The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c7.s6.73

v1.c7.s6.73

Thus the elimination of the Greek power from India did not bring permanent relief to the Sātavāhanas of the Deccan. When Puḷumāvi (I) ascended the throne in 43 B.C., he found the political map of India very like what it had been in the days of Sātakarṇi (II). Only this time it was not the Greeks but the Śaka-Pahlavas who dominated the land. The Śuṅgas had been overthrown in 73 B.C. and the Kaṇva dynasty had been founded in Magadha. But Vāsudeva, through whom Devabhūti, the ‘over-libidinous Śuṅga’ king, was ‘reft of his life’, did not become master of all the Śuṅga possessions. Malwa and other lands in Central India were in the hands of the foreigners and the Kaṇvas came in possession of only a much depleted Magadha empire. According to the Purāṇas, Vāsudeva ruled for 9 years, his son Bhānumitra for 14, and his grandson Nārāyaṇa for 12. Within 5 years of the Puḷumāvi’s accession to the Sātavāhana throne, Nārāyaṇa Kaṇva was succeeded by his son Suśarman. The Kaṇva kings were weak and incapable of any exertion either in order to defend the land from aliens or even to save their own lives. The fall of Magadha was certain and imminent. Who should take it was the question. Puḷumāvi was quite determined that it should not be the foreigner. And when he struck the blow in 28 B.C., Magadha fell to him like a ripe fruit; Suśarman, the last Kaṇvāyana, was killed by the Andhra ruler; Sātakarṇi’s former conquests of Avanti and Ākara also came once again under Sātavāhana rule.