Many Purāṇas, including the relatively early Viṣṇu Purāṇa, describe a flat disk of earth, which is itself composed of a series of circles. These are in fact seven concentric islands that keep doubling in size as one moves outward. (The first is an actual circle, and the concentric islands are ring-shaped.) The islands are separated from each other by a series of oceans, each of which has the width of the island it encircles. The center-most island is the most well known and is called Jambudvīpa (Rose Apple Island). And at the center of the world, the golden mountain called Meru anchors the entire arrangement. Meru is unusual in that it is an inversion of the usual mountains and points downward. Jambudvīpa is further divided into nine varṣa s, or regions, that consist of mountain ranges. The lines are latitudinal, running from east to west. The region of Jambudvīpa that is the farthest north is called Uttarakuru and may well be Kurukṣetra, where the central battle of the Mahābhārata took place. Moving southward, one encounters the other varṣas: Hiranmaya, Ramyaka, Ketumāla, Ilavṛta, Bhadrāśya, Harivarṣa, Kiṃpuruṣa, and Bhārata. The final region, Bhārata, is assumed by many scholars to be India, as this is the same name for India in the twenty-first century. In the Purāṇic cosmograph, however, it is a karmabhūmi, or realm where the laws of karma apply. As such one can only attain mokṣa, or liberation from these laws, in this region. Bhārata is also the only place on earth where rain falls. Bhārata itself is divided into nine sections. Moreover the celestial river Ganges also divides into seven branches—the traditional seven rivers found in ancient Vedic texts. The full series of seven islands then begins with Jambudvīpa, whose diameter is 100,000 yojana s. Jambudvīpa forms an actual circle with a radius of fifty thousand yojana s. (A yojana is a word that occurs as early as the Ṛgveda; it has been variously measured as two, four, five, or nine English miles, although it also has an etymological link to Yoga and yuga that makes its connotations metaphysical.) The rest of the ring-shaped islands are named as follows: Plakṣadvīpa, Sālmaladvīpa, Kuśadvīpa, Krauṇcadvīpa, Śākadvīpa, and Puṣkaradvīpa. All the islands are named after some species of the trees and plants that grow on them. Each concentric ring island is double the width of the previous one, so that the outermost, Puṣkaradvīpa, ends up with a width of 6.4 million yojana s. Finally, just as Jambudvīpa is divided into nine varṣa s, or regions, of mountain ranges, so too each of the five inner ring-shaped islands also is divided into seven mountain-range varṣa s. The outer most island, Puṣkaradvīpa, is delineated by a ring of mountains called Mānassottara. The oceans that separate the ring islands from one another have the same width as the diameter they surround, with the same expansion of measurement up to 6.4 million for the last ocean. Their names are drawn from the substance of the oceans themselves: Lavaṇoda (Salt Ocean), Ikṣura (Molasses Ocean), Suroda (Wine Ocean), Ghṛtoda (Ghee Ocean), Dadhyoda (Curd Ocean), Kṣīroda (Milk Ocean), and Svādūdaka (Freshwater Ocean). The Freshwater Ocean flows beyond the last ring island, Puṣkaradvīpa, and separates it from the end of the universe (lokasaṃsthiti). The realm at the end of the universe is a golden realm that divides the world from the nonworld, similarly to the way in which being and nonbeing are distinguished even in the earliest Vedic cosmologies. The golden realm also has a mountain, Lokakāloka (World and non-World). After this mountain is a region of perpetual darkness, where, the texts seem to suggest, only the elements of earth, wind, air, and fire exist. After that realm is the shell of the egg of Brahmā, which envelopes the universe in its entirety. The entire diameter of this universe is said to be 500 million yojana s. What of the stars and other heavenly bodies? The stars move around Mount Meru in a circular direction, with the North Star (dhruva) as their pivot. Below them lies the flat disk of the earth. The sun, moon, and planets move about in chariots drawn by horses, as was the case even in the earliest Vedic texts. They are attached to the North Star by bands of air that allow them to travel in their proper orbits. The Hindu cosmograph, with its conical center, Mount Meru, and the chariot of the sun and disk of stars circulating above the disk of concentric islands and oceans may be based on a projection of the celestial sphere onto a flat surface. In such an analysis the circle of the sun is the mythographic expression of the circle of the ecliptic. Mount Meru represents the projection of the celestial Tropic of Cancer, while the Mānassottara Mountain represents the projection of the Tropic of Capricorn. The prominence of the North Star, the conspicuous absence of the south polar star, and the stories about the exile of Agastya (Canopus) to the Southern Hemisphere to preserve the cosmograph all support the idea that the Hindu cosmograph is a northern, planispheric projection of the sort used to construct such instruments as the astrolabe. As for a vertical cosmology, there are seven worlds with the same names as those of the Upaniṣads, although the Purāṇas make considerable elaboration on these. The bhūrloka contains the cosmograph of the seven islands outlined above, with Bhārata as the only land where the law of karma applies and liberation is possible. Most significantly, there are seven Pātalas, or netherworlds: Atala, Vitala, Nitala, Gabhastimat, Mahātala, Sutala, and Pātala. Below these are twenty-eight hell realms. The bhuvaṣḥ, or intermediate realm, is the realm of the sun, which moves through its annual course in its chariot. Above this is the svarloka, which contains, in ascending order, the moon; its twenty-seven or twenty-eight Nakṣatras, or houses of the moon; Mercury (Buddha); Venus (Śukra); Mars (Angārika); Jupiter (Bṛhaspati); Saturn (Śani); and the Seven Ṛṣis (the Great Bear) and Dhruva (the North star, mentioned above). The three basic realms of bhur, bhuvaḥ, and svaḥ are described as kṛtika —meaning they are "created" worlds and therefore transitory. They are the regions where consequences are experienced and renewed with every kalpa. In these three realms the fruits of karma that are acquired in Bhārata manifest themselves, and souls are reborn to enjoy these fruits. These are the enjoyment realms (bhogabhūmi) as opposed to the karmabhūmi of Bhārata. Above the svarloka is the realm of mahas, which is considered a mixed realm because it is a deserted by beings at the end of kalpa but is not destroyed. Finally, the three highest realms—janas, tapas, and satyam —are described as akṛittika: that which is uncreated. They perish only at the end of the life of Brahmā.