The Coinage of the Gupta Empire and its Imitations c18.s2.5

c18.s2.5

According to Jain tradition, Toramāṇa, who had his Indian headquarters at Pavaiyya on the Chenab, had a preceptor named Harigupta, who himself was a scion of the Gupta family.² This preceptor may well have been his political adviser rather than spiritual guide. The findspot of the coins of Harigupta in northern Pañchāla would suggest the possibility of the identity of Harigupta, the adviser of Toramāṇa, with Harigupta of these coins. If such was the case, we may regard Harigupta as a scion of a local Gupta family in northern Pañchāla, who had made a common cause with the Hūṇa invader. No definite identification, however, can be proposed in the present state of our knowledge. The palæography of his coins shows a survival of the eastern form of *ha* on the Kalaśa (Vase) type and his Chhatra type closely imitates that type of Chandragupta II; it may therefore be presumed that Harigupta could not have flourished later than the first half of the 6th century A. D.