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Indian Epigraphy c15.s2: Section V. Fabricated Reckonings and Doubtful Cases

Indian Epigraphy c15.s2

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Section V. Fabricated Reckonings and Doubtful Cases

1. Kali-yuga Era

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¹ Ojha, *Bhāratīya Prācīn Lipimālā*, pp. 161 ff.

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A Kalpa constituting a single day of the god Brahman is believed to consist of 14 Manvantaras and 6 Mahāyugas, or 1000 Mahāyugas, or 4,320,000,000 years. Each Mahāyuga (also called *Caturyugin*) is supposed to consist of 4 Yugas, viz. Satya or Kṛta, Tretā, Dvāpara and Kali. The Kali age consists of 432000 years, while Dvāpara, Tretā and Satya or Kṛta respectively two, three and four times that number.

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The Kali-yuga era is also called the Yudhiṣṭhira² or Bhārata war³ reckoning. Its beginning is counted from the 18th February 3102 B. C. The Aihole inscription of Cālukya Pulakeśin II of Badami was incised on the expiry of 3735 years after the Bhārata war and 556 years of the Śaka kings. Thus the expired Kali year is arrived at by adding 3179 to the expired Śaka year. Similarly, we have to add to the years of the Kali era 3044 and 3101 to arrive at the years respectively of the Caitrādi expired Vikrama year and the year of the Christian era.

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² Kielhorn's Southern List, No. 1077.

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³ Cf. *Ep. Ind.*, Vol. VI, p. 7.

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According to Varāhamihira,⁴ the Saptarṣi were at the nakṣatra Maghā when king Yudhiṣṭhira was ruling and [the beginning of] his reign was 2526 years earlier than [the beginning of] the Śaka-kāla. This tradition places the end of the Bhārata war, and the succession of Yudhiṣṭhira resulting from it, 3179—2526=653 years after the beginning of the Kali era.

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⁴ *Bṛhatsaṃhitā*, XIII, verse 3 : *Āsan=Maghāsu munayaḥ śāsati pṛthvīm Yudhiṣṭhire nṛpatau | ṣaḍ-dvika-pañca-dvi-yutaḥ Śaka-kālas=tasya rājyasya* (var. lect. *rājñas=ca*) ||

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The same tradition is followed in Kalhaṇa’s Rājatarangiṇī according to which the Bhārata war was not fought at the end of Dvāpara,¹ and the Kurus and Pāṇḍavas flourished in the expired year 653 of the Kali era.

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¹ I. 49 : Bhārataṁ Dvāpar=ānte=bhūd=vārtay=eti vimohitāḥ | kecid=etāṁ mṛṣā teṣāṁ kāla-saṅkhyāṁ pracakrire ||

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There are other discrepancies in the tradition besides the above. There is a Puranic saying, that 1015, or 1050, or 1115, or 1500 years intervened between the birth of Prikṣit (an event that took place shortly after the Bhārata war) and the accession of Mahāpadma Nanda (who ruled some decades before Alexander’s invasion, i.e. about 400 B.C.).³ This would make the difference between the Bhārata war and the beginning of Nanda rule between ten and fifteen centuries. On the shaky basis of the dynastic lists in the Purāṇas, Pargiter placed the Bhārata war about 950 B.C.⁴

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³ Matsya Purāṇa, 273. 36 : Mahāpadm-ābhiṣekāt=tu yāj=janma Parikṣitaḥ | evaṁ varṣa-sahasraṁ tu jñeyaṁ pañcāśad-uttaram || Cf. Vāyu Purāṇa, 99. 415; Brahmāṇḍa Purāṇa, Madhyama Bhāga, Upodghātapada 3, ch. 74, verse 227; Viṣṇu Purāṇa, IV. 24. 32: jñeyaṁ pañca-śat-ottaram or pañcadaś-ottaram || Bhāgavata Purāṇa, XII. 2. 26 : etad=varṣa-sahasraṁ tu śataṁ pañcadaś-ottaram || The reading pañcāśad-uttaram has been accepted by some scholars. See Pargiter, Purāṇa Text, p. 58; cf. pp. 13-22, 67-69, 74; Anc. Ind. His. Trad., p. 179; Raychaudhuri (PHAI, 1950, pp. 29 ff.) assigns the Bharata war to c.850 B.C. on the basis of the Vedic lists of teachers, which appear to offer somewhat better evidence than the Puranic lists of kings. But the importance attached to the event is possibly unrealistic.

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⁴ See Pargiter, Ancient Indian Historical Tradition, pp. 179-83.

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There is no doubt that the Kaliyuga era was fabricated by the astronomers just as the Saptarṣi era.⁵

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⁵ See Fleet in JRAS, 1911, pp. 479 ff., 675 ff.

2. Saptarṣi Era

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⁶ See Ojha, Bhāratīya Prācīn Lipimālā, pp. 159 ff.

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The Saptarṣi era, otherwise called the Laukika, Śāstra, Pahāḍī or Kaccā reckoning, is an imaginary cycle of 2700 years. Its calculation is based on the supposition that the Saptarṣi (Great Bear) stays for one hundred years at each one of the 27 nakṣatras or lunar mansions. The name Pahāḍī is due to the prevalence of the era in the hills of the Punjab and Kashmir regions, while the names Laukika and Kaccā refer to its use with the omission of the hundreds. Owing to its use mainly in the works pertaining to *jyotiḥ-śāstra*, it is called the Śāstra-saṁvat. The movement of the Great Bear, though mentioned in works like the *Bṛhatsaṁhitā*¹, *Bhāgavata Purāṇa*, etc.², is really imaginary and is also recognised as such by medieval astronomers.³

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² Ibid., verse 31 : Śateṣu ṣaṭsu s-ārdheṣu try-adhikeṣu ca bhūtale | Kaler=gateṣu varṣāṇām=abhūvan=Kuru-Pāṇḍavāḥ ||

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¹ XIII. 4: *ek-aikasmin=ṛkṣe śataṁ śataṁ te (munayaḥ) caranti varṣāṇām.*

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² XII. 2, 27-28 : *Saptarṣīṇāṁ tu yau pūrvau dṛśyeta uditau divi | tayos=tu madhye nakṣatraṁ dṛśyate tat-samam niśi || ten=aita ṛṣayo yuktās=tiṣṭhanty=abda-śataṁ nṛṇām || Cf. Viṣṇu Purāṇa, IV. 24. 53-54.*

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³ Cf. Kamalākara-bhaṭṭa’s *Siddhāntatattvaviveka*, verse 32 : *ady=āpi kair=api narair=gatir=ārya-varyair=dṛṣṭā na c=ātra=kathitā kila saṁhitāsu | tat=kāvyam=eva hi purāṇavad=atra taj-jñās=ten=aiva tattva-viṣayaṁ gadituṁ pravṛttāḥ ||*

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The name of the individual *nakṣatra* for particular centuries of the Saptarṣi era is not mentioned, the years being counted from year 1 to year 100 and again from 1 to 100 for the following centuries without mentioning the figures for the hundreds.⁴

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⁴ In some of the Kashmir almanacs, the hundred figures are also quot-d. Cf. *Ind. Ant.*, Vol. XX, pp. 150-51.

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In Kashmir, year 1 of the Saptarṣi era is considered equivalent to year 26 of the Kali era,⁵ though the *Purāṇas* and astronomical works equate the first year of the one with the same of the other.⁶ Kalhaṇa’s *Rājatarangiṇī*⁷ refers to the year 24 (current) of the Laukik-ābda as corresponding to the expired Śaka year 1070. Thus the difference between the current Laukika year and the expired Śaka year is 1070-24=1046, i.e. 46 years. The number of the Laukika year with the hundreds omitted, when added to 46, would give the number of the expired Śaka year without the hundreds. It would give the current Christian year when added to 24-25 and the Caitrādi Vikrama year when added to 81.

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⁵ Buhler, *Kashmir Report*, p. 60 : *Kaler=gataiḥ sāyaka-netra-varṣaiḥ Saptarṣi-varyās=tridivaṁ prayātāḥ | loke hi saṁvatsara-patrikāyāṁ Saptarṣi-mānaṁ pravadanti santaḥ ||*

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⁶ Cunningham, *Indian Eras*, p. 4.

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⁷ I. 52 : *Laukik-ābde catur-imśe Śaka-kālasya sāmpratam | sapṭaty-ābhyadhikam yātaṁ sahasraṁ parivatsarāḥ.* See *Ind. Ant.*, Vol. XX, p. 152.

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The year of the Saptarṣi era begins from Caitra-sudi 1, and the months are Pūrṇimānta. The era seems to have been fabricated by the astronomers of the Punjab-Kashmir region.

3. Jain Nirvāṇa Era

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¹ V.A. Smith, E. Hist. Ind., 1924, p.49 and notes 2-3; Ojha, Bhāratīya Prācin Lipimālā, p. 163.

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A reckoning from the date of the Nirvāṇa or salvation of the last Jain Tīrthaṅkara, Vardhamāna Mahāvīra (or Vīra), is prevalent among the Jains and is called the Jina-kāla or Vīra-nirvāṇa-saṃvat.

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The Vicāraśreṇī (c. 1310 A.D.) of the Śvetāmbara author Merutuṅga gives the difference between the Vīra-nirvāṇa and Vikrama eras as 470 years² while another Śvetāmbara writer named Nemicandra, disciple of Ambadeva and author of the Prakrit poem entitled Mahāviracariam (1084 A.D.), quotes 605 years and 5 months as the intervening period between Mahāvīra’s Nirvāṇa and [the beginning of the rule of] the Śaka king, i.e. the beginning of the Śaka era.³ The same difference between the Vīra-nirvāṇa and Śaka eras is given also in Digambara works like Nemicandra’s Trilokasāra (11th century A.D.)⁴ as well as in the Harivaṃśa Purāṇa and Meghanandin’s Śrāvakācāra.⁵ But there are discrepancies in the traditional dates of Mahāvīra.⁶

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² Cf. Vikkama-ṇajj-ārambhā paraū siri-Vīra-nivvuī bhaṇiyā | sunne-muni-vea-juto Vikkama-kālaū Jina-kālo || Jina-kālaḥ śūnya-muni-veda-yuktaḥ catvāri śatāni saptaty-adhika-varṣāṇi śrī-Mahāvīra-Vikramādityayor = antaram--ity = arthaḥ ||

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³ Cf. Chahim vāsāṇa sachim paṃcahim vāsehim paṃca-māsehim | ṇuma nivvāṇa-gayassa u uppajissai Sago rāyā ||

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⁴ Cf. verse 848 : paṇachas-saya-vassam paṇa-māsa-judam gamia Vīra-nibbuido Saga-rājo.

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⁵ See Ind. Ant., Vol. XII, p. 22.

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⁶ See Smith, E. Hist. Ind., 1924, p. 49, note 3.

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Mādhavacandra, commentator on Nemicandra’s Trilokasāra, understood by the expression Śaka-rāja the Śaka king named Vikramāṅka (Vikramāditya).⁷ This makes the difference between the Vīra-nirvāṇa and Vikrama eras 605 years and 5 months and therefore gives 740 years between the Vīranirvāṇa and Śaka eras. Some other Digambara writers have also followed this tradition.¹ Certain authors of the Digambara sect have moreover given various durations of the intervening period between the Vīra-nirvāṇa and the Śaka eras, such as 461, 9795 and 149793 years.² These conflicting traditions clearly show that the era was fabricated at a much later date. There is no literary or epigraphic record of the first millennium after Mahāvīra’s nirvāṇa, which uses the era. The era was never a popular reckoning in regular use.

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⁷ Cf. śrī-Vīra-nātha-nirvṛtteḥ sakāśāt pañc-ottara-ṣaṭ-chata-varṣāṇi pañca-māsa-yutāni gatvā paścād=Vikramāṅka-Śaka-rājo=jāyata.

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¹ See the Sravanabelgola inscription equating the Vīra-nirvāṇa year 2493 with Vikrama 1888 and Śaka 1752 (Ind. Ant., Vol. XXV, p. 346).

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² Cf. Trilokaprajñapti quoted by Ojha, op. cit., p. 163, note 6.

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Some scholars have accepted the Śvetāmbara tradition giving the difference between the Vīra-nirvāṇa era on the one hand and the Vikrama and Śaka eras on the other as 470 years and 605 and 5 months respectively and suggesting the beginning of the era in 527 or 528 B.C. But this is untenable since, as now accepted by most historians, Mahāvīra, who was a contemporary of the Buddha, must have died in the first half of the 5th century B.C.³

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³ In the Camb. Hist. Ind., Vol. I, p. 696, the probable period of Mahāvīra is given as 540-468 B. C.

4. Buddhist Nirvāṇa Era

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⁴ See V. A. Smith, E. Hist. Ind., 1924, pp. 48 ff.; Ojha, Bhāratīya Prācīn Lipimālā, p. 164.

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The Cantonese dotted record suggests that the Buddhist Clergy had a record in which each past year after the Buddha’s death was represented by a dot and that the said event took place in 486 B.C.⁵ But that there was no genuine, continuous and universally accepted tradition on the subject is clear from the different epochs of the Buddha-nirvāṇa era prevalent in different parts of the Buddhist world. Thus, according to the Ceylonese tradition, now also accepted in Burma and Siam, the era starts from 544 B.C. while the Chinese tradition places it in 638 B.C.⁶ The Chinese traveller Fa-hien, who came to India in 399 A.D., speaks of 1497 years having passed after the Buddha’s death, thus placing the beginning of the era about 1097 B.C.¹

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⁵ Cf. JRAS, 1905, p. 51; Smith, E. Hist. Ind., 1924, p. 49.

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⁶ Cunningham, CII, Vol. I, p. 3; Prinsep, Antiquities, Vol. II (Useful Tables), p. 165.

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¹ Beal, *Si-yu-ki*, Vol. I, Intr., p. 75.

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On the basis of the Cantonese dotted record and considering certain other factors, scholars now generally assign the Buddha’s death to 483 B.C.² The Gaya inscription of the Buddha-nirvāṇa year 1813, Kārttika-badi 1, Wednesday, was believed by some scholars to suggest the epoch of the era in 638 B.C.³ But the date seems actually to be referable to the Ceylonese Buddha-nirvāṇa era of 544 B.C.⁴

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² See *Camb. Hist. Ind.*, Vol. I, p. 696.

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³ *Ind. Ant.*, Vol. X, p. 346; Bhandarkar’s List, No. 1459.

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⁴ Cf. *IHQ*, Vol. XXXIV, p. 27; above, p. 277.

5. Grahaparivitti Cycle

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⁵ Ojha, *Bhāratīya Prācīn Lipimālā*, p. 189.

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It is a ninety-year cycle supposed to start from the current Kali year 3076 (24 B.C.). It is prevalent in the Madurai region of the Tamil-speaking area. As in the case of the Saptarṣi cycle of 100 years, the years of this cycle are counted from 1 to 90 and then again from 1 without being continued after 90. We get the number of the year in this cycle by adding 72 to the number of the current Kali year and then dividing the result by 90. Another way of getting it is to add 11 to the number of the current Śaka year and then to divide the result by 90. The era was apparently fabricated by astronomers.

6. Śrī-Harṣa Era of 457 B. C.

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As we have seen above, Al-Bīrūnī speaks of a Śrī-Harṣa era which is stated to have started from 457 B.C. and to have been prevalent in his time, i.e. in the 11th century A.D., in the regions of Mathura and Kanauj.⁶ It is said that he received this information from some inhabitants of the Mathura-Kanauj area. There is however no reason to believe that such an era was actually current in the said region in the age in question, and it is doubtful whether such an era was ever instituted, since no such reckoning is known from literary and epigraphic records.¹ As we have seen, the Indians never used any era in dating their documents before the introduction of the old Scytho-Parthian era or Vikrama-saṃvat of 58 B.C. Al-Bīrūnī learnt from the Kashmiriān almanacs that the Śrī-Harṣa era commenced in 606 A.D. and failed to understand how this fact could be reconciled with the information regarding the prevalence of a Harṣa era commencing from 457 B.C. in the Mathurā and Kanauj regions. The persons from the Mathurā-Kanauj area, whom Al-Bīrūnī happended to meet, appear to have played a trick on the foreigner by giving this false information.²

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⁶ Sachau, *Alberuni’s India*, Part II, p. 5; above, pp. 294-95.

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¹ See IHQ, Vol. XXIX, pp. 76-77.

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² A similar but more serious trick played on foreign scholars is known from the story of the *Ezour-vedam* (cf. Winternitz, *A History of Indian Literature*, Vol. I, p. 13).

7. Maurya Era

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Some scholars read the expression *muriya-kāla* (Sanskrit *Maurya-kāla*, i.e. the Maurya era) in line 16 of the Hāthigumphā inscription of Khāravela³ and suggested the existence of an era of the Mauryas started by Candragupta (c. 324-300 B.C.). There is however no evidence that Maurya Candragupta ever started any era. The correct reading of the passage in question is again *mukhiya-kala* (Sanskrit *mukhya-kalā*, ‘the principal art’, and not *Muriya-kāla*. Thus the suggestion about a Maurya era is entirely based on imagination.

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³ *Select Inscriptions*, p. 210 and notes 15-16.

8. Nanda Era

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R. C. Majumdar⁴ draws our attention to the Yedarave inscription of Cālukya Vikramāditya VI, which is said to contain the following statement, with reference to the foundation of the Cālukya-Vikrama era : “Having said, ‘Why should the glory of the kings Vikramāditya and Nanda be a hindrance any longer?', he (i.e. Vikramāditya VI), with a loudly uttered command, abolished that [era] which has the name of Śaka and made that [era] which has the Cālukya counting.”¹ In Majumdar’s opinion the passage refers to an era founded by the Nandas. But the reading *nanda* in the passage in question is avowedly doubtful and seems to be wrong. The word expected in the context is *Śaka*. In any case, there is no evidnece in Indian epigraphic and literary records of the existence of a Nanda era. As we have seen, the use of the reckoning in eras was introduced into India by the foreigners long after the Nandas.

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⁴ *JBORS*, September-December 1923, pp. 1-2 of offprint.

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¹ Cf. Bomb. Gaz., Vol. I, Part ii, p. 447.

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9. Era of Samprati

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The era of the Maurya king Samprati is sometimes referred to on the basis of Jain sources.² It is another fictitious reckoning.

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² Smith, E. Hist. Ind., 1924, p. 202, note.

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10. Āguptāyika Era

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The Gokak plates³ of the Rāṣṭrakūṭa king Dejja-mahārāja has the following passage to indicate the year when the charter was issued—*Āguptāyikānām rājñām=aṣṭāsu varṣa-śateṣu pañca-catvāriṃśad-agreṣu gateṣu*, ‘when 845 years of the Āguptāyika kings had expired.’ There is no means to determine exactly the period when Dejja-mahārāja flourished excepting the fact that the plates may be assiged on palaeographical grounds to a date about the middle of the 7th century A.D. It is not improbable that he ruled in the Belgaum region during the interval between the death of Cālukya Pulakeśin II in 642 A.D. and the accession of Vikramāditya I in 655 A.D., when the Cālukya suzerainty was shadowed by the occupation of the southern part of the Cālukya empire by the Pallava king Narasimhavarman I.⁴ If such was the case, the origin of the Āguptāyika era may be roughly assigned to 845—645=200 B.C. But we are entirely in the dark about an era with this epoch, nor have we any information about a ruling family called Āguptāyika. The date portion of the Gokak plates will remain a mystery till further light is thrown on the subject. But we can scarcely accept the evidence of a single inscription regarding the existence of a genuine era starting from about 200 B.C. in the face of overwhelming negative evidence. The tradition about the era recorded in the Gokak plates seems to be based on a local story of Āguptāyika rule starting 854 years previously. The story may have been fabricated by the astronomer at Dejja-mahārāja's court.

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³ Ed. Ind., Vol. XXI, p. 289.

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⁴ The Classical Age, ed. Majumdar, p. 241.

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