The Cambridge History of India, Vol. I: Ancient India v1.c30.86

v1.c30.86

For the history of this period the cave-inscriptions of Nānāghāt (nos. 1112–20) are of the highest importance. They prove by their situation that the Andhras now held the Nāna pass, which leads from Junnar in the Deccan to the Konkan, the coastal region of Western India. Most of them describe statues of members of the royal family—Simuka, the founder of the line, Çātakarṇi himself and his queen Nāganikā, a Mahāraṭhi, and three princes. But most valuable of all is the inscription, unfortunately fragmentary, of the queen (no. 1112). She was the daughter of a Mahāraṭhi, i.e. a king of the Rāshṭrikas; and we must conclude therefore that the incorporation of the Marāthā country in the Andhra empire had been ratified by a matrimonial alliance between the two royal houses. The inscription records the performance of certain great sacrifices and the fees paid to the officiating priests—fees which testify eloquently to the wealth of the realm and to the power of the Brāhman hierarchy at this date—tens of thousands of cows, thousands of horses, numbers of elephants, whole villages, and huge sums of money (tens of thousands of *kārshāpaṇas*). Twice, it appears, had Çātakarṇi proclaimed his suzerainty by the performance of the horse-sacrifice; and, on one of these occasions at least, the victory thus celebrated must have been at the expense of the Çuṅgas, if we are right in supposing that the appearance of the Andhras of Southern India in the dynastic lists of the Purāṇas indicates that, at some period, they held the position of suzerains in Northern India (p. 318). That the Andhras did actually come into conflict with the Çuṅgas during the reign of Pushyamitra appears probable from the *Mālavikāgnimitra* (p. 519). On this occasion the Çuṅgas were victorious; but this was no doubt merely an episode in the struggle in which the Andhras were finally triumphant. The progress of this intruding power from its western stronghold, Pratishṭhāna, first to Ujjayinī and subsequently to Vidiçā seems to be indicated by the evidence of coins and inscriptions.