The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c7.s4.2

v1.c7.s4.2

But like every other problem of Andhra-Sātavāhana history the question of their chronology is very difficult to solve. Except for the testimony of the Purāṇas and a couple of difficult but possible synchronisms, we are indebted entirely to palaeography for our scanty knowledge of the regnal periods of these princes. And palaeography seems to authorize such widely divergent views that we are never absolutely sure of anything at all. The Nānāghāṭ inscriptions of the Sātavāhanas, for instance, are assigned, for palaeographical reasons, to anywhere between the middle of the second century B.C. and the latter half of the first century B.C.,¹ to any time ‘between the Besnagar pillar inscription of Heliodorus (about the beginning of the first century B.C.) and the Hāthigumphā inscription of Khāravela (end of first century B.C.)’.²