Book of Indian Eras, with Tables for Calculating Indian Dates c6.59

c6.59

In Abu Rihân’s account of the centenary cycle, there are several discordant numbers which I find it difficult to reconcile. He states that when the Indians wished to note the date of the taking of Somnâth [January 1026 A.D.], they set down the figures 242, 606, and 99, which added together gave 947 of the Saka era [equivalent to A.D. 1025-26]. He explains the numbers by referring 242 to the number of years which had passed before the Indians began to use the centenary cycle, which came in with the era of the Guptas.* In a previous passage, however, he makes this period only 241 years. The figure 606 indicates the number of complete centuries (counting 101 years to each century), and the last figure 99 represents the number of years elapsed (éconlees) of the current cycle. Now it seems to me that Abu Rihân has not properly understood the number 606, which I would explain as follows: The unit 6 seems to me to refer to the period which had elapsed between the establishment of the so-called Gupta era in A.D. 319, and the beginning of the centenary reckoning in A.D. 325. According to this explanation, the account will stand thus:—