History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c11.s5.5

c11.s5.5

The learned Professor cites the authority of Dr. Fleet who was of opinion that the Haidarabad grant, dated in the third year of Pulakeśi’s Rājyābhiṣeka or installation in the sovereignty in the Śaka saṃvat 534 expired or 612 A. D., implied “by the title which Pulakeśi acquired by his victory over him (Harṣa), that that victory had then already been achieved.”² Now, what does the Haidarabad grant testify? It informs us that Pulakeśi II acquired the title of Parameśvara “by defeating hostile kings, who had applied themselves (or a hostile king who had applied himself) to the contest of a hundred battles.”¹ Since the subsequent records state more specifically that he acquired it “by defeating the glorious Harṣavardhana, the warlike lord of all region of the North,” it is with some plausibility argued that the conflict, which according to the Haidarabad grant won this title for Pulakeśi, was against Harṣa himself, and that it occurred about A. D. 612, the date of the epigraph. If this, however, were a fact, would it not be inexplicable why Harṣavardhana’s name is not mentioned in the earlier Haidarabad grant, and finds specific mention—with legitimate pride too—in the Aihole inscription of A. D. 634-35, and other later documents. In my opinion this omission goes against Dr. Fleet’s theory, for it appears hard to believe that any of Pulakeśi’s earlier inscriptions would ignore the name of so great and formidable an adversary, and particularly when the victory was achieved just at the start of the Cālukya monarch’s career.