History of Kanauj to the Moslem Conquest c9.s1.t1.6

c9.s1.t1.6

The earliest defections from the empire were evidently Saurāṣṭra and Western Malwa. There is a curious break in the silver currency after Skandagupta, and we have no inscriptions to prove that his successors, had any direct connection with these regions.⁴ Besides, it is almost certain that towards the last quarter of the fifth century the Maitrakas rose to power in Valabhī under the leadership of Senāpati Bhaṭṭāraka. This is obvious from the fact that the first known record of this family belongs to Mahārāja Dhruvasena I, the third son of Bhaṭṭāraka, and bears the Gupta-Valabhi date 206 = 525 A. D. Between them there intervened the other two sons of Bhaṭṭāraka-Senāpati Dharasena I and Mahārāja Droṇasiṃha. If we, therefore, roughly assign 40 to 45 years for the first three reigns, the kingdom must have been founded in *circa* 480-85 A. D. We know from the inscriptions that the first few Maitraka rulers were not absolutely independent,⁵ but it is not clear whose suzerainty they acknowledged. Possibly they owed allegiance to the Hūṇas, who gradually overwhelmed the western and central parts of India. Or perhaps, for sometime they nominally kept alive the tradition of Gupta paramountcy.