गुप्त अभिलेख संग्रह (जे. एफ. फ्लीट - गुप्त सम्राटों एवं परवर्ती नरेशों के ऐतिहासिक पाषाण व ताम्रलेख)

12 CORPUS INSCRIPTIONUM INDICARUM, VOL. III.
to the Gupta era. I have shewn elsewhere¹ that Mihirakula's fifteenth year, which is
recorded in his Gwâlior inscription, must fall somewhere very close to A.D. 533-34, which
is the recorded date of Yaśôdharman ; and in all probability a year or two before it ; so
that we shall be very near the mark, if we select A.D. 515 for the commencement of his
career. If, then, the date on Tôramâṇa's coins is 52, and if we apply it as his regnal date,
about which there need be felt no special difficulty, Tôramâṇa's reign must have com-
menced, roughly, about A.D. 460. This falls very near the latest date, A.D. 466, that
we have for Skandagupta, who, up to A.D. 457-58, held the whole of Northern India, below
the Pañjâb, from Kâṭhiâwâḍ to the frontier of Nêpâl. And it was doubtless the death of
Skandagupta, that enabled the Hûṇas, who had been repulsed by him, to assume the
aggressive again, under the leadership of Tôramâṇa ; and, on this occasion, with such
success as to hold even Central India for a short time. This view is also in perfect
accordance with the statement of the Valabhî inscriptions,² that it was the founder of their
family, the Sênâpati Bhaṭârka ; with the date of about A.D. 500, who successfully
fought, in Kâṭhiâwâḍ, against the Maitrakas, i.e. the Mihiras, i.e. the particular family or
clan, among the Hûṇas, to which Tôramâṇa and Mihirakula belonged. If, on the other
hand, the date on Tôramâṇa's coins is 82, then it cannot be applied as a regnal date ; and,
though it must then run from the period at which his own branch of the Hûṇas rose to
power, it cannot be used to fix the commencement of his own accession. The general
outline of the history of the period, which I have briefly indicated above, would, however,
remain much the same.
To some time or other in this early period belongs the mysterious emperor Chandra,
of whom we have a posthumous record in the iron pillar inscription at Mêharaulî, No. 32,
page 139. I call him mysterious, because, though the inscription speaks of him as a
powerful supreme monarch, who conquered the whole of Northern India, from beyond
the river Indus down to the plains of Bengal, yet it makes no mention of his lineage, and
gives no clue by which we can determine exactly his period and surroundings. All that
we know for certain, is, that his inscription belongs, on palæographical grounds, to a
fairly early date. In the palæography of it, there is, in fact, no real obstacle to our
allotting it to Chandragupta I., the first paramount sovereign in the Early Gupta family ;
and the only objection that I can see, is, that it contains no reference to the Indo-Scythi-
an kings, unless they are here called Vâhlikas, by overthrowing whom Chandragupta I.
must have established the power of his own family. But there is an interesting point in
the fact that the name of the village at which this inscription stands, viz. Mêharaulî or
Mêṁharaulî, is an evident corruption of Mihirapurî, 'the city of the Sun, or of the Mihiras.'
Mihira, as a proper name, is a Saṁskṛitised form of the name of the family, clan, or tribe
among the Hûṇas, to which belonged Mihirakula and his father Tôramâṇa. And it is not

---

¹ Ind. Ant. Vol. XV. p. 252.
² See page 167, and note 11.