North Indian Inscriptions

POLITICAL HISTORY

jaya of Kusthalapura. Before we make an attempt to identify these rulers or locate their territories, we have to bear in mind the fact that they were all kings of Dakshiṇāpatha, that is, of India to the south of the Narmadā. No ruler, whose kingdom was to the north of the Narmadā, could here be described as a king of Dakshiṇāpatha and could not thus have been mentioned in this list.

       Let us now see, very briefly, what is known about these kings and kingdoms of South India. The first is Mahēndra of Kōsala. This Kōsala must be Dakshiṇa (or South) Kōsala, or Mahākōsala as it is also called. “Mahā-Kosala” says Cunningham “comprised the whole of the upper valley of the Mahānadi and its tributaries, from the source of the Narbada at Amarkantak, on the north, to the source of he Mahānadi itself, near Kānker, on the south, and from the valley of the Wen-Gangā, on the west, to the Hasda and Jonk rivers on the east. But these limits have often been extended, so as to embrace the hilly districts of Mandala and Bālāghāt, on the west up to the banks of the Wen-Gangā, and the middle valley of the Mahānadi, on the east, down to Sambalpur and Sonpur.”¹ In other words, it comprises the greater portions of the modern districts of Raipur and Bilaspur in Madhya Pradesh and of such former native states of Orissa as Sonpur and Patna. The country of Kōsala is intimately associated with the Ikshvākus. Thus the Rāmāyaṇa speaks of Kōsala with its capital Ayōdhyā, where reigned Daśaratha and his son Rāma who belonged to the Ikshvāku race. In the time of the Buddha, the boundaries of Kōsala had extended. It had then become co-extensive with practically the eastern half of Uttar Pradesh and was ruled over by Pasenadi (Prasēnajit) and his son Viḍūḍabha, both scions of the Ikshvākus family. Their capital, however, was not Ayōdhyā, but Śrāvastī.² When we, therefore, hear of Kōsala being situated in Dakshiṇāpatha, the question naturally arises whether the Ikshvākus had proceeded southward and established their kingdom there also.

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Fortunately, both tradition and epigraphy support the conclusion. The two well-known provinces of Dakshiṇāpatha were Mūlaka and Aśmaka. According to the Purāṇas, they were so called after two Ikshvāku rulers, son and father, of these names. This clearly shows that according to tradition South India was being colonised long ago by scions of the Ikshvāku race. We have epigraphic evidence also consisting of records found at two Buddhist Stūpas, one at Jaggayyapēṭa in the Krishna District and the other at Nāgārjunikoṇḍa in the Guntur District, Andhra Pradesh. They speak of three Ikshvāku Mahārājas, namely, Vāsishṭhīputra Chāṁtamūla (I), his son Māḍharīputra Vīrapurushadatta, and the latter’s son Vāsishṭhīputra Ehuvuḷa Chāṁtamūla (II).³ And further what we have to note is that the first of them is eulogised for having celebrated Agnihōtra, Agnishṭōma, Vājapēya, and, above all, Aśvamēdha. The last of these sacrifices is particularly important, as it shows that he was a very powerful ruler. This indicates that the Krishna and Guntur Districts where their monuments have been found were but a tiny part of the mighty kingdom, which was held by these Ikshvākus and which must have embraced Kōsala, which, as its very name indicates, was prima facie the Ikshvāku country of Dakshiṇāpatha. But which was the capital town of this Ikshvāku kingdom—the Southern Kōsala ? In this connection we have to note that the Sonepur Plates of Mahābhavagupta II-Janamējaya speak of a place called Kōsalā.⁴ Kōsalā cannot but mean ‘the city of Ayōdhyā’, the capital of North Kōsala. It is therefore clear enough that Southern Kōsala also had Kōsalā as its capital. Where could it be ? It seems tempting to iden-
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¹ CASIR., Vol. XVII, p. 68.
² Car. Lec., 1918, pp. 65 ff.
³ Ep. Ind., Vol. XX, pp. 3-4; see also the various transcripts, pp. 16 ff.
⁴ Ibid., Vol. XXIII, p. 251, line 13. This Kōsalā is more centrally situated than Ayōdhyā six miles from the capital of the former Nilgiri State in Orissa (Nagendranath Vasu’s. The Archaeological Survey of Mayurbhanj, Vol. I, pp. 87 ff.).