Early Period of Kamarupa

Part of a series on the
History of Kamarupa
Rulers and Events

Nalanda seal of Bhaskar Varman

The Early Period of Kamarupa stretches from early times to the 7th century A.D.

Genealogy

In the Nidhanpur plate of King Bhaskar Varman^[1] the genealogy of the kings mentioned therein is traced from Naraka, his son Bhagadatta and his grandson Vajradatta. There is really no inherent impossibility in the same dynasty ruling from the time of the Mahabharata war down to the seventh century A.D. It is known that a Paurava kin, who must have descended from Puru, the remote ancestor of Yudhishthira of the Mahabharata fame, ruled over a part of the Punjab in the fourth century B.C. when Alexander the Great invaded India. Pragjyotisha was a frontier kingdom of India, girt on all sides except the west, by natural defences.^[2]

It is possible that its kings, after Vajradatta, either acknowledged the overlordship of other more powerful kings of northern India or, being out of the way, were not molested by any of them but, the fact that the kingdom came to play no part in the history of northern India within historical times from the rise of Bimbisara in Magadha, in the sixth century B.C. down to the time of Samudra Gupta in the fourth century A.D, is rather striking and leads one to suppose that probably there might have been some upheaval within the kingdom which reduced it to an insignificant position. Anyway, in the absence of clear proof to the contrary, it can assume as correct Bhaskar Varman's claim of descent, in unbroken line, from Naraka, as stated in the Nidhanpur copper-plate inscription.^[3]

Similarity in naming process

The names of some of the Kamarupa kings closely follow those of the emperors of Aryavarta, who according to Sanskrit literature ruled North India. Pushyamitra Shunga usurped the Mourya throne in about 185 BC and revived the ancient horse sacrifice or Aswamedha. He died in about 149 BC The name of the Kamarupa king Pushya Varman was probably given after the renowned Shunga king of Magadha. Similarly, Pushya Varman's son was named Samudra Varman after Samudra Gupta, the Gupta emperor who ruled from 330 to about 385 AD. Samudra Varman's queen also bore the same name as the queen of Samudra Gupta. This indicates that Samudra Varman probably ruled a short time after Samudra Gupta whose illustrious name was then fresh in the memory of the people of northern India.^[4]

Epigrapghic records

Kamarupa, Guptas, Dvaka, Licchavis, Pundravardhana, Samatata, Vakatakas, Western Satraps

The first epigraphic record which mentions Kamarupa is the famous Allahabad inscription Of Samudra Gupta which was once regarded as posthumous but which historians now believe to have been engraved during the life time of the famous emperor. In this inscription Kamarupa is mentioned as a frontier kingdom along with Samatata, Davaka, Nepal and Kartripura the kings of which fully gratified the imperious commands of Samudra Gupta "by giving all kinds of taxes and obeying his orders and coming to perform obeisance".^[5]

The "pratyanta nripati" of Kamarupa who submitted to Samudra Gupta was very probably no other than Pushya Varman. Gait has placed him tentatively in the first half of the fifth century but this is probably not correct, as his accession to the throne took place no later than 380 A.D. It is known that Samudra Gupta celebrated the horse-sacrifice but it does not appear that his son Chandra Gupta II, who assumed the title Vikramaditya, performed the same ceremony. In the traditional accounts of Kamarupa it is however stated that a king of the Naraka dynasty named Subahu detained the sacrificial horse of Vikramaditya who then invaded Kamarupa and put Subahu to flight. Subahu might have been the popular name of Pushya Varman as Mriganka was the popular name of Susthita Varman and Samudra Gupta was the Vikramaditya referred to in the traditional account. It is quite possible that, following the ancient custom, Samudra Gupta, in his digvijaya, prior to the Aswamedha, led his sacrificial horse and challenged all the kings to detain the horse. Those who accepted the challenge had to fight while those who wanted to avoid fight acknowledged the overlordship of the conqueror and allowed the horse to pass unrestricted. Pushya Varman, otherwise known as Subahu, having stopped the horse had to fight and being worsted acknowledged the suzerainty of the Gupta emperor and performed obeisance.

Pushya Varman was succeeded by his son Samudra Varman who was perhaps the contemporary of Chandra Gupta II Vikramaditya and the celebrated poet Kalidasa. In the Nidhanpur inscription it is stated that there was no "matsyanyaya" in his kingdom and that Samudra Varman was like the fifth ocean.^[1] The word "matsyanyaya" has been explained as anarchy due to the absence of a strong ruler when the powerful people oppress the weak just as the larger fish devour the smaller fry. The mention of this word seems to indicate that there was such anarchy during the reigns of his predecessors. It may be that after such anarchy was ended Pushya Varman rose to power or that after the accession of Pushya Varman the anarchy ended.

Kalidasa poetry references

Some scholars believe that the poet Kalidasa who was in the court of Chandra Gupta II Vikramaditya, really narrated in canto IV of his Raghuvansha, the conquering tour (digvijaya) of Samudra Gupta under the poetic disguise of Raghu. At any rate, Kalidasa in the beginning of the fifth century A.D. must have recorded the facts concerning the countries of India mentioned in his book according to his own knowledge of those countries. For instance, the hydrographical condition of Bengal at that time is clearly referred to in canto IV, verses 34 to 38. The poet mentions that Raghu's son Aja selected the king of Kamarupa as his best man in his marriage with Indumati. This shows that the king of Kamarupa of his time, who was probably Samudra Varman, was a very important monarch belonging to an old and reputed dynasty; otherwise the poet would not have made him the best man of the son of his hero.

Kashmir Chronicles

With regard to the next king Bala Varman I, the son of Samudra Varman by his queen Datta Devi, the Nidhanpur inscription states that "his irresistible troops constituted his armour". It appears therefore that he was a powerful king and a conqueror. There is mention in the Kashmir chronicle Rajatarangini that king Meghavahana of Kashmir married a Pragjyotisha princess named Amritaprabha. It is stated that the king of Pragjyotisha held a svayamvara for the marriage of the princess. Of all the princes assembled Amritaprabha's choice fell upon the Kashmir prince Meghavahana. It is recorded that "there in the presence of the kings Meghavahana received from the princess Amritaprabha the bridegrom's garland while the parasol of Varuna cast its shade upon him. By this the people knew his future greatness as by the west wind the gathering of clouds. Because this parasol, which king Naraka had carried away frown Varuna cast its shade on no one but a sovereign of the whole globe (Chakravartin).^[6] This parasol or umbrella is mentioned also in the Harsha Charita of Bana wherein it is stated that it was an heirloom of the kings of the dynasty of Naraka.

It is also stated there that King Bhaskar Varman, through his envoy Hangshavega, presented this umbrella to Sri Harshavardhana. It is stated that queen Amritaprabha erected in Kashmir a lofty Vihara for the benefit of the foreign bhiksus and that this Vihara was known as Amritabhavan. It is further stated that Amritaprabha took to Kashmir a Tibetan Buddhist scholar named Stunpa who was a preceptor of her father, the Kamarupa king. This Stunpa erected a stupa in Kashmir known as "Lo-stunpa".^[7]

It the above statements are to be believed as true it would appear that Buddhism had spread into Kamarupa long before the visit of Yuan Chwang, that a remote ancestor of Bhaskar Varman was a Buddhist and that the cultural connection between Kamarupa and Tibet, began as early as fifth century A.D. According to Kahlan, the author of the Rajatarangini, Meghavahana was succeeded by Sresthisena and the latter by Toramana. If this Toramana is identical with the Ephthalic king Toramana, the father of the famous Mihiragula, the king of the white Huns who ruled over the Punjab and possibly also over Kashmir, then he cannot be placed earlier than the third quarter of the fifth century A.D. The identification would probably be correct for, according to Kahlan, Toramana struck coins in his name extensively and such coins have, as a matter of fact, been discovered in large quantities. These bear the name Toramana in characters of the Gupta period.

This being so, Meghavahana may be placed about the second quarter of the fifth century though Kahlan's chronology places him in the first century and he was probably the son in law of the Kamarupa king Bala Varman I. This matrimonial alliance and the celebration of the Svayamvara indicates that Pragjyotisha or Kamarupa was then an important kingdom in northern India and that it was no longer a mere frontier kingdom as in the days of Pushya Varman.

Other accounts

Vincent Smith mentions that in the year 428 A.D., during the reign of emperor Kumara Gupta, an embassy was sent to China by an Indian king named Yue-ai (Moon-loved) who was lord of the Ka-pi-Ii country. Lt. Col. Wilson has identified Ka-pi-li with the Kapili river of Assam named in the Kalika purana as Kapila-Ganga, and Vincent Smith has tentatively accepted this identification.^[8] The Kapili valley, which is still called Davaka, may be identified with the kingdom of Davaka mentioned in the Allahabad inscription of Sumudra Gupta. The embassy may therefore have been sent by the king of Davaka whose name was either Chandra Priya or Chandra Vallabha. It should however be mentioned that there was a king of Kamarupa named Chandra-mukha (moon-faced) who was the great-grandfather of Bhaskar Varman. He cannot, however, be assigned to the second quarter of the fifth century. It seems that in the sixth or the seventh century this kingdom of Davaka was absorbed by Kamarupa, for according to Yuan Chwang's account the Kapili valley was included in Kamarupa. The kings after Bala Varman were Kalyana Varman, Ganapati Varman, Mahendra Varman and Narayana Varman who do not appear to have been much renowned.

Copper plate seals and inscriptions

According to the Nidhanpur inscription, Ganapati Varman was generous in his gifts while Narayana Varman was, like king Janaka, deeply versed in the knowledge of the self. Narayana Varman was succeeded by his son Mahabhuta Varman who is named in the Harsha Charita as Bhuti Varman. It was he who granted, to a large number of Brahmans, lands in the Chadrapuri vishaya. The copper-plate relating to this grant having been destroyed by fire his great great grand son Bhaskar Varman recorded, what is known as the Nidhanpur grant, to confirm the gift made by his ancestor.

Originally only three plates of this inscription were discovered by Pandit Padmanath Bhattacharya Vidya Vinod who contributed a paper on them in Epigraphia Indica vol XII. Subsequently two more plates found were described by Pandit Vidya Vindod in XIX of the Epigraphia Indica. The third lost plate was again discussed by him in the same journal. One more plate is still missing. The newly discovered plates mention the names of Chandrapuri vishaya, Kausika River and Mayura-Salmala agrahara. The occurrence of the word "agrahara" seems to indicate the existence of a temple for the maintenance of which and its Shebaits the lands were granted. As the inscription begins with the adoration of ashbesmeared Mahadeva it is clear that these Kamarupa kings were all devotees of Siva. As a matter of fact Siva is invoked in the inscription as the istadevata of the donor. Further in the Harsha Charita it is stated that Bhaskar Varman worshiped only the lotus-feet of Siva. So it may be assumed that the agrahara mentioned in the inscription was no other than a Siva temple. The further discovered plates contain the names of the donees, who number more than 200. From this list it can find such names as Vishnu-Ghosha, Arka-Datta, Rishi-Dama, Dama-Deva, Dhurva-Soma, Vishnu-Palita, Gayatri-Pala, Yajna-Kunda, Padma-Dassa, Tosha-Naga and Gopala-Nandi.

It is curious that the surname Ghosha, Datta, Dama, Deva, Soma, Palita, Pala, Kundu, Dasa, Naga and Nandi are now confided to Kayasthas of Bengal but not to Brahmans. One authority named Dr. Bhandarkar has pointed out that identical surnames were used by the Nagar-Brahmans. It is not known when and how such a colony of Brahmans came to be settled in Kamarupa near the Kosi River as early as the beginning of the sixth century. Pandit Vidya Vinod's surmise that most of the Brahman families in the neighbouring province of modern Bengal are the, descendant; of these Brahmans from Kamarupa seems to rest on good foundation.^[9]

The Nidhanpur inscription is an epigraphic record of very great historic value. In the first part of the sixth century during the reign of Narayana Varman or his son Mahabhuta Varmran. Yasodharman king of Malwa, who defeated Mihiragula, the leader of the white Huns, is said to have conquered the whole of northern India from the Brahmaputra to the western ocean. This is recorded in his Mandasor pillar inscription^[10] wherein it is emphasized that Yasodharman conquered territories which even the Guptas (on the east) and the Huns (on the west) failed to penetrate. It is possible to detect here a reference to Kamarupa which was always outside the Gupta Empire. The invasion of Kamarupa by Yasodharman is here indicated. It is not known how far this invasion was successful. Anyway, the conquest of Eastern India by Yasodharman, in the early part of the sixth century, shows that about that period the Gupta power in Magadha was nearly extinct.

Boundaries

As a matter of fact the Imperial Guptas ceased to rule after the close of the fifth century and, as remarked by Vincent Smith, that line passed by an obscure transition into what is known as the dynasty of the "Later Guptas of Magadha". This dynasty did not exercise sovereignty even over the whole of Magadha, part of which came under the sway of the Varmans of Maukhari.

Taking advantage of the decline of the Gupta power the Kamarupa kings appear to have extended their kingdom towards the west. Down to the end of the fifth century the tract of country between the Teesta and the Kosi formed the Pundravardhana Bhukti of the Gupta Empire. In the first quarter of the sixth century it can find this tract within the Kamarupa kingdom. Mahabhuta Varman's grant referred to above may be dated about 525 A.D. This grant consisted of lands in the Chandrapuri Vishaya within the present district of Purnea for, according to the Nidhanpur inscription, the lands granted were on the banks of the old channel of the Kausika or Kosi.^[11] Rennell's map of Bengal (1783) shows the position of the old channel of the Kosi. It appears that this river originally took an easterly course and flowing to the west of Purnea fell into the Ganges at Rajmahal or nearly forty miles below its present confluence with the Ganges.

It appears from the Nidhanpur inscription that the river had already abandoned its old channel by the time Bhaskar Varman confirmed his ancestor's grant. That the Kausika, mentioned in the inscription, is the Kosi River in modern Bihar admits of no doubt, but certain writers have attempted to identity Kausika with the Kusiara river in Sylhet.^[12] These writers conveniently forget that in the ninth century another Kamarupa king, named Vanamala, granted lands adjoining the Chandrapuri Vishaya and, in order to localize the lands more definitely. He stated in his inscription that the lands lay to the west of the Teesta (Trisrotayah paschimatah). After this, any attempt to locate the Chandrapuri Vishava anywhere in the Sylhet district cannot but be regarded as childish.

Confrontation with Guptas

Towards the close of the sixth century the dynasty of the Later Guptas produced a powerful king named Mahasena Gupta. By checking the Maukharis in mid-India he re-established the Gupta power to some extent. After this he turned his attention towards the east where the Kamarupa kings had appropriated to themselves the whole of the Pundravardhana bhukti.

He was therefore compelled to declare war against the then Kamarupa king Susthita Varman, the father of Bhaskar Varman. It appears that Susthita Varman sustained a crushing defeat and Mahasena Gupta earned a Treat victory which was glorified by his grandson in the Aphshad inscription. It is stated in this inscription that Susthita Varman was defeated by Mahasena Gupta "whose mighty fame, marked in honour of victory over the illustrious Susthita Varman (and white) as a full-blown Jasmine flower or water-lily, or as a pair of necklace of pearls pounded into little bits, is still constantly sung on the banks of the Brahmaputra, the surfaces of which are (so) cool, by the Siddhas in pairs, when they wake up after sleeping in the shade of the betel plants that are in full bloom".^[13]

This panegyric was justified for the victory had really important political consequences. Mahasena Gupta recovered the whole of the Pundravardhana bhukti and the Kamarupa boundary was pushed back to the Teesta- Karatoya. The result was that the territories which included the lands donated by Mahabhuta Varman in the previous century were lost to Kamarupa. When in the early part of the seventh century Sasanka was overthrown, Bhaskar Varman re-acquired the lost tracts and confirmed the grant of his ancestor. This explains why the confirmation was issued immediately after the overthrow of Sasanka and from the victorious camp itself where Bhaskar Varman was "accompanied by a fleet of war-boats, war-elephants, cavalry and infantrv." Susthita Varman, though defeated, was a great king and therefore in the Aphshad inscription he is described as "illustrious". The victory over him and the recovery of the territories were therefore regarded as a great triumph as the text of the inscription indicates. Susthita Varman could not retaliate for the defeat during his lifetime. He left this duty to his worthy son Bhaskar Varman.

Alliance with Harsha

The starting fixed point in the above chronology is the reign of Bhaskar Varman, the contemporary of Harshavardhana – Siladitya or Sri Harsha and the Chinese pilgrim Yuan Chwang. Sri Harsha ruled from 606 to 648 A.D. It appears that Bhaskar Varman was older than Sri Harsha, for in the procession at Kanauj in 644 A.D. Sri Harsha himself dressed as Indra while Bhaskar Varman personated as Brahma. The role of Brahma would not have been assigned to Bhaskar Varman if he was not older than Sri Harsha. It can therefore place Bhaskar Varman's accession to the throne about 600 A.D.

From this point, by allowing on an average 20 years for the reign of each king it can place Pushya Varman's accession about 380 A.D., but probably he ruled earlier. The allowance of 20 years for each reign cannot be considered extravagant in view of the long reign of Bhaskar Varman himself which covered nearly fifty years. The names of the above-mentioned kings, as given in the inscription, can be partly verified from two sources. The first is the clay-seal of Bhaskar Varman which was discovered during excavation of the Nalanda ruins. This seal contains the names of all the kings and queens from Ganapati Varman to Bhaskar Varman. The second is the Harsha Charita of Bana who flourished in the court of Sri Harsha and was therefore a contemporary of Bhaskar Varman. In this work the names of the Kamarupa kings and queens from Mahabhuta Varman are given. The only difference is that Mahabhuta Varman is mentioned in the Harsha Charita as Bhuti Varman. As a matter of fact, in line 51 of the Nidhanpur inscription itself Mahabhuta Varman is referred to as Bhuti Varman. Evidently he was popularly known as Bhuti Varman.

See also

• Varman Dynasty
• Pala Dynasty

References

Further reading