History of India, c. 150 A.D. to 350 A.D.: Naga–Vakataka Imperial Period c16.s4.12.2

c16.s4.12.2

Immediately north to them were the Yaudheyas, stretching from Bharatpur [where their republican inscription of a time anterior to Samudra Gupta has been found at Bijaygarh] right up to the lower course of the Sutlej on the border of the Bhawalpur State where Johiyāwār still bears the stamp of their name. This was the biggest republican state also in the time of Rudradāman [c.150 A.D.]; the Yaudheyas were his neighbours, that is, reaching Lower Sindh. Between the Mālava and the Yaudheya States there was the small State of the Āryunāyanas whose exact location is not known but whose coins indicate that they were near Alwar and Agra. The Mā drakas were immediately to the north of the Yaudheyas extending up to the foot of the Himalayas. Madra-deśa was the plain country between Jhelum and Ravi¹, sometimes extending up to the Bias.² In the tract between the Bias and the Jumna lay the Vākāṭaka feudatories the Varmans of Siṃhapura and the Nāga king Nāgadatta. The other republican group of Samudra Gupta’s inscription consists of the Ābhīras, Prārjunas, Sahasānikas, Kākas and Kharparikas. None of these struck their coins before Samudra Gupta, and this for the simple reason that they had been under the Vākāṭaka governor of Western Malwā at Mandhātā (Māhishmatī) and under the Nāgas of Padmāvatī. Gaṇapati Nāga, in fact, is called the overlord of Dhārā [Dhārādhīśa]. We know now that the Sahasānikas and the Kākas were nearabout Bhilsa.