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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA of the Maurya lineage. Another inscription[1] from Waghli near Chalisgaon in West Khandesh mentions the Maurya chief Gōvindarāja who was the twenty-first descendant of the chief Kīkaṭa of the Maurya dynasty of Valabhī (i.e. modern Wala in Kathiawar) and ruled in Śaka 991=1069 A.D. as a subordinate of the Yādava Mahāmaṇḍalēśvara Sēuṇachandra II of the Sēuṇa country (i.e. modern Khandesh). But the facts that the palaeography of the inscription under study closely resembles that of the Kanaswa inscription and that the Malwa-Rajasthan region is much closer to Mathurā than the Konkan and Khandesh appear to connect the Mauryas mentioned in our epigraph with the Maurya king Dhavala of the Kanaswa inscription. It was probably these Mauryas who are referred to in the Nausari plates[2] of the Gujarat Chālukya chief Pulakēśin Avanījanāśraya, dated in the Kalachuri year 490=738 A.D. It is stated in that record that the Chālukya chief repulsed a Tājika (i.e. Arab) army which, after destroying the Saindhava, Kachchhēlla, Surāshṭra, Chāvōṭaka (i.e. Chāpōtkaṭa), Maurya and Gurjara kings and wishing to penetrate the Dakshiṇāpatha country, came to reduce the Navasārikā territory under his rule. It was probably the Maurya king Dhavala who was defeated by the Arabs then in occupation of Sind. D. R. Bhandarkar[3] was inclined to identify Maurya Dhavala of the Kanaswa inscription with Paramabhaṭṭāraka Mahārājādhirāja Paramēśvara Dhavalappa, overlord of Guhilaputra Dhanika of Dhavagartā, mentioned in the Dhod inscription probably dated in the Gupta year 407[4]=726 A.D. Dhavalappa, however, appears to be a South Indian (probably Kannaḍa) name and the king may have been related to Rāshṭrakūṭa Naṇṇappa, bearing a similar appa-ending name, of the Indragarh (Mandasaur District, Madhya Pradesh) inscription[5] of the Mālava year (i.e. V.S.) 767=710 A.D. It has, however, to be admitted that the Maurya king’s name is given in the Kanaswa inscription as Dhavalātman which may be a Sanskritisation of Dhavalappa. If Bhandarkar’s identification is accepted, the southern name of a Maurya king of the Malwa-Rajasthan region may be explained by supposing that these Mauryas were related to the Mauryas of the Konkan in the south.
As already indicated above, it is very probable that Maurya Dhavala of the Kanaswa inscription belonged to the family referred to in the inscription under study. It also seems that the Mauryas of the Malwa-Rajasthan region were descendants of one of the Kumāra viceroys of the western province of the ancient Maurya empire, which had its headquarters at the city of Ujjayinī. Since the Kanaswa inscription of V.S. 796 (738 A.D.) appears to be slightly later than the present record, king Dhavala may be tentatively regarded as one of the successors of Ḍiṇḍirāja Karka of our epigraph. The genealogy of these Mauryas would thus stand as follows :
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[1] Above, Vol. II, pp. 221 ff.
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