History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c16.s1.t4.1

c16.s1.t4.1

Nāgabhaṭa ceased to rule in the Vikrama year 890 or 833 A. D. according to the Jain *Prabhāvakacarita*² and was succeeded by Rāmabhadra, sometimes also called Rāma or Rāmadeva, his son by queen Iṣṭādevī. Rāmabhadra’s reign seems to have been marked by some crisis, for we are told in the Gwalior inscription that he had “the haughty and cruel commanders of armies forcibly bound down by (his subordinate) kings who had the best cavalry under their charge”³ It is difficult to detect precisely who these enemies were. Dr. R. C. Majumdar identifies them with the Pālas of Bengal,⁴ who, as we shall see below, claim to have made some depredations in Northern India about this time, and he may be right considering that the Rāṣṭrakūṭa monarch, Amoghavarṣa I, was then far too occupied with domestic troubles to think of emulating the exploits of Dhruva and Govinda III. Although the record, as usual, speaks of the destruction of “evil-doers,” the disturbances caused by them must have been sufficiently serious, since Rāmabhadra, being unable to cope with the danger single-handed, is here recorded to have invoked the good offices of his feudatory chiefs.