History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c16.s1.t1.9

c16.s1.t1.9

This view, however, will not bear scrutiny, as a close perusal of the Rajor inscription would show. In line 12 there occur the words “... Tathaitat pratyāsanna Śrī Gurjjara vāhita samasta-kṣetra sametaḥ ...,” which has rightly been translated by “together with all the neighbouring fields cultivated by the Gurjaras.” Here the cultivators themselves are clearly called Gurjaras, and it may, therefore, be reasonable to presume that in the earlier part of the grant, in line four too, the term bears a racial signification. That the Pratīhāras belonged to the Gurjara stock is also confirmed by the Rāṣṭrakūṭa records, and the Arab writers like Abu Zaid and Al Ma‘sūdī who allude to their fights with the Juzr or Gujaras of the north¹. These references are undoubtedly to be held as applying to the Pratīhāras of Kanauj, for at this period they were the only power to contend against the Rāṣṭrakūṭas, with whom sometimes the Arabs even co-operated against Kanauj. Besides, we have the important testimony of the Kanarese poet Pampa, who expressly calls Mahīpāla “Ghūrjararāja.”² This epithet could hardly be applied to him, if the term “Ghūrjara” bore a geographical sense denoting what after all was only a small portion of Mahīpāla’s vast territories. Lastly, support for the foreign or Gurjara origin of the Pratīhāras may further be found in certain outlandish personal names of the earlier Pratīhāra rulers of Mandor (Māṇḍavyapura, near Jodhpur), from whom, as remarked by Dr. R. C. Majumdar, “it is not impossible that the imperial Pratīhāras of Kanauj also branched off.” Thus the Jodhpur inscription of Bāuka informs us that Haricandra was surnamed Rohillāddhi, and Narabhaṭṭa had another name Pellāpelli on account of his prowess.³ Surely these do not sound Aryan names, and what is more notable is that they were assumed when the Pratīhāras of Rajputana had wholly become merged into the Hindu Society.¹