History of the Pallavas of Kanchi c9.s2.5

c9.s2.5

As regards the probable period when this happened, he indicates that this must have happened at a time when the Sātavāhanas as a ruling dynasty had passed away, and the attempt at the assertion of the Gupta power over this region under Samudragupta had in a way shaken the authority of the older dynasties to allow of a new dynasty to spring into prominence. The character of the invasion of Samudragupta itself makes it clear that the whole of the western portion or the empire of Āndhras was in the hands of a power whom for some good reason Samudragupta did not attack. One such reason might have been that they held possession of the territory with some power, such as the Vākāṭakas in Berar and Central India. It is likely that their authority was not readily acquiesced in by the smaller chieftains, feudatories of the Sātavāhanas, along the east coast. If this surmise should turn out correct it is possible to conceive that the southwestern portion was held by a powerful family of the Nāgas, relatives of the Sātavāhanas, and the Pallavas were among the feudatories who showed a ready inclination to throw off the Sātavāhana yoke. When Samudragupta had come and gone, the western power, whatever that was, might have entered into a marriage alliance with the Pallavas and recognized them in the position to which they had already risen by their own efforts.