Political History of Ancient India, from the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty c22.s6.38

c22.s6.38

To meet the formidable league between the Guptas and the Gauḍas, Harsha, the successor of Rājya-vardhana, concluded an alliance with Bhāskara-varman, king of Kāmarūpa, whose father Susthita-varman Mṛigāṅka had fought against Mahāsena Gupta. This alliance was disastrous for the Gauḍas as we know from the Nidhanapur plates of Bhāskara. At the time of the issuing of the plates Bhāskara-varman was in possession of the city of Karṇasuvarṇa that had once been the capital of the Gauḍa king, Śaśāṅka, whose death took place some time between A.D 619 and 637. The king overthrown by Bhāskara-varman may have been Jayanāga (*nāgarāja-samāhvayo Gauḍarāja*, the king of Gauḍa named Nāga, successor of *Somākhya* or Śaśāṅka), whose name is disclosed by the Vappaghoshavāṭa inscription.² The Gauḍa people, however, did not tamely acquiesce in the loss of their independence. They became a thorn in the side of Kanauj and Kāmarūpa, and their hostility towards those two powers was inherited by the Pāla and Sēna successors of Śaśāṅka.