A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c11.16

c11.16

In society new sub-castes were forming on an occupational basis, such as shepherds (golikas) and ploughmen (hālikas). More interesting is the total assimilation of foreigners, Śakas and Yavanas, either as Buddhists or as degraded Kshatriyas, many of them bearing such thoroughly Indian names as Dharmadeva, Rishabhadatta and Agnivarman. The Śaka Rishabhadatta, we read, made a pilgrimage to Pushkara on the river Barnāsa and presented cows and villages to Brahmins; but we do not hear of foreigners following Hindu practices in the western Deccan after the second century A.D. Gautamiputra, who is said to have destroyed the Śakas, Yavanas and Pahlavas, was evidently thorough in his work. Though nothing is said of the Yavanas in the eastern Deccan, it is certain that Graeco-Roman influences had a great share in fashioning the stupas at Amarāvati and other places in the Krishna valley, and Greek (yonaka) lamps are mentioned in an inscription from Allūru.