Political History of Ancient India, from the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty c26.37

Language: English

c26.37.1

Like the Maukharis, the rulers of Bengal, too, seem to have thrown off the Gupta yoke in the second half of the sixth century A.D. In the fourth and fifth centuries Bengal undoubtedly acknowledged the suzerainty of the Gupta Empire. The reference to Samataṭa in Eastern Bengal as a *pratyanta* or border state in the Allahabad Pillar Inscription of the emperor Samudra Gupta proves that the Imperial dominions must have embraced the whole of western and central Bengal, while the inclusion of northern Bengal (Pauṇḍravardhana *bhukti*) within the empire from the days of Kumāra Gupta I (A. D. 443-44) to A. D. 543-44¹ is sufficiently attested by the Dāmodarpur plates. Samataṭa, though originally outside the limits of the Imperial provinces, had, nevertheless, been forced to feel the irresistible might of the Gupta arms. The Harāhā Inscription of Iśānavarman, however, shows that the political situation had changed completely about the middle of the sixth century A.D. A new power, *viz.*, that of the Gauḍas, was fast rising to importance in the valley of the Lower Ganges. Gauḍa was already known to Pāṇini² and the *Kauṭilīya Arthaśāstra*.³ The grammarian seems to associate it with the East.⁴ A passage occurring in the *Matsya*, *Kūrma* and *Liṅga Purāṇas*⁵ has, however, been taken to mean that the Śrāvasti region was the cradle of the Gauḍa people.

c26.37.2

But the passage in question does not occur in the corresponding text of the *Vāyu* and *Brahma Purāṇas* and the *Mahābhārata*.⁶ In early literature the people of the Śrāvasti region are always referred to as the Kosalas. Vātsyāyana, the author of the *Kāmasūtra*, writing probably in the third or fourth century of the Christian era, refers to Gauḍa and Kosala as names of distinct countries.¹ Gauḍa in the *Matsya-Kūrma-Liṅga* MSS. may have been inserted as a Sanskritised form of Goṇḍa in the same way as the term Madra-maṇḍala is employed to denote the Madras Presidency, by some modern *paṇḍits* of the Southern Presidency, as well as other scholars and journalists who are unacquainted with the topography of Ancient India.² In the Central Provinces the name "Gond" is very often Sanskritised into Gauḍa.³ Varāhamihira, writing in the sixth century A.D., places Gauḍaka in the Eastern division of India. He does not include Gauḍa in the list of countries situated in the *Madhyadeśa*. Mention is no doubt made of a place called Guḍa. But, if Alberuni⁴ is to be believed, Guḍa is Thanesar and not Oudh. The use of the term *Pañcha Gauḍa* as the designation of a territory embracing Northern India as far as Kanauj and the river Sarasvatī, is distinctly late and dates only from the twelfth century A.D. The term is possibly reminiscent of the Gauḍa empire of Dharmapāla and Devapāla, and cannot be equated with the ancient realm of the Gauḍas in the early centuries of the Christian era.

c26.37.3

The distinct statement in the Harāhā Inscription that the Gauḍas were on the seashore clearly suggests that the Bengal littoral and not Oudh, was the seat of the people in the sixth century A.D. In the next century, their king Śaśāṅka is found in possession of Karṇasuvarṇa near Murshidābād. In the century that follows a Gauḍa appears, in the *Gauḍa-vaho* of Vākpati-rāja, as the occupant of the throne of Magadha. The zenith of Gauḍa power is reached in the ninth century when the Gauḍa dominion extends over the Gangetic Doāb and Kanauj. About the early kings of the Gauḍas our information is meagre. Certain copper-plate inscriptions, discovered in the Faridpur and Burdwan⁵ Districts, disclose the existence of three kings—Dharmāditya, Gopachandra⁶ and Samāchāradeva, who are described as overlords of Navyāvakāśikā, Vāraka-maṇḍala, and, in one case, of Vardhamāna-*bhukti* (Burdwan Division). The Vappaghoshavāṭa inscription introduces to us a fourth king, viz., Jayanāga, who ruled at Karṇasuvarṇa. These kings are, however, not expressly referred to as Gauḍas. The earliest king, to whom that epithet is applied is the famous Śaśāṅka, the great rival of Rājya-vardhana of Thanesar and his brother Harsha. The title *Mahārājādhirāja* assumed by the Bengal kings mentioned above, leaves no room for doubt that they no longer acknowledged the suzerainty of the Guptas and set themselves up as independent sovereigns.