight-up impossible. Even the usually reliable
Survey of India never showed the Jetpur estates as individual, distinct entities - in all maps produced by them that I've so far seen, they are merged together as an amorphous blob of mostly contiguous territory rather than the mess of tesselated enclaves they were in reality.
As to how many states there were in this territory, on that I am much more uncertain. As mentioned, no two sources can agree, especially before the various estates disentangled themselves from the complex co-ownership deals. Earlier sources that go into detail such as
the 1916 Memoranda and the 1
928 Leading Princes list about sixteen notable estates. In
their table showing the semi-jurisdictional states of the Western Kathiawar Agency, worldstatesman helpfully marks with an asterisk sixteen states that "
were separated from the old Jetpur state (Jetpur Majmu) in a process that was completed in 1937 by ending of joint ownership", with each fromer estate now going by the name of its capital town rather than the founder of the original branch. This is a promising development, especially in light of the fact that all named capital towns show up in the area marked "Jetpur states" in the
Survey of India maps.
But there's a catch. If you account for all the other semi-jurisdictional states in the Western Kathiawar Agency in both the
worldstateman list and the
1939 Memoranda list (their lists are identical, another reason I think worldstatesman follows the 1939
Memoranda), you are left with four small states otherwise unaccounted for; Akala, Dangavadar, Nadala and Pipalia. On the other hand, there are towns with these names located within the collective area of the Jetpur states, strongly implying that worldstatesman got things wrong, and the sixteen states singled out as originally part of Jetpur are not the only post-Jetpur states. To add a further wrinkle, there is one more non-jurisdictional state listed by the 1939
Memoranda I was not able to account for;
Rupavati (the two other anomalies on
that list are a double-counting of Bantwa-Sardargarh under a variant name (Sadargadh) and the aforementioned Zabardast Khanji estate). As the small town of Rupavati is also located in the collective Jetpur shown on period maps, I decided to call it as an extra Jetpur-descended state and add it to the list alongside the 20 others.
The new hisatlas map provides a little more uncertainty however. All 21 towns already identified as the capitals of the post-Jetpur states are marked as capitals, lending further credence to my conjectures. However, the new hisatlas also marks six further towns as if they were capitals of states. My best guess is that that is indeed what they were, but they were minor, non-jurisdictional states that very easily could have fallen through the cracks and not been recorded as states. Assuming those 6 were missing states would bring the total number of Jetpur estates to 27, right in line with the
1939 Memoranda estimate that there were between 20 and 30 such states. But as I have so far found no evidence in the primary literature that these were indeed extra states I decided to omit them. It is after all possible that these were the capitals of still-extant co-dominions, or else the capital territory of an estate unified with another under personal union.
In summary, Jetpur was a horrible, horrible mess. This mess was sorted out by the 1930's, but was still even messier back in 1914. Now, I could've done a deep dive through sources trying to link up the 1939 States with the various estates listed in other sources (
here, and
starting here), but honestly, life's too short. This was one of the last tasks I finished in Kathiawar, and by this point I just wanted things done, so I took the easier route. Two final corrections, the Jetpur Taluka Court was a collective entity so I'm not counting it, while what the 1939
Memoranda lists as Jetpur State was previously Pithadia State, a change which is reflected in the spoilered list. Bloody hell, that was a long explanation.
- Annoyingly many sources cannot even agree on how many Thanas there were. The 1909
Gazetteer for example lists 12 in a footnote to the table
here, but those aren't the same 12 listed by worldstatesman
here and
here. I had to look into each of the squiffy cases individually (more on that below), which was a deeply tedious process.
- Dasada is not listed as a Thana by the
1909 Gazetteer even though basically every other source calls it one.
It is mentioned as the seat of a Thana in the 1880
Gazetteer, a conjecture apparently confirmed by both hisatlas maps and worldstatesman (that calls it "
Dasada thana (itself a taluka)", implying that there was only one state in the Thana) and
the 1916 Memoranda. Further, worldstatesman also
lists Zainabad state separately, while elsewhere stating that Zainabad was
separated from Dasada Thana and elevated to a state in 1921. From this, it can be assumed that before 1921, Dasada Thana featured both Dasada taluka and the future Zainabad state, for a grand total of two estates. The problem is that while it does show up in later sources, no mention is made of Zainabad earlier than the
1939 Memoranda, which is IOM concerning, but not enough to get it cut from the 1914 list.
- The other thana missing from the 1909
Gazetteer is Jhinjuvada Thana. As with Dasada,
basically every source besides the 1909
Gazetteer lists it as a Thana, with some also adding in the enigmatic state of Rozwa. For example, while it may not consider Jhinjuvada a Thana, it still has a listing in the Kathiawar table of the 1909
Gazetteer,
where it is listed as; "
Jhinjuvada including Rozva",
while a sub-list in Leading Princes (1928) marks Rozwa with an asterisk and says nothing more.
Worldstatesman and both
hisatlas maps include it as a state alongside Jhinjuvada State as a component part of Jhinjuvada Thana, so I'm including it in the list.
- On the other hand, the 1909
Gazetteer lists two extra Thanas that I had to do some real digging to track down. From what I can tell, Bagasra was a Thana covering the four main branches of what was originally a unified Bagasra State before it was split by multiple inheritances. According to a footnote in the 1916
Gazetteer,
Bagasra Thana had been recently abolished. Thus the resulting branch lines were no longer under the purview of a Thana and should be shown distinctly, however they were small and fragmented enough that it just makes sense to show them cumulatively like with the Bantwa and Jetpur state complexes.
One extra note, as I said at the beginning, I think the 1939
Memoranda miscounted the Bagasra states, with worldstatesman apparently following suit. In their table for semi-Jurisdictional states in Western Kathiawar,
they list Bagasra (Majmu), and two further lines of Bagasra as states 4, 5 and 6, apparently without realising that the extra Bagasra states were already accounted for.
From other sources, I know that the other three lines were Khari-Bagasra, Hadala-Bagasra and Bagasra-Natwarnagar, which is problematic, as the
Memoranda also lists all three as
states 14 (Hadala), 19 (Khari) and 33 (Natwarnagar) in a separate table, essentially double-counting them. All four Bagasra branches are shown on the
new hisatlas map under those names.
- Chamardi Thana threw me for a loop for a bit until I found better sources,
as it's listed as a thana by the 1909 Gazetteer, but isn't mentioned by other lists and maps. It took quite a while for me to figure out that what later sources called Songadh Thana had originally been two Thanas, Chamardi and Songadh. Before the merger, the states of what later sources would refer to as just Songadh Thana were split between the two. Hence later sources, and more modern resources focused on the era immediately before Indian independence like
hisatlas (both maps are set in 1947) don't mention it.
Here's where things get very annoying. For a long time the only datapoints I had to work with were the 1909
Gazetteer that mentions Chamardi Thana and
Leading Princes (1928),
which doesn't, including its states in Songadh Thana. From this I decided that it was best to err on the side of caution and assume Chamardi Thana still existed in 1914, and to figure out how the small states were split. Thus I read all the entries for relevant small states in the 1880
Gazetteer, that, among other things, mentions what Thana each state was under the aegis of. As you can imagine, that was a lot of work.
Last weekend however I stumbled on two new sources;
Memoranda on Native States in India (1911) &
(1916). So far I've only been citing the 1916 version, but the 1911 version is important as it provides a slightly earlier date right after the 1909 Gazetteer was published.
Both tables list Chamardi Thana and Songadh Thana separately, confirming that my division of states was the correct one,
but also states in a footnote to the relevant table that Chamardi was recently "
Amalgamated under the new Thana reorganisation scheme with Songadh Thana". In a deeply annoying twist, it turned out all that work I sunk in was for nothing,
as here was a source from 1910 stating that the merger had already happened. I put in all that work separating the two Thanas apart, then in the end I found a source that both would've made separating the two thanas a trivial exercise and confirmed that it was pointless to begin with. Typical.
The one positive is that it makes the map a little more accurate. While the states of Songadh clustered together in one place, so cumulatively they were big enough to be shown as a single pixel, the states of Chamardi Thana were too small and scattered to realistically show at this scale. To show them I had to really finneagle the borders to get a single pixel visible, but now I know the two Thanas had already merged by 1914 I could revert the map back to a slightly more realistic earlier version.
- While I'm on the subject I may as well mention one more little niggle I encountered checking Songadh Thana.
The old hisatlas map lists two extra states in the thana, but I think these are both minor map errors that didn't actually exist. In every other map (including the revised hisatlas map) the relevant territories go to other states, and no source makes mention of them, so I just didn't include them.
- Another small "state" that threw me off was Padargadh in Lakhapadar Thana. It appears on maps as a distinct territory, but is never listed or even mentioned as a state in any source I've thus far found. My suspicion was that it was a similar case to Dhasa; a distinct territorial unit (shown as such on maps) that was nevertheless governed by a different larger state as an exclave (for the full story on Dhasa, see below), but because I didn't have firm proof of that I wasn't certain. I was still going to omit it anyway, but a quick search
here pulled up a couple of references to an entity called "
Dahida-Padargadh" or some variation. As Dahida was one of the other small states in Lakhapadar Thana, it isn't a stretch to suppose that the ruling family also controlled Padargadh, but that this wasn't noted on by period sources due to the state's insignificance. I have no other evidence for this assertion besides the above records of documents, but it would make sense, and explain why a distinct territorial unit in Lakhapadar Thana is never named as a state in any primary source, so I went with it as the best explanation.
- I now need to spend
waaay too long talking about the Khambhala-Vankia problem. I was eventually able to prove my hypothesis, but as I only found the final evidence on Saturday and had by then amassed a wealth of circumstantial evidence, I'll be laying it all out here.
What I think happened is that one of the small states of Babra Thana changed its name, perhaps multiple times, but due to the state's general insignificance this name change was not noted on by other sources. There are a few other states that changed their names,
for example Pol State in northern Gujarat was renamed to Vijaynagar State in 1934, but the thing is, those other renaming's happened to notable states where the change was clearly recorded. In this case, the name change(es?) happened, but resulted in some sources using one name and different sources using the other without mentioning the change, leading to a lot of confusion when comparing lists between sources.
Without fail, every source I have so far found listing the states of Kathiawar either mentions Vankia state without mentioning Khambhala, or notes Khambhala state without talking about Vankia. With the exception of the new hisatlas map (that shows both states simultaneously), every other source I can find mentions one state while completely omitting the other.
All maps I've so far seen show only one state in the area, with the vast majority labelling that state Vankia (see
sheet 41, Baroda and Diu (1915), 41 O & 41 P Amreli district (1939), and 41/O/05 Amreli District (1946)), with no mention of Khambhala. The more detailed maps show that both the towns of Vankia and Khambhala were located in the borders of this state. There is one exception - sheet 41/N/08 Ahmadabad District (1946), labels the small portion of the state that protrudes into the field of view Khambhala, even though based on the positions of the two towns and the putative borders given in the new hisatlas map, that territory should go to Vankia were they separate. As mentioned, the only source I have for the two states coexisting is the new hisatlas map, that shows the territory divided roughly in half between the two towns, but again this is only one source.
Among older sources, a similar dichotomy is observed. The 1880
Gazetteer makes no mention of Vankia at all,
but does have an admittedly short description of Khambhala. Most notably, that description names the other towns in the state, confirming something I already suspected - Vankia and Khambhala co-existed in the same state. The 1909
Imperial Gazetteer swings the other way -
Vankia is mentioned in the main table of the Kathiawar states, listed as a sixth-class state.
It also gets a perfunctory name-drop in a different article. Meanwhile Khambhala is nowhere to be found, either in the table, or mentioned elsewhere in those lengthy tomes. Later sources go the other way however; in its list of minor states by Thana, the
Ruling Princes (1928)
names Khambhala with no Vankia,
as does the 1939 Memoranda. But even this is uncertain,
as the map at the beginning of Ruling Princes labels the only town in the state "Vankia". As I said in the beginning, even individual sources contradict themselves in places.
From these records I think different later researchers drew different conclusions.
worldstatesman lists Khambhala as part of Babra Thana while making no mention of Vankia (as I've said already, I think they were following the 1939
Memoranda tables), while wikipedia (which I strongly suspect follows the 1909
Gazetteer) has
a short article on Vankia but makes no mention of Khambhala.
The other list of Princely states I've found lists Khambhala (without an article unfortunately), but again makes no mention of Vankia.
The old hisatlas map assigns the whole territory to Vankia, but mentions Khambhala in the list of states in Babra Thana as an uncertain state not shown on the map (
I wonder why that might be?).
All the evidence I amassed pointed to there only being one state in the area, existing under different, mutually-exclusive names on different lists depending on the source originally used. The final proof came when I stumbled on the
Memoranda on Native States in India (1916) last weekend,
which lists "
Khambhala ... (Vankia)" as state no. 77 in its list of jurisdictional and semi-jurisdictional states in Kathiawar, outright stating that Khambhala and Vankia were different names for the same State.
But why does the new hisatlas map show them as two separate states occupying the territory all other maps give to one or the other? With a little thought I was able to come up with an explanation for the discrepancy - it was two states ruled in a personal union. In a few places, the new Hisatlas map shows states in personal union distinct from each other when every other map doesn't, e.g. putting a border between Satudad and Vavdi when every source I've found calls it
Satudad-Vavdi (with some variation in spelling). Assuming this explains why this is the only map to show both states - as it is showing the two component parts of a unitary state, not de-facto political units. I also still think the state alternated its capital at least once between the two component parts, hence why it shows up under two different names depending on the source.
The Khambhala/Vankia discrepancy was quite the research rabbit hole that ate up a lot of time (not quite as bad as the "Nimsod" debacle, but getting there). As for what name I'll be using for the state, I'm going with Vankia, as this is a primarily cartographic project and almost all other maps use that name, and to be honest, I like the way it sounds more.
- A similarly big research project stemmed from
a footnote in the 1909 Gazetteer list of states in Kathiawar, that mentions 11 small entities that were for various reasons omitted from their list. Full quote;
"
The total number of villages and population according to the census of 1909 are respectively 4,242 and 2,329,196: of the former, 11 (three civil stations and the rest villages of insignificant talukdars who do not pay tribute) with an aggregate population of 26,736, have been omitted from the prant totals. They are: Rasnal, Pipalva (Vithalgadh) (1,811), Ranparda (459), Hathasni (939) and Noghanvadar (113), in Gohilwar; Rajkot Civil Station (8992), and Hadala (468), in Halar; Wadhwan Civil Station (11,255) in Jhalawar; and Jetalsar Civil Station (463), Dhasa (1,473), and Shapur (763), in Sorath prant."
Of these, the three civil stations can be quickly discounted. These were notable as they were areas owned by Princely rulers but administered by the British government. They were different from other British administered areas as the land remained the territory of the respective Princely State, with the British government paying rent for the privilege of administering those areas. Civil stations aside, that leaves eight petty entities of questionable status. Tracking them all down was quite the task however, and one that ate up an awful lot of time.
The fact that Vithalgadh was mentioned with Pipalva was a massive clue that they were linked in some way, and with only a little digging I had hard confirmation that three of the mentioned states (Pipalva, Rasnal and Hadala) were actually exclaves of Vithalgadh. All three are the chief towns of scattered exclaves that every map I've found labels as part of Vithalgadh, while
Leading Princes (1928)
straight-up names them as Vithalgadh possessions.
One that took more luck than skill to track down was Dhasa. This one was annoying as it appears labelled as if it were a full state on all the period maps I could dig up, and I was on the verge of tentatively adding it to my list when I was saved by dumb luck. I was randomly scrolling through the 1880
Gazetteer when I found
the entry on Rai-Sankli State, a tiny sliver of land no more than three kilometers across sandwiched between Wadhwan and the many small states of Bhoika Thana up in Jhalawar prant. Right at the end of that entry on the following page,
it states that "
These Desais [a shorthand for the ruling dynasty]
also possess Dhasa in the Alag Dhanani sub-division of the Sorath Prant.". This was backed up by further research, as
Leading Princes (1928)
is even more explicit, stating that "
The Taluka of Rai-Sankli is comprised of three villages, Rai, Sankli and Dhasa. The first two villages are in the Eastern Kathiawar Agency, while the third is in the Western Kathiawar Agency. Jurisdiction is enjoyed over the first two villages. Dhasa is placed under the Lakhapadar Thana of the Agency." Dhasa was an exclave of the semi-jurisdictional state of Rai-Sankli administered under Lakhapadar Thana for convenience.
Hathasni was also fairly annoying, as it is listed as a state in some lists (notably
the 1916 Memoranda). In this case however, period maps were more useful,
as all label the territory around the small town as an exclave of Datha. Following this up,
the 1880 Gazetteer entry on Datha is unequivocal in describing Hathasni a possession of the monarchs of Datha (it was actually an older holding of theirs, that they used as a base during their conquest of what became the rest of Datha State in the 1750's).
This just leaves three states of questionable validity; Noghanvadar, Ranparda and Shapur. In the end I added all of them to the list, though their additions are questionable, and they could still be removed if I find better sources.
I'll start with Shapur, which I think also went by the names Lungya, Lunghia or Shapur-Lunghia depending on the source. It took quite a bit of time for me to link up Lunghia, a small territory in Lakhapadar Thana
with some scattered references in the primary literature, with Shapur, an otherwise much more elusive entity (a search complicated by the existence of
Shahpur, note the spelling, an unrelated sixth-class state up in Halar prant). It was
this document that tipped me off that the two states were actually one; the accession agreement signed by "
talukdar of non-jurisdictional Shapur & Lunghia", where the state's ruler (Talukdar) signed over his powers to the government of India in 1947.
That document is unfortunately not digitised, but it provides proof that a state of that name existed and was annexed by India on independence, and that Shapur and Lunghia were linked. Shapur shows up sporadically in later lists (
such as in the 1916 Memoranda list under Lakhapadar Thana) but is otherwise never mentioned in the primary sources. On the other hand, I do have a hard reference to the existence of Lunghia,
a short mention in the 1880 Bombay Gazetteer. Lunghia also shows up under that name on every period map I've so far seen, and the state is labelled Shapur-Lunghia in the new hisatlas map. In summary, I have a tenuous trail of references attesting to the state's existence under multiple names, and it shows up on maps. It might've been an exclave of another state like the other examples discussed already, but the separate accession document linked above would appear to dispute this.
Noghanvadar is much more tenuous. The most worrying detail is that I haven't been able to find it on any period maps thus far, which is a serious strike against it. On the other hand, it is shown on the extremely reliable improved hisatlas map, where it is shown as a thin sliver of territory between an exclave of Jasdan State and the messy Jetpur estates, so it isn't inconceivable that such a small territory could be overlooked, even if unlikely considering the otherwise general high-quality maps produced by the
Survey of India. It is also enigmatic in the primary sources; there is no state by that name in the 1880
Bombay Gazetteer or the 1928
Leading Princes, and it only appears as an entry in tables in both
the 1915 and 1939 Memoranda's, aside from the
cursory mention in the 1909
Gazetteer that got me looking for it in the first place. It is however cited by
worldsatesman as a state of Babra Thana, and I eventually erred on the side of including it, though as mentioned the citations are spotty at best.
Finally we have Ranparda. Aside from an embarrassing incident where I mixed it up with the state of
Ramparda (again, note the spelling) in Chotila Thana, I was, as with Noghanvadar unable to find primary sources outside of lists of states (Also like Nognanvadar, it shows up the the
Memoranda tables but rarely elsewhere). It does however consistently show up labelled on period maps and
both hisatlas maps, which makes its absence from some sources all the more perplexing.
As the first five named entities turned out to be exclaves of other states, it remains possible that the three states I tentatively included were also exclaves, and I just haven't been able to track down the parent state. As mentioned however, Shapur-Lunghia has a more substantive trail of references in the primary literature than the other two, so I would consider it more likely to be a full state that for whatever reason slipped through the cracks and just got missed by some sources than the other two.
In conclusion, three of the mentioned states were exclaves of Vithalgadh, one was an exclave of Datha, one was an exclave of Rai-Sankli, and the final three were (I think) distinct states. Again, there is some uncertainty to these conclusions, and all three states were under the aegis of a Thana, so would not show up on the R-QBAM anyway (Ranparda under Chock-Datha Thana, Noghanvadar under Babra Thana, Shapur-Lunghia under Lakhapadar Thana).
- Fortunately, in terms of portraying all these states on the R-QBAM, there weren't too many mergers barring the Thanas themselves. Tiny
Rai-Sankli (owner of Dhasa, see above) was merged with Wadhwan, while the two small states
Rajpara and
Bhadva were merged into
Kotda Sangani (it helps that the former two states were collateral lines of the latter).
The main merger was the seven Rajkot branch lines. Every generation or so for two centuries,
Rajkot, a
Second-Class state slap bang in the middle of Kathiawar, would split off a cadet state under a branch line of the main dynasty. These branch lines themselves sometimes bifurcate, creating the two
Lodhika lines mentioned already. These states were invariably small, their territories fragmented between multiple exclaves and as such they were impossible to include distinctly. As they all descended from Rajkot however, I was able to merge them and label them collectively "Rajkot Cadet Lines'' in the colour key. The seven states thus merged were;
Gadhka,
Gavridad,
Kotharia,
Lodhika (Senior),
Lodhika (Junior),
Pal and
Shahpur (the one apparently often confused with Shapur-Lunghia, see above).
- One final note, a modification to the bits of Gujarat I've already done.
Jambughoda State was known as Narukot before 1926, its entry in the colour key has been changed accordingly.