Indian Epigraphy c15.t5.47

c15.t5.47

Considering the facts that the early indigenous kings of India used no era, that the foreign kings who ruled in India between the 2nd century B.C. and the 3rd century A.D. are known to have used two different eras separated from each other by a considerable period of time and that the epochs of the earliest extant historical eras of India, viz. the Vikrama and the Śaka, separated from each other by 135 years, fall in the 1st century B.C. and the 1st century A.D., it is only natural to think that the Vikrama and Śaka reckonings may after all be identical respectively with the two foreign eras known from epigraphs. Of course it is easy to argue that the Scytho-Parthian and Kaniṣka eras have died out and that the Vikrama and Śaka eras are different from them. But the identification of the two with the two is certainly more logical, if the attested facts of Indian history can be reconciled with it.¹ As regards the Śaka era, moreover, the very name points to its foreign origin. The identification of the Scytho-Parthian era with the Vikrama-saṃvat is again supported at least by one evidence. The Takht-i-Bahi inscription, as we have seen above, is dated in the year 103 of this era and in the 26th regnal year of Gondophernes. It is interesting to note that a Parthian king named Gondophernes, called the king of India in some versions, is represented in an old Christian tradition as a contemporary of Saint Thomas, the apostle (one of the 12 disciples of Jesus Christ, 4 B. C.—29 or 33 A. D.) who flourished in the 1st century A.D.² It will be seen that, if year 103 of the Tekht-i-Bahi inscription be referred to the Vikrama-saṃvat, the reign of Gondophernes falls exactly in the said period, i.e. in the period 21-46 A.D. It should be pointed out that no difficulty that may be supposed to stand in the way of the identification of the Scytho-Parthian reckoning with the Vikrama-saṃvat and the Kaniṣka era with the Śak-ābda is insurmountable.³