Political History of Ancient India, from the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty c17.s2.36

c17.s2.36

On the other hand, the *Vāyu*, *Brahmāṇḍa* and certain Matsya MSS., generally speaking, show a tendency to omit the Sātavāhanas of Kuntala and the rulers of the period of Śaka revival under Rudra-dāman I, and mention only about 19 kings most of whom belonged to the main line whose rule may have lasted for about three centuries. If the main line of Sātavāhana kings consisted only of about nineteen princes, and if the duration of their rule be approximately three centuries, there is no difficulty in accepting the Purāṇic statement that Simuka flourished in the time of the later Kāṇvas, that is to say, in the first century B.C., and that his dynasty ceased to rule in the Northern Deccan in the third century A.D. The sovereignty of the Sātavāhanas and Sātakarṇis of Kuntala lasted longer and did not come to an end probably before the fourth century A.D., when it was ended by the Kadambas. Thus the total duration of the rule of all the lines of Sātakarṇis is really more than 400 years.¹ The kings of the Kuntala group (Nos. 10-14 of the DKA list) are no doubt usually placed before the great Gautamīputra and his successors. But Pargiter points out that in certain *Matsya* MSS. Nos. 10-15 are placed after the penultimate king of the line (No. 29).² As to Hāla (No. 17) if he is really the author of the *Gāthāsaptaśatī*, he could hardly have flourished before the fourth century A.D. The references to *Vikramāditya-charita*, *Aṅgāraka-vāra* and Rādhikā make it difficult to assign to him a date before the Great Gautamīputra. We have many other instances of the inversion of the order of kings in the *Purāṇas*.³ The fact that the extant Purāṇic texts do misplace kings appears abundantly clear from the important discovery of a coin of Śiva Śrī Āpilaka whom Mr. Dikshit connects with the *later* Sātavāhanas though the *Purāṇas* place him *early* in the list.⁴