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History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c17.s2: Mahīpāla

History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c17.s2

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Mahīpāla

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The enthronement of his step-brother Bhoja II was naturally unacceptable to Mahīpāla; he therefore sought the support of the Candella king Harṣadeva as a counterpoise to the alliance between his rival and the Cedi ruler Kokalla I. The Candella chief, who probably still recognised the supremacy of Kanauj, at once took up his cause, and according to the Khajuraho inscription No. I signalised his intervention in imperial affairs by placing Kṣitipāla on the throne, which thus increased the power and prestige of his own house.¹ This Kṣitipāla has been identified on all hands with Mahīpāla, and the fact that the two terms Kṣiti and Mahī are synonymous no doubt goes far to confirm this identification. But it appears from a comparison of the Siyadoni and Khajuraho inscriptions that Mahīpāla was known by other names as well. In the former Kṣitipāla is said to have had a son named Devapāla, who was ruling in 948-49 A. D., while in the latter we are told that the Candella Yaśovarman received an image of Vaikuṇṭha from one Devapāla, son of Herambapāla. As Yaśovarman’s reign closed about the year 954 A.D., it is reasonable to hold that the two Devapālas were identical, and consequently in all likelihood the names of their fathers Kṣitipāla and Herambapāla also refer to one and the same person.² Mahāmahopādhyāya Pandit Gaurī-shankar Ojha, on the other hand, does not accept the identity of the two Devapālas, as in the Khajuraho inscription Devapāla is given the epithet of Hayapati, and it was “never the accepted title of the Pratīhāra kings of Mahodaya, and is not met with in their inscriptions.”¹ This need not, however, be an insuperable objection in view of the fact that the Pratīhāras of Kanauj were then widely noted for their cavalry. Thus, Sulaiman, the Arab traveller, referring to Bhoja says that “no other prince has so fine a cavalry”.² Again, according to the Cātsū inscription Harṣarāja presented horses to Bhoja, perhaps because of the latter’s fondness for them. Similarly the Gwalior epigraph speaks of the “best cavalry” in charge of the feudatories of Rāmabhadra. The occurrence of the term *Hayapati* in an inscription of another dynasty, therefore, probably indicates that the Pratīhāras continued to enjoy among their contemporaries a reputation for maintaining an excellent cavalry, and as such were regarded “lords of horses” *par excellence*, although they did not, like the Gāhaḍavālas who used the epithet *Aśvapati*, adopt it as an official title in their records. Another name of Mahīpāla seems to have been Vināyakapāla, which is used in the Bengal Asiatic Society’s plate.³ The identity of the two is probable on the ground that the two terms Vināyaka and Heramba are synonymous, both being names of Gaṇapati,⁴ and also because the record describes Vināyakapāla as “begotten on Mahīdevī and who meditated on the feet of his father Mahendrapāla and his brother Bhojadeva.” If, however, we assume that the names Vināyakapāla and Mahīpāla represent two distinct persons, there is nothing in the absence of any evidence regarding a fratricidal war to explain the circumstance why the plate mentions one brother and omits all reference to another. Further, it need not militate against the above identification that in the earlier inscriptions and in the writings of Rājaśekhara the name Mahīpāla is uniformly given, whereas Vināyakapāla occurs for the first time in a late inscription of the year 931 A. D. There is no such overlapping even in the known dates of Mahīpāla and Kṣitipāla, but this does not prevent scholars from accepting that the two names denoted the same person. Thus Mahīpāla may be regarded as having borne at least three other names—Kṣitipāla, Vināyakapāla, and Herambapāla;¹ this multiplicity of nomenclature was obviously due to the Hindu love for synonyms, which, as well remarked by Colonel Tod, “in the east is very destructive to history.”²

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¹ Cf. “Punar yena Śrī-Kṣitipāla-devanṛpatiḥ siṃhāsane sthātsāditārātiśakti-kīrti-vibhūṣaṇaḥ” (Ep. Ind., I, p. 122, line 10). The word “punaḥ” has so far been taken by scholars in the sense of “again;” and they think that it alludes to Mahīpāla’s “replacement” after a temporary loss of kingly dignity. In my opinion, however, “punaḥ” here means “further,” “besides,” or “now” (cf. Monier Williams’ Sanskrit Dictionary, p. 581), and is used simply to introduce further details about the achievements of the Candella king who has been identified by Hoernle with Yaśovarman (J. R. A. S., 1904, p. 654). But it seems more correct to identify him with Harṣadeva Candella, for according to the Khajuraho inscription No. II, Yaśovarman was a contemporary of Mahīpāla’s son, Devapāla (Ep. Ind., I, pp. 129, 134, verse 43), and the above incident relates to the beginning of the career of Mahīpāla.

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² Ep. Ind., I, pp. 134, 171.

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¹ *Ibid.*, XIV, p. 180.

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² *Elliot, History of India*, Vol. I, p. 4.

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³ *Ind. Ant.*, XV, p. 140.

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⁴ *J. B. B. R. A. S.*, XXI, pp. 406-07.

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¹ See also *Jour. Dep. Lett.*, X, pp. 59-62; *Dy. Hist. North. Ind.*, vol. I, pp. 572-75. ² *Rājasthāna* (Crooke’s edition) Vol. I, p. 50. ³ *Ind. Ant.* XII, p. 195. ⁴ *Ep. Ind.*, VII, pp. 38, 43, verse 19.

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We do not know when Mahīpāla effected his *Coup d'etat*, but as the Haddala grant of his feudatory Dharaṇīvarāha³ mentions him as ruling in Śaka *saṃvat* 836 or 914 A. D., his accession may be approximately fixed in the year 912 A. D. At the very beginning of his career Mahīpāla was seriously menaced by the war-fever of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas, the hereditary enemies of his house; and the effects of their renewed activity seem to have been for the time disastrous to the prosperity of Kanauj, for we are told in the Cambay plates of Govinda IV that Indra III “completely devastated (nirmmūlam unmūlitam) that hostile city of Mahodaya, which is even today greatly renowned among men by the name of Kuśasthala.”⁴ A close perusal of the record further reveals that the invader’s line of march lay through Ujjain where “the courtyard (of the temple of the god) Kālapriya (became) uneven by the strokes of the tusks of his rutting elephants,” and across the valley of the “unfathomable Jumnā which rivals the sea.”¹ Thus if the region of Ujjain continued to remain under Kanauj during the disturbed reign of Bhoja II—and there is nothing to prove that it did not—this campaign must have caused its loss, although, as we shall see below, it was only temporary. In his expedition against Kanauj, Indra III was probably accompanied by his feudatory chief Narasimha Cālukya, who, according to the *Vikramārjunavijaya* or *Pampabhārata* written by the Kanarese poet Pampa under the patronage of Arikeśarin Cālukya, is said to have “plucked from the Ghūrjararāja’s arms the goddess of victory, whom, though desirous of keeping he had held too loosely. Mahīpāla fled as if struck by thunder-bolts, staying neither to eat, nor rest, nor pick himself up; while Narasimha pursuing bathed his horses at the junction of the Ganges.”² The reference to the confluence of the Ganges shows that the army overran the greater part of modern United Provinces, and advanced as far east as Prayāga. Some scholars on the other hand take the junction of the Ganges to be with the sea and not with the Jumnā, but this view is obviously wrong, for Mahīpāla’s dominions did not extend upto the seashore, and there is no evidence that Indra III’s expedition brought him into conflict with his Pāla contemporary, Rājyapāla. Was its success, therefore, due to the unsettled state of Kanauj, as a result of the troubles which had culminated in Mahīpāla’s accession? At any rate the date of the raid raises a strong presumption in favour of this hypothesis. The Nausari grant specifies 915 A. D. as the year of Indra III’s coronation,³ and his successor is known from the Daṇḍapur (Dhārwāḍ district) inscription to have been ruling in 918 A. D.¹ Hence we may feel certain that the Rāṣṭrakūṭa attack must have taken place sometime between the years 916 and 917 A. D. i.e., just a few years after the civil turmoil in Kanauj. As regards the results of the conflict, Dr. R. C. Majumdar is of opinion that “Mahīpāla fled from his capital, hotly pursued by his enemies,” and that later on Harṣadeva Candella assisted the Imperial ruler “to re-establish his authority over the shattered kingdom.”² For the latter part of the statement, however, I am unable to find any evidence, since the passage in the Khajuraho inscription discussed above, on which the learned Professor evidently bases his conclusion, does not refer to Mahīpāla’s restoration, but merely to his accession to the throne with the help of the Candella prince. Besides, we even know from the Asni inscription that Mahīpāla was ruling in (Vikrama) year 974 = 917 A. D., and his authority was recognised so far from the capital as the modern district of Fatehpur.³

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¹ *Ibid.* The god Kālapriya in the above passage refers to the temple of Mahākāla in Ujjayinī.

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² Ed. Lewis Rice (Bangalore, 1898), pp. 3-4; *Karṇāṭaka Śabdānuśasana*, p. 26; J. R. A. S., N. S., Vol. XIV (1882), p. 20; *Bom. Gaz.*, Vol. I, pt. II, p. 380.

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³ Fleet, *Dynasties of the Kanarese Districts*, p. 415.

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¹ Ibid., p. 417; Ind. Ant., XII, pp. 222-23; Ep. Ind., VI, pp. 176, 177.

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² Jour. Dept. Lett., X, pp. 66, 68. The effects of this invasion have been greatly exaggerated. Thus says Dr. R. C. Majumdar: “But the prestige of the Pratihāras suffered a severe blow from which they never completely recovered” (Ibid., p. 68). At another place, however, he affirms contrariwise: “It may be safely laid down that the Pratihāra empire remained intact and probably its boundaries were extended in Mahīpāla’s time” (Ibid., p. 64).

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³ Ind. Ant., XVI, p. 174.

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But in the east the Pālas, who had already reoccupied Uddaṇḍapura or Bihar probably in the confusion following the fratricidal struggle for the throne,⁴ seem to have taken advantage of this temporary shock to the fortunes of the Pratīhāra family, and they recovered some of their ancestral possessions upto the eastern banks of the river Son. This is evident from the Baragaon (Patna district) pillar inscription of the 24th year of Rājyapāla¹, and two other Pāla inscriptions that refer to the time of Gopāla II, and are incised on pedestals of images. One of them was discovered in the ruins of Nalanda in the Patna district, and records that an individual did honour to the image of the goddess Vāgīśvarī by covering it with gold leaf in the first year of Gopāla II's reign². The other was discovered in the ruins of Mahābodhi temple at Bodhgaya; it is undated and commemorates the installation of an image of the Buddha by Dharmabhīma³. These inscriptions no doubt belong to a period about two decades after the invasion of Indra III, but the re-assertion of Pāla power in Magadha cannot be far removed from this event, as the subsequent career of Mahīpāla appears to have been a glorious one.

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⁴ Cf. the Bihar image inscription of Nārāyaṇapāla’s reign, dated year 54, recording the dedication of Thāruka, son of Rānaka Ucha (Utsa). Ind. Ant., XLVII (1918), p. 110.

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¹ Ibid., p. 111.

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² Arch. Surv. Ind. Rep., Vol. I (1862-65), p. 36.

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³ Ind. Ant., XXXVIII, p. 237.

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Thus although there were some secessions in the outlying parts of the kingdom, in the home provinces themselves Indra III's campaign meant in effect no more than a successful raid, and it left no traces behind save the horrid marks of sanguinary war. Kanauj soon revived, and we have even indications that Mahīpāla resumed his predecessors' schemes of conquest. For the court-poet Rājaśekhara, who must have lived in the early part of Mahīpāla's reign, not only speaks of him as the "pearl-jewel of the race of Raghu," and the "Mahārājādhirāja of Āryāvarta," but also in a magniloquent verse in the introduction to the *Pracaṇḍa Pāṇḍava* of *Bāla-Bhārata* attributes to him the following victories in distant lands : "And in that (lineage of Raghu) there was born the glorious Mahīpāladeva who has bowed down the locks of hair on the tops of the heads of the Muralas; who has caused the Mekhalas to suppurate; who has driven the Kalingas before him in war; who has spoilt the pastime of (the king who is) the moon of the Keralas; who has conquered the Kulūtas; who is a very axe to the Kuntalas; and who by violence has appropriated the fortunes of the Ramaṭhas"¹. It is difficult to identify Murala in this passage; possibly it stands for the Narbada and the Muralas were consequently those who inhabited its banks. Some scholars on the other hand take it to signify the country watered by the river Muralā in or around the Kerala country (*Raghuvamśa*, IV, 55).

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Mekhala is another name for the Amarkantak hills, where the Narbada rises, and so the Mekhalas may be the people living in that region. The Kalingas were certainly the natives of the coast of Orissa, perhaps extending as far south as the Ganjam district. The Keralas or Ceras are the well-known kingdom in the south between the Western Ghats and the sea-coast. The Kulūtas, of course, were a people who dwelt in the Kangra district of the Panjab on the banks of the Bias river². The name Kulūta is probably represented by the modern Kullu. The Kuntalas lived in the western part of the Deccan. Indeed, Kuntala denoted more or less the old Cālukya kingdom in the highlands of the Western Ghats.³ The Ramaṭhas were, according to the *Kāvyamīmāṃsā* (ch. XVII, p. 94) of Rājaśekhara, a people who dwelt beyond the Pṛthūdaka in the north, and are mentioned with the Kulūtas and Kiras etc. Taking the passage literally, it would appear that Mahīpāla’s arms penetrated remote regions extending from the upper course of the river Bias in the north-west to Kalinga or Orissa in the south-east;

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and from the Himālayas to the Kerala or Cera country in the far south.¹ But as we have no epigraphic evidence to corroborate these claims of victories, it is more reasonable to hold that by attributing to him this conventional area of “world-conquest” the poet primarily intended to show in a general way that his patron was a mighty monarch, who undertook many warlike expeditions in Āryāvarta or Northern India, and struck terror into the hearts of his contemporary rulers. That Mahīpāla must have overrun the territories as far as the lower course of the Narbadā seems also evident from the Partabgarh inscription, which informs us that in the year 946 A. D. Ujjain was being ruled by a governor of his son Mahendrapāla II. Now the latter is nowhere credited with any achievements, and we have seen above that Ujjain was occupied by the Rāṣṭrakūṭas during the northern campaigns of Indra III. There can therefore be no doubt that the recovery of the Ujjain region was the work of Mahīpāla himself. Support for this conclusion is also lent by the Kahla plate, according to which Bhāmāna is said to have gained fame by conquering Dhārā.² This Bhāmāna must have been a contemporary and vassal of Mahīpāla, being the successor of Ullabha, who was preceded by Guṇāmbodhideva. the feudatory of Mahipāla’s grandfather Bhoja I.

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As it is unlikely that a minor prince like Bhāmāna would by himself lead an expedition from Gorakhpur District, where this Kalacuri family was settled, to distant Ujjain, we may reasonably suppose that he accompanied his suzerain Mahīpāla in his southern campaigns and helped him in his victories. Another chief who rendered him similar assistance was perhaps his Guhila contemporary, Bhaṭṭa, who is represented in the Cātsū inscription as having defeated the armies of the kings of the south at the behest of his overlord.¹ Presumably the progress of Mahīpāla’s arms was facilitated by the then moribund condition of the Rāṣṭrakūṭa monarchy, for we are told in the Karhad plates that Indra III’s successor, Govinda IV, instead of looking to the affairs of the state, had taken to “vicious courses” and had thus “with his intelligence caught in the noose of the eyes of women displeased all beings.”² The weakness of Govinda IV’s rule is also apparent from the fact that according to the *Vikramārjunavijaya* of the Kanarese poet Pampa he was defeated by one of his feudatories, Arikeśarin II of Puligere.³ This event must have occurred soon after Śaka 851 or 930 A. D., the date of the Kalas inscription, which bestows conventional praises on Govinda IV.⁴

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¹ See I, 7. Carl Cappeller's edition (1885), p. 2. Cf. "Namita-Murala-mauliḥ pākalo Mekalānāṁ, Raṇa-kalita-Kaliṅgaḥ keli taṭa Keral-endoḥ, Ajani jita Kulūtaḥ Kuntalānāṁ kuṭhāraḥ, Haṭha-hrita-Ramaṭha-śrīḥ śri-Mahīpāladevaḥ."

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² *Ann. Rep. Arch. Surv. Ind.*, 1907-08, p. 260.

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³ See also *Arch. Surv. W. Ind.*, Vol. IV, pp. 126, 127; *Ind. Ant.*, XXII, p. 182.

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¹ *Jour. Dept. Lett.*, X, p. 64; Wilson, *Theatre of the Hindus*, II, p. 361.

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² *Ep. Ind.*, VII, pp. 89-90, verse 13. Cf. “...... nija vijayi pa (do) ddhāra Dhārāvanīśa (hrisya) t-senajaya-śrī-haṭha-haraṇa-kalā-dhāma Bhāmāna-devaḥ.”

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¹ *Ep. Ind.*, XII, pp. 12, 16, verse 26.

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² *Ibid.*, IV, pp. 283, 288, verse 20.

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³ *Ibid.*, XIII, pp. 328-329.

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⁴ *Ibid.* The fact that in some records Govinda IV is described as being served by the Gaṅgā and the Yamunā in his palace need not be taken to mean that he retained possession of the Doab. As shown above, Indra III’s invasion did not produce any lasting results, and Govinda IV was far too busy with sensual pleasures to think of foreign affairs.

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As regards the Ramaṭhas and the Kulūtas of the Panjab of whom Rājaśekhara expressly states that they were “conquered” and their “fortunes appropriated by violence,” there is nothing improbable in the view that they were actually compelled to accept the suzerainty of Mahīpāla. This conclusion is further reinforced by the fact that the district of Karnal was included within the Pratihāra kingdom since the days of Bhoja I, and Mas‘udī records that “the Mihran of Sindh comes from well-known sources in the highlands of Sindh, from the country belonging to Kanauj in the kingdom of Baüüra and from Kashmir......,”¹ which clearly shows that parts of the Panjab continued to be under Kanauj. The south-western limit of Mahīpāla’s jurisdiction is of course fixed by the Haddala plates dated Śaka 836 or 914 A. D., from which we learn that at the beginning of his reign eastern Saurāṣṭra was being governed by his feudatory (Mahā-sāmantādhipati) Dharaṇivarāha, who granted to Maheśvarācārya on the day of the winter solstice the village named Vimkala.² Bühler on the other hand identified the Mahīpāla of the Haddala grant with one of the Cūḍāsamas of Girnar-Junāgaḍh,³ but considering the fact that the Unā grant mentions Avanivarman II Yoga, the feudatory of Mahendrapāla, as an opponent of a Dharaṇivarāha, identified with the Mahāsāmantādhipati of the Haddala record, it seems more reasonable to suppose that the latter eventually came under the Pratihāra yoke and that the name Mahīpāla refers to his Kanauj suzerain. It has sometimes been assumed that Saurāṣṭra, which had been connected with the Pratihāras since the reign of Nāgabhata II, must have slipped away from their hands after the raid of Indra III, but there is no evidence of any such rupture until the rise of Mūlarāja Cālukya. A powerful monarch like Mahīpāla must certainly have made his authority felt there, and even after him we may well believe that for a time the local chiefs of Kāthiāwād continued to make a show of submission, as the Nawabs of Oudh found it profitable to do during the declining days of the Great Moghul at Delhi. Towards the east, however, after the Pālas had recovered some of their lost territories, the Pratīhāra kingdom does not seem to have extended much beyond the western borders of Bihar. The Bengal Asiatic Society’s plate, issued from Mahodaya, which records the grant in V. E. 988 or 931 A. D. to Bhaṭṭa Bhullāka of a village named Tikkarigrāma in the Vārāṇasi-viṣaya of the Pratiṣṭhāna-bhukti, at any rate shows that the Benares region was still under Kanauj¹.

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¹ Elliot, History of India, I, p. 21.

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² Ind. Ant., XVIII, pp. 90-91; Ep. Ind., IX, p. 4.

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³ Ind. Ant., XII, p. 192.

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¹ *Ind. Ant.*, XV, pp. 140, 141.

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There are indications that the closing years of Mahīpāla were again disturbed by a renewal of the Rāṣṭrakūṭa attacks on northern India. For the Deoli and Karhad plates of Kṛṣṇa III, while eulogising his achievements in the usual style of inflated panegyric specifically inform us that “on hearing of the conquest of all the strongholds in the southern regions simply by means of his angry glance, the hope about Kālañjara and Citrakūṭa vanished from the heart of the Gurjara.”[²] A critical study of the Deoli plates shows that Kṛṣṇa III undertook these expeditions sometime before Śaka 862 or 940 A. D., the date of the inscription, and while he was still a mere crown-prince or Kumāra. Accordingly we can be certain that the term Gurjara in this passage signifies Mahīpāla. It has been suggested that Kṛṣṇa III was successful in occupying Kālañjara and Citrakūṭa. This may perhaps be true, although all we learn from our Rāṣṭrakūṭa version of the incursion is that hearing of the triumphant progress of Kṛṣṇa III’s arms, the Gurjara ruler became so panic-stricken as to lose all hopes of the defence and safety of two of his most strategic strongholds. That Kṛṣṇa III’s claims of conquests in northern India are not a mere vaunt is no doubt clear from the discovery of a Kanarese praśasti inscribed on a stone slab at Jura in the Maihar state of the Baghelkhand Agency.¹ But it is significant that he assumes the full imperial titles of Paramabhaṭṭāraka, Mahārājādhirāja, and Parameśvara in this record, and the suspicion cannot, therefore, be entirely avoided that the credit for actual occupation of any territory in the north belongs to the subsequent career of Kṛṣṇa III, who, as king, may have led a second expedition when the power of the Pratihāras was distinctly on the wane.

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² *Ep. Ind.*, IV, pp. 284, 289, v. 30; V, p. 194, verse 25. Cf. “Dakṣiṇadig-durga vijayaṁ-ākarnya, Galita Gūrjara-hṛdayāt Kālañjara-Citrakūṭa-āśā.”

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¹ Ibid., XIX, pp. 287-90.

Arab testimony

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The Arab traveller Al Mas‘ūdī,² who visited the valley of the Indus in Hijri 303-04 or 915-16 A. D. at the beginning of Mahīpāla’s reign and wrote an account of his travels in 332 H = 943-44 A. D.,³ bears eloquent testimony to the power and prestige of the king of Kanauj. He informs us in his Murūj-ul-Zahāb that “one of the neighbouring kings of India who is far from the sea, is the Baūūra, who is lord of the city of Kanauj. This title is given to all the sovereigns of that kingdom.” Evidently the term Baūūra is an Arabic corruption of the term Pratihāra or its Prakrit equivalent Paḍihāra, and the description of being “far from the sea” also answers well to the position of Kanauj. The Arab chronicler then testifies to the Rāṣṭrakūṭa-Pratihāra struggle that was the characteristic feature of this epoch.

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² Elliot, History of India, Vol. I, pp. 21-23.

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³ Ibid., p. 454.

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He says : “This Baüüra who is the king of Kanauj is an enemy of the Balhara, the king of India.” Further he gives a rough indication of the dimensions of the kingdom of Kanauj, which according to him extended about one hundred and twenty square parasangas of Sindh, each parasang being equal to eight miles of this country. We are also told that the king of Kanauj maintained a large army both for aggression and defence. “He has large armies in garrisons on the north and on the south; on the east and on the west, for he is surrounded on all sides by warlike kings.” In another passage Mas‘ūdī gives the huge numbers of the army : “The king has four armies according to the four quarters of the wind. Each of them numbers 700,000 or 900,000 men.” Lastly, the traveller indicates the political disposition of the times, and mentions some of the powers that had relations with Kanauj. “The army of the north wars against the prince of Multan, and with the Musulmans, his subjects, on the frontier. The army of the south fights against the Balhara, king of Mankir. The other two armies march to meet enemies in every direction.” From these brief references it is clear that to an observant foreigner Kanauj appeared as the leading state of northern India, whose western limits extended upto Sindh, and whose ruler kept other kingdoms in awe and subjection by his vigilant forces.¹

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¹ See J. A. S. B., N. S. XVI (1920), p. 84, also pl. XII, No. 1, for certain gold coins which have been attributed by Mr. R. D. Banerji to Mahīpāla Pratihāra. On the obverse the king's name appears in three lines and on the reverse there is the seated goddess of the Gupta type. The form of ha no doubt shows that the coins are earlier than the 12th century A. D., but their ascription is rather doubtful.

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