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The Indian Analyst
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North Indian Inscriptions |
POLITICAL HISTORY and exacting and would swell into abnormal and prohibitive expenses. We are therefore compelled to suppose that Mādhavavarman had a long reign and that he spent the whole of it in the performance of sacrificial rites. The only way out of this difficulty is that suggested by the remark which Vyāsa makes to Yudhishṭhira in connection with his Aśvamēdha. “Let thy sacrifice, O the best of kings,” says Vyāsa, “be performed in such a way that it shall not be defective, In consequence of the large quantity of that gold (having to spend which) it is called Bahusuvarṇaka (Profuse-Gold Sacrifice). Increase here the dakshiṇā threefold, O great king, and thy (sacrifice) shall become threefold. The Brāhmaṇas are competent for this purpose. Having thus accomplished three Aśvamēdhas each with profuse dakshiṇā, thou shalt be freed, O king, from the sin committed in consequence of the slaughter of thy kinsmen.”1 This is a most significant passage, because it clearly says that he, who gives dakshiṇā that is triple of what is enjoined, is looked upon as having performed three different Horse Sacrifices and consequently as having attained to triple the spiritual merit. May we not therefore infer that Pravarasēna I and Mādhavavarman I disbursed dakshiṇā four and eleven times respectively, of that actually prescribed for that sacrifice, and were credited with having performed four and eleven Aśvamēdhas respectively, when, as a matter of fact, the ceremony was performed but once? The same may have happened in the case of Samudragupta. We do not know the exact value of anēka in the epithet anēk-Āśvamēdha-yājī which has been applied to him in his granddaughter’s copper-plate grant. It may be ‘four’; it may be ‘eleven’; it may be even two. We have only to presume that he distributed dakshiṇā among Brāhmaṇas just so many times more than laid down for the sacrifice, but that he performed only one solemn rite.
One of the many epithets by which Samudragupta is known is nyāy-āgat-ānēka-gō-hiraṇya-kōṭi-prada, “the giver of many crores of lawfully acquired cows and gold”. This may not be an exaggeration, as from the verses just cited Bahusuvarṇaka, because profuse quantities of gold are given by way of dakshiṇā. That cows also were bestowed upon the Brāhmaṇa priests is too wellknown to require any proof. Of the epigraphic records that have been hitherto published, the Nānāghāṭ cave inscription is the most important in this connection. There the Śātavāhana king, or rather, his queen, is represented as having celebrated Śrauta sacrifices of various kinds, and the various dakshiṇās distributed by this charitable monarch in connection therewith have also been described.2 Even a cursory glance is enough to show that the kine formed an important item of dakshiṇā in the case of most of his sacrifices. But there is no mention of suvarṇa except in the case of the Aśvamēdha performed by him.3 Vēdiśrī performed two Aśvamēdhas, but the details of the second of them alone have been preserved, and these again only partially. Nevertheless, what has been preserved indubitably points to the conclusion that the precious metal or coin that was associated with Horse Sacrifice is Suvarṇa as we also know from the Mahābhārata, and not silver or Kārshāpaṇas which we find invariably associated with all other sacrifices of Vēdiśrī in the Nānāghāṭ cave inscription. It is but natural that the memory of such an important event as the celebration of
Aśvamēdha by Samudragupta should be preserved in a variety of ways. We have already
described what is called the Aśvamēdha type of coins, which he issued to commemorate this
event. Some scholars are of opinion that they were struck for distribution to the Brāhmaṇas
who took part in the Aśvamēdha ceremony.4 But this seems unlikely, because these coins, 1 Mahābhārata, XIV, 88, 13-15, to which we drew attention long ago in IC., Vol. I, pp. 116-17.
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