Book of Indian Eras, with Tables for Calculating Indian Dates c15.12

c15.12

In the Jain books also there is very early mention of the Vikrama Samvat. Thus the Satrunjaya Mahâtmya professes to have been written 477 years after Vikrama, or in A.D. 420, when “Silâditya, king of Vallabhi, expelled the Buddhists from Saurashtra, recovered Satrunjaya and other places of pilgrimage from them, and erected many Jain temples.”* The era of Vikrama also is said to have been established by Vikramârka Raja 470 years after Mahâvira, or in 527 — 470 = 57 B.C. From the way in which he is spoken of as “honouring the advice of Siddha Sena Suri as the words of Jaina,” it would appear that Vikramârka was a Jaina, which would account for the use of his era in the Jaina books, as well as for the non-mention of it in early Brahmanical inscriptions.