The Dynastic History of Northern India (Early Mediaeval Period) v1.c10.12

Language: English

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But though the year 647 A.D. cannot be regarded as an epoch marking the transition of the ancient into the mediaeval period, it is certainly a date of considerable importance in the history of Northern India. There is some reason to believe that after the death of Harṣa the power of Tibet extended across Nepal to the Ganges valley. There was also probably a revival of the power of the Guptas under Ādityasena. But the most important event that followed was the struggle for the mastery of Kanauj. That city appears to have acquired an imperial reputation under the sway of the Maukharis and the Puṣpabhūtis. For about a hundred years Kānyakubja and the Ganges-Jumna Doab remained a bone of contention amongst the rulers of India. The struggle was opened by the Kārkoṭa Lalitāditya of Kashmir, who about 736 A.D. conquered the principality of Kānyakubja, which at that time extended “from the bank of the Yamunā to that of the Kālikā” (probably the Kālī Nadī, which runs parallel to the Ganges and falls into it below Kanauj). Then came the Pālas of Bengal and Bihar, who some time after 783 A.D., under Dharmapāla, conquered the city of Kanauj and extended their power as far as the eastern districts of the Punjab. Then came the attacks of the Gurjara-Pratīhāras of Western India and the Rāṣṭrakūṭas of the Deccan. The tripartite struggle between Pālas, Raṣṭrakūṭas and Pratīhāras at last resulted in the winning of the *Mahodayaśrī* by the last-named.

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It is not exactly known when they first captured Kanauj; but they must have done it some time before 836 A.D., the date of the Barah inscription of Bhoja I, which was issued from Mahodaya itself. The capture of this city gradually led to the foundation of a Gurjara-Pratīhāra empire which rivalled that of the Guptas, and was more extensive than that of the Puṣpabhūtis. Even if we omit the somewhat doubtful passage in the *Rājataraṅgiṇī* which refers to the dominion in the Punjab of an *Adhirāja* Bhoja, the power of the Bhoja I in the Punjab is unquestionably demonstrated by the discovery of his Pehowa inscriptions in the district of Karnal. The Una grants of Balavarman and Avanivarman show that the Saurāṣṭra-*Maṇḍala* (Kathiawar) was within the dominions of Mahendrapāla I. As the Khajuraho inscription of the Candellas, dated in V. S. 1101 (A.D. 954) still acknowledges the sovereignty of Vināyakapāla, it is reasonable to conclude that the Candellas were also feudatories of the Pratīhāras from an earlier period. The Dighwa Dubauli plates of Mahendrapāla I, show that Śrāvastī-*Viṣaya* in the U. P. was in his dominions. The writings of the Arab geographers seem to indicate that the Gurjara empire touched the borders of Sind in the extreme west, while the Ramgaya, Guneria and Itkhori inscriptions in the East show Pratīhāra power in Bihar.

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The recent discovery of a pillar-inscription of Mahendrapāla I at Paharpur, in North Bengal probably shows the extreme eastern extension of the Gurjara-Pratīhāras' kingdom. In the face of all this epigraphic evidence which shows that the Gurjara-Pratīhāra empire embraced the whole of Northern India excepting Sind, western portions of the Punjab, Kashmir, Nepal, Assam and portions of Bengal, C. P., and Orissa, it is absurd to say that they ruled over only "the Cis-Sutlej districts of the Punjab, the greater part of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh and the Gwalior territory.’¹ Unlike the limits of the empire of Harṣa, which has been defined for us by vague expression of his friends and enemies, the bounds of the Pratīhāras’ empire are determined by unquestioned archaeological evidence. It is of course unfortunate that no Bāṇa or Yuan Chwang has left for us a detailed account of the life and administration of Bhoja and Mahendrapāla I; but that is no reason why we should relegate their history to the mediaeval period, which, according to V. A. Smith and his followers, specifically deals with the history of the ‘petty states’ whose internecine wars preceded the Muslim conquest of India. The period of disruption that intervened between the fall of the Puṣpabhūtis and the rise of the Gurjara-Pratīhāras cannot in any sense be regarded as a curious phenomenon marking an epoch in Indian history.

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A period of struggle has always intervened between the fall of one and the rise of another powerful dynasty in India until the establishment of British rule. But if for practical purposes we must draw a line between the so-called ancient and mediaeval periods, it is more convenient to draw it somewhere about 916 A.D. when the Pratīhāra empire in Northern India at last began to break up into numerous petty states. As usual, ‘‘a political re-adjustment would probably have taken place, sooner or later, if the Indian states were left to themselves.’’ But unfortunately the Turks appeared at this crisis on the north-western frontier carrying the Muslim flag. The Pratīhāra empire had played no insignificant part in preventing the Arabs from gaining the same success in India as in other lands. But the Turks were more fortunate, and before the breach could be repaired by the same natural process which had hitherto always operated in India, they charged through the gap and carried everything before them. The incidents during the period of about three hundred years (*c.* 916 to 1200 A.D.) may be taken to be only a prelude to the final act of the drama, which saw the standards of Islam on most of the important citadels of Northern India. Considered from this point of view, the year 916 A.D. may for practical purposes be accepted as the line of demarcation between the two periods in the history of Northern India. These may be called the ancient and the mediaeval periods;

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but it would perhaps be more reasonable to call them simply the Hindu period and the period of the Turks and Afghans.