North Indian Inscriptions

RECORDS OF THE SOMAVAMSI KINGS OF KATAK.

with three Purâṇic kings of the Lunar Race, to which race the copper-plate charters refer Śivgupta and his successors, suggests a knowledge of the fact that there really had been kings of Orissa who claimed to belong to that lineage ; (2) there certainly is preserved a reminiscence, but a completely erroneous and anachronistic one, of two of those real kings, Janamêjaya-Mahâ-Bhuvagupta I. and Yayâti-Mahâ-Śivagupta ; and (3) the alleged occupation by the Yavanas for a hundred and forty-six years, from A.D. 328 to 474, plainly embodies a vague memory of the Early Gupta kings, for whom, as far as their unbroken lineal succession goes, we have dates (see Gupta Inscriptions, Introd. p. 17) ranging from the year 82 to the year 147 or 149 of an era commencing A.D. 320,¹ and whose power, extending from Kâṭhiâwâḍ right across India to Lower Bengal, formed a barrier between Orissa or any part of Southern India and the ‘Yavanas’ of that period, viz. the Indo-Scythians of the Panjâb.² And, with such result as these before us, it is evident that everything relating to ancient times, which has been written on the unsupported authority of these annals, has to be expunged bodily from the pages of history.

......It only remains to say a few more precise words about the ‘Yavanas’ who are mentioned in these annals : it is obvious that, whoever they may be, no real history connected with them is preserved in the annals ; but it is also as well to shew clearly who they really were. They are first brought to notice in connection with Vajradêva (allotted to the period B.C. 538 to 421), in whose reign, we are told, they invaded Orissa from Mârwâr, Delhi, ‘Babul Dêś’ (supposed to be Îrân, i.e. Persia, and so explained to Mr. Stirling), and Kâbul, but were repulsed ; and, Mr. Stirling says (Asiatic Researches, Vol. XV. p. 258), “then follows an incomprehensible story, “involving some strange anachronism, about Imarût or Himarat Khân, who comes from Delhi “with a large army and attacks the Râja.” They are not specifically named in connection with Narasiṁhadêva (B.C. 421 to 306 ; he is called ‘Sarsankh Deo’ by Mr. Stirling) ; but they seem to be meant in the statement that “another chief from the far north invaded the country “during this reign, but he was defeated and the Orissa prince reduced a great part of the Delhi “kingdom” (Orissa, Vol. II. Appendix VII. p. 184),─ or, as Mr. Stirling says, “Sarsankh Deo, “a warlike prince, is attacked by another Khân, whose name is variously written, and is always “so incorrectly spelt that it is impossible to unravel it ; the Râja defeats the invader, and, “emboldened by his success, advances upon Delhi, and reduces a great part of the country.” In the time of Mânakṛishnadêva (B.C. 306 to 184 ; he is called ‘Hans or Hangsha Deo’ by Mr. Stirling), the Yavanas again invaded the country,─ from Kashmîr,─ but were driven back after many battles. Bhôjadêva also (B.C. 184 to 57) is said to have repulsed a Yavana invasion,─ from Sindh, according to Mr. Stirling’s account. And finally, in the time of Śôbhanadêva (A.D. 319 to 323) the Yavanas invaded Orissa by sea, under the leadership of a person named Raktabâhu, i.e. ‘Red-arm’ or ‘Bloody-arm,’ and on this occasion with success : the Yavanas force, indeed, after effecting a landing and plundering the town of Purî, was overwhelmed by the sea ; but the Yavanas remained masters of the country ; Śôbhanadêva, who had fled before their approach, died in the jungles ; his nominal successor, Chandradêva, was put to death by them in A.D. 328 ; and so they held the country until they were driven out from it by Yayâti-Kêsari in A.D. 474. Sir William Hunter admitted this last story so fully as to remark that, ‘while the very fact of this invasion having been made by way of the sea would suggest a doubt ‘as to whether the invaders were ordinary Hindûs,─ the idea of braving the ocean in armed ‘galleys, in order to descend on a province which could easily be reached by dry land, being ‘repugnant alike to the Hindû genius and the Brâhmaṇical faith,’─ “it formed an adventure “exactly suited to the imagination of the Asiatic Greek ; it was Alexander’s sail down the
__________________________________________________________________________________________

......¹ The commencement of the Yavana occupation might perhaps (see the preceding note) be brought to exactly A.D. 320.
......² In the Gupta records, however, they are called Śakas (Gupta Inscriptions, p. 14) ; the name ‘Yavana’ does not occur.