North Indian Inscriptions

POLITICAL HISTORY

himself Khādyaṭapākika which shows that he was a native of Khādyaṭapāka.¹ It may be observed that the Allahabad pillar inscription is not a posthumous record as supposed by Fleet. For this rather egregious conclusion he relies upon lines 29-30 where the king’s fame is described as itas=tridaśapti-bhavana-gaman-āvāpta-lalita-sukha-vicharaṇā, which he renders by “(has departed) hence (and now) experiences the sweet happiness attained by (his) having gone to the abode of (Indra) the lord of the gods.” The most serious fault in this translation is the word ‘(his)’ which Fleet has imported into it, but, which is not warranted by the passage quoted above. The person that went to the abode of Indra is not he, that is, Samudragupta, but his kīrti or Fame which is invariably personified as a female in Sanskrit poetry. And Sanskrit poets are always in the habit of describing the Fame of their hero king as first pervading the whole earth and, when she finds it impossible to spread any further on the earth, as thereafter ascending to heaven. But this does not mean at all that their hero king is defunct. And, further, if Samudragupta had really been deceased when this record was put up, Harishēṇa would certainly have mentioned the name of the monarch who was then ruling, especially as he speaks of his mind having been expanded in consequence of his always staying near the Bhaṭṭāraka, who cannot but stand for the ruling monarch. These reasons make it abundantly clear that the Allahabad pillar inscription is not a posthumous record, composed at the bidding of Samudragupta’s successor, but a contemporary epigraph, containing an account of his reign and achievements.²

        The Allahabad pillar inscription is historically a most important document, because it throws light not only on the expeditions of conquest undertaken by Samudragupta but also upon the historical geography of the period, and, above all, the system of political organisation that had developed in India at the time. Let us, in the first place, see what it tells us about the Gupta monarch, his military achievements and his personal accomplishments. It covers thirtytwo lines and a half, consisting of eight verses at the beginning (lines 1-16), a long prose passage (lines 17-30), a concluding verse (lines 30-31), a subscription of the author (line 31-32) in which he specifies details about himself (and these we have already considered), and lastly a postscript (line 33) added by the officer of Samudragupta who saw to the engraving of this praśasti on the Aśōkan column. The first part of the epigraph which consists of eight verses occupying the first sixteen lines of it is badly preserved. It tells us something of his character and accomplishments, and, above all, the unique military glory he attained by putting down the Confederacy of Four by a coup de main, killing three and fettering one member thereof. As three of the princes that formed this Confederacy have been mentioned again in the prose passage of the record where the list of the Āryāvarta rulers destroyed by him is given and as nevertheless all the members of the Confederacy have been thought fit to be mentioned in the verse portion of the inscription which again does not speak of any other of his conquests, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that this military achievement of Samudragupta was then considered to be of supreme importance. This matter, however, we have already dealt with in extenso.

       The next passage which is in prose describes the many and manifold conquests achieved by Samudragupta in the different parts of India. It begins with the kings of Dakshiṇāpatha whom he captured but released. Not only their names but also those of their kingdoms have been specified. They are as follows: (1) Mahēndra of Kōsala, (2) Vyāghrarāja of Mahākāntāra, (3) Maṇṭarāja of Kurāla, (4) Mahēndragiri of Pishṭapura, (5) Svāmidatta of Kōṭṭūra, (6) Damana of Ēraṇḍapalla, (7) Ṿishṇugōpa of Kāñchī, (8) Nīlarāja of Avamukta, (9) Hastivarman of Vēṅgī, (10) Ugrasēna of Pālakka, (11) Kubēra of Dēvarāshṭra, and (12) Dhanañ-
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¹ [See note under this word in text line 32 in No. 1 below.—Ed.]
² [Cf. IHQ., Vol. xxiv, pp. 104-13.—Ed.]