The Dynastic History of Northern India (Early Mediaeval Period) v1.c10.12.3

v1.c10.12.3

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.