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History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c15.s2.t7: War with Kashmir

History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c15.s2.t7

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War with Kashmir

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Kalhaṇa represents Lalitāditya Muktāpīḍa as a mighty monarch, who, "being eager for conquests," passed most of his time in expeditions abroad, "moving round the earth like the sun."⁶ His ambitions naturally brought him into conflict with the rising power of Yaśovarman, and in the struggle which followed his attack the "thoughtful ruler of Kānyakubja" is said to have, like a wise man, first "showed his back to the fiercely shining Lalitāditya, and (then) made his submission."⁷ A treaty was drawn up, and the document was called “the treaty of Yaśovarman and Lalitāditya,” but Mitraśarman, the Kashmiri minister of Foreign Affairs (Sāndhivigrahika) refused to ratify it on the ground that it meant a slight to his victorious master, if the name of the defeated Kanauj sovereign were allowed to precede. Thereupon negotiations broke off, and Lalitāditya highly esteeming his minister’s insistence on the proper form, bestowed upon him the five great offices distinguished by the term “great” (pañcamahā-śabda)¹. This led to a resumption of hostilities, though his generals, “who were dissatisfied with the long duration of the war, blamed it.”²

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⁶ *Rājat.*, Bk. IV, verse 131, (Stein, p. 131).

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⁷ *Ibid.*, verse 135, (Stein, p. 132). Cf. "Matimān Kanyakubjen-

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¹ *Ibid.*, verse 140, (Stein, p. 133). According to Fleet also the above is the special significance of the term “pañca-mahāśabda” in the Rājatarangiṇī. But it usually denoted “the sounds of five great musical instruments (pañca-mahāvādya), the use of which was allowed, as a special mark of distinction to persons of high rank and authority (*Ep. Ind.*, XII, pp. 254-55). See also *Ind. Ant.*, I, p. 81; IV, pp. 106, 180, 204; XIII, p. 134, etc. Sometimes, however, the epithet was applied to paramount kings (*Ep. Ind.*, VI, p. 106; *C. I. I*, III, p. 296, n. 9).

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² *Rājat.*, Bk. IV, verse 139, (Stein, p. 133).

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