History of India, c. 150 A.D. to 350 A.D.: Naga–Vakataka Imperial Period c16.s4.12.3

c16.s4.12.3

The modern Kākapur was their town which is within 20 miles from Bhilsa³; the Sāñchi hill was called the Kākanāda. In the time of Chandra Gupta II a Sahasānika Mahārāja, probably a republican chief of the Sahasānikas, built the Chandra Gupta Temple in the Udayagiri rocks. About the Ābhīras, we get great help from the Bhāgavata. The Bhāgavata calls the Ābhīras, ‘Saurāṣṭra’ and ‘Āvantya’ rulers (Saurāṣṭra-Āvanty Ābhīrāḥ), and the Viṣṇu treats the Ābhīras as occupying the Surāṣṭra and Avanti provinces. We know from the Vākāṭaka history that in Western Malwā there were the Puṣyamitras and two other republics with their names ending in -Mitra. These were the Abhira republics and in their place in later Gupta history we find the Maitrakas rising as monarchs. This group beginning with the Abhiras and ending with Kharparikas is almost in a straight line from Kathiawar and Damoh, below the Malava republic and above the Vakataka kingdom. The Abhiras in the time of the Periplus occupy Gujarat, and there is no justification in locating them in Bundelkhand as Dr. Vincent Smith did [J.R.A.S., 1897, p. 30]. He was led to do so on account of a mistaken notion that Kathiawar and Gujarat were at that time governed by the Western Satraps. Both the Puranas and Samudra Gupta's inscription leave no room for the Satraps in Kathiawar or Gujarat. The Western Satraps had been already dispossessed in the Naga-Vakataka period from Kathiawar. The Puranas here throw great light.