Gupta Empire
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The Gupta Empire (320 - 540 AD) was one of the largest political and military empires in ancient India. It was ruled by the Gupta dynasty from around 240 to 550 CE and covered most of northern India and what is now eastern Pakistan and Bangladesh. During this period it was considered a Great power. The period of this Jat Empire is considered to be the Golden period in the History of India.
The origins of the Guptas are shrouded in obscurity. Nothing certain is known about the rise of this dynasty. Only this much is known that a person named Srigupta took advantage of the confusion that prevailed in the country after the fall of Kushan Empire and declared himself the ruler of Magadha. Historians write that probably he belonged to a low caste but gradually rose to the position of an independent ruler. He was followed by his son Ghatotkacha. The most likely date for the reign of Srigupta is c. 240-280 CE His successor Ghatotkacha ruled probably from c. 280-319 CE In contrast to his successor, he is also referred to in inscriptions as 'Maharaja' .
At the beginning of the 4th century the Guptas established and ruled a few small Hindu kingdoms in Magadha and around modern-day Uttar Pradesh. Actual rise of the Gupta Empire started when Chandragupta I succeeded to the throne in 320 AD.
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Guptas were Jats of Dharan gotra
The Arya Manjushri Mul kalpa, is a history of India covering the period 700 BCE to 770 AD. The history was a Buddhist Mahayana work, by a Tibetan scholar, and was composed sometime in the 8th century CE.
K P Jayaswal brought this material out from above book in his eminently scholarly book :An Imperial history of India C 700 BC – C 770 AD. K P Jayaswal has spotted and brought out the fact that the second Guptas, (Chandra Gupta II, Samudra Gupta etc circa 200 BCE to 600 BCE) were Jats, who came originally form the Mathura area. They were of the “ Dharan” Gotra, as shown by the inscription of the Prabhadevi Plate, where she gives her father’s (and her) goth as Dharan. The Dharan Jats still can be found in the U.P Mathura region and they proudly point to their ancient glory, of how their forefathers ruled Hindustan.
According to him Gupta is said to have been a Mathura-Jata (Sanskrit- Jata-vamsa). Jata-vamsa, that is, Jata Dynasty stands for Jarta, that is, Jat. That the Guptas were Jat; we already have good reasons to hold (JBORS, XIX. p. 1U). His Vaisali mother is the Lichchhavi lady.
Here is produced point wise account from a famous historian K.P. Jayaswal's book, History of India, PP 115-16 :
- That nowhere Guptas disclose their origin or Caste status. That their caste sub-division was Dharan. Since Prabhavati Gupta daughter of Chandra Gupta II and queen of Rudrasen II Vakataka in her copper plate grant of Pune has shown sub-caste of her family (Gupta) as Dharan (EI XV-41 P-42).
- The Salvas were a branch of the Madras and were ruling at Sialkot. These Madras had a branch named Kuninda, who were related to Koliya Naga.
- Karaskars were thus a Punjabi people a sub-division of the Madras. We know that the Madras were Vahikas and Jartas. This community, thus, consisted of several sub-divisions.
- Since according to grammatical illustration of Chandra-gomin the Jarta defeated the Huns, which means Skanda Gupta defeated the Huns. Hence Guptas were Jartas or Jat.
Bhim Singh Dahiya has proved by applying “Grimm’s Law of Variation” that in Indo-European languages the alphabet “J” changes to “G”. Due to this law the Chinese call Jats as “Getae” and Germans call them “Got”, “Gaut” or “Goth”. The Proto-Germanic name Gaut changes to Gupt as under:
Gapt is considered to be a corruption of Gaut (Gaut→Gavt→Gaft→Gapt, cf. eftir and eptir, "after" in Old Norse). Gapt changed to Gupt in India.
When Chandragupta II, Vikramaditya married his daughter with a Vakataka prince he called tribe as "Dharan" which is a gotra of Jats even today. Skandagupta has written in an inscription of Junagarh that Gupta is a title, which means soldier or a chief.
The first notice of this word 'Gupta' was taken by Panini in fifth century BC when two words are mentioned, viz., 'Goptri' and 'Gupti'. V S Agarwal in "India as known to Panini" defines 'Gupti' as 'defence' and 'Goptri' as the art of science of Military arrangements. On this basis the person who was incharge of defence was called 'Gupta' or 'Gopta'. Skandagupta wrote in his inscription that he had "appointed military governors in all provinces" (सर्वेषु देशेषु विधाय गोप्त्रीन) [1]
Thus we find that this word 'Gupta' means a military governor and used in this sense right from the fifth century BC to the 18th century AD and the so called 'Guptas' themselves used this word in the same sense. The mere fact that the word Gupta is a part and parcel of the names of the emperors, should not, and can not, give any other meaning to this word. If we give 'Gupta' the meaning of surname of the Vaishya caste, then even Chanakya will become a Vaishya because his name was Vishnugupta. Even the Mahabharata used this word 'Gupta' in the sense of military defence. [2]
While illustrating the use of a tense, grammarian Chandragomin mentions in sanskrit language अजय जर्टो हुणान - Ajay Jarto Hunan meaning "the invincible Jats defeated the Hunas". He was a contemporary of the event and we know from history that 'Guptas' were the only people who defeated Hunas. This has been rightly taken as proof that so called 'Guptas' were Jats. [3]
Majumdar and Atlekar mention the fact that at the time of marriage of Prabhavati Gupta, daughter of Chandragupta II, the name of their gotra was given as Dharan. The Poona plate of Prabhavati Gupta herself gives the gotra as Dharan. This has been identified with the still existing Dharan clan of Jats of Bikaner and the adjoining districts of the Punjab. [4], [5]
Hence Bhim Singh Dahiya concludes that Guptas were Jats.
Chandragupta (320 - 335 AD)
Ghatotkacha (c. 280–319) CE, had a son named Chandragupta. In a breakthrough deal, Chandragupta was married to Kumaradevi, a Lichchhavi—the main power in Magadha. With a dowry of the kingdom of Magadha (capital Pataliputra) and an alliance with the Lichchhavis, Chandragupta set about expanding his power, conquering much of Magadha, Prayaga and Saketa. He established a realm stretching from the Ganga River (Ganges River) to Prayaga (modern-day Allahabad) by 320. Chandragupta was the first of the Guptas to be referred to as 'Maharajadhiraja' or 'King of Kings'.
Samudragupta (335 - 375 AD)
Chandragupta died in 335 and was succeeded by his son Samudragupta, a tireless conqueror. He took the kingdoms of Shichchhatra and Padmavati early in his reign. He then took the Kingdom of Kota and attacked the tribes in Malavas, the Yaudheyas, the Arjunayanas, the Madras and the Abhiras. By his death in 380, he had incorporated over twenty kingdoms into his realm, his rule extended from the Himalayas to the river Narmada and from the Brahmaputra to the Yamuna. He gave himself the titles King of Kings and World Monarch. He performed Ashwamedha yajna (horse sacrifice) to underline the importance of his conquest.
Samduragupta was not only a warrior but also a great patron of art and literature. The important scholars present in his court were Harishena, Vasubandhu and Asanga. He was a poet and musician himself. He was a firm believer in Hinduism and is known to have worshipped Lord Vishnu. He was considerate of other religions and allowed Sri Lanka's Buddhist king to build a monastery at Bodh Gaya.
He was succeeded by his son Ramagupta, who was captured by the Saka Satraps (Kshatrapas) and was soon succeeded by his brother Chandragupta II.
Chandragupta II (380- 414 AD)
Chandragupta II, the Sun of Power (Vikramaditya), ruled until 413. It is said that his reign was preceded by a five year rule of his elder brother Ramgupta (375-380 AD), who suffered humiliting defeat at the hands of the Saka rulers.. It forced Chandragupta to set aside his brother and capture the reign of the empire in his own hands in 380 AD. Chandragupta ruled for a period of about 34-35 years from 380 AD to 415 AD. He married his daughter Prabhavatigupta to Rudrasena II, the Vakataka king of Deccan, and gained a valuable ally. Only marginally less war-like than his father, he expanded his realm westwards, defeating the Saka Western Kshatrapas of Malwa, Gujarat and Saurashtra in a campaign lasting until 409, but with his main opponent Rudrasimha III defeated by 395, and crushing the Bengal (Vanga) chiefdoms. This extended his control from coast-to-coast, established a second (trading) capital at Ujjain and was the high point of the empire.
Despite the creation of the empire through war, the reign is remembered for its very influential style of Hindu art, literature, culture and science, especially during the reign of Chandra Gupta II. Some excellent works of Hindu art such as the panels at the Dashavatara Temple in Deogarh serve to illustrate the magnificence of Gupta art. Above all it was the synthesis of the sacred and sensual elements that gave Gupta art its distinctive flavour. During this period, the Guptas were supportive of thriving Buddhist and Jain cultures as well, and for this reason there is also a long history of non-Hindu Gupta period art. In particular, Gupta period Buddhist art was to be influential in most of East and Southeast Asia. Much of advances was recorded by the Chinese scholar and traveller Fa-hsien in his diary and published afterwards.
The court of Chandragupta was made even more illustrious by the fact that it was graced by the navaratna, a group of nine who excelled in the literary arts. Amongst these men was the immortal Kalidasa whose works dwarfed the works of many other literary geniuses, not only in his own age but in the ages to come. Kalidasa was particularly known for his fine exploitation of the sringara (erotic) element in his verse.
Kumaragupta I (414 - 455 AD)
Chandragupta II was succeeded by his son Kumaragupta I. Known as the Mahendraditya, he ruled until 455. Towards the end of his reign a tribe in the Narmada valley, the Pushyamitras, rose in power to threaten the empire.
Skandagupta (455 - 467 AD)
Skandagupta is generally considered the last of the great rulers. He defeated the Pushyamitra threat, but then was faced with invading Hephthalites or "White Huns", known in India as Indo-Hephthalites or Hunas, from the northwest. He repulsed a Huna attack c. 455, But the expense of the wars drained the empire's resources and contributed to its decline. Skandagupta died in 467 and was succeeded by his son Narasimhagupta Baladitya.
Narasimhagupta (467-473 AD)
Narasimhagupta (467-473) was followed by Kumaragupta II (473-476) and Buddhagupta (476-495?). In the 480's the Hephthalite king Toramana broke through the Gupta defenses in the northwest, and much of the empire was overrun by the Hunas by 500. The empire disintegrated under the attacks of Toramana and his successor, Mihirakula; the Hunas conquered several provinces of the empire, including Malwa, Gujarat, and Thanesar, broke away under the rule of local dynasties. It appears from inscriptions that the Guptas, although their power was much diminished, continued to resist the Hunas, and allied with the independent kingdoms to drive the Hunas from most of northern India by the 530's. The succession of the sixth-century Guptas is not entirely clear, but the last recognized ruler of the dynasty's main line was Vishnugupta, reigning from 540 to 550.
The Guptas of Magadha
A minor line of the Gupta clan continued to rule Magadha after the disintegration of the empire. These Guptas were ultimately ousted by the king Harshavardhana, who established an empire in the first half of the seventh century that, for a brief time, rivalled that of the Guptas in extent.
References
- Bhim Singh Dahiya : Jats the Ancient Rulers, Dahinam Publishers, Sonepat, Haryana
- K P Jayaswal : An Imperial history of India C 700 BC – C 770 AD, published by Eastern book House, Patliputra Path, Rajendra Nagar, Patna, Bihar, a reprinted by Brite printers, 27 new Rohtak Road New Delhi.
- R N Kundra & SS Bawa, History of Ancient and Medieval India
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