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

THE GUPTA INSCRIPTIONS; INTRODUCTION. 33
Cunningham, who finally fixed on A.D. 166-67 as the epoch ;—and the late Sir E.
Clive Bayley, who selected A.D. 190-91.
Examination of the previous Theories.
Mr. Fergusson’s theory of A.D. 318-19 for the epoch of the era, and A.D. 319-20
for its commencement, is easily disposed of. It was wrong ; but by one year only. The
reason is, that, as has been said, his assumption,—based apparently on a sugges-
tion thrown out by Dr. Bhau Daji in 1864,—was, that the commencement of it was regu-
lated only by the completion of four of Jupiter’s Sixty-Year Cycles from the commence-
ment of the Śaka era, in order that there might be always an even and convenient
difference of two hundred and forty years between the Śaka and Gupta dates. This how-
ever, could be arranged only by applying the Sixty-Year Cycle as used now in Southern
India, where it is not in reality an astronomical cycle at all ; since there the cyclic years run
on in regular succession, without any adjustment of them to the motion of the planet, with
reference to his sign-passing or his heliacal rising, by the omission of a year on certain
occasions, and are taken as commencing and ending with the luni-solar years. According
to the present southern system, Śaka-Saṁvat 1 current (A.D. 78-79) was the Bahudhânya
saṁvatsara ; and Śaka-Saṁvat 241 current (A.D. 318-19) was again the same cyclic year,
Bahudhânya ; and, by this means, some justification might be found for Mr. Fergusson’s view.
But I shall shew hereafter that the real epoch of the Gupta era was A.D. 319-20, which
does not correspond to Saka-Saṁvat 241 current ; so that there was, in reality, a com-
pletion of four cycles and one year, even by the southern system ; and this, alone, is fatal to
they stand, that Śîlâchârya treated the Gupta and Śaka eras as identical, contain a mistake
of some kind or another, which must be attributed to a pedantic desire on his part to introduce a
mention of an era,—whether the Gupta or the Śaka, as the case may be,—with which he was only
imperfectly acquainted. And the mistake cannot be cleared away, unless we can obtain some inde-
pendent record of the real date of Śîlâchârya, sufficient to shew whether the Âchârâṅka was written
during Gupta-Saṁvat 772 to 798 expired (A.D. 1092 to 1118), or during Śaka-Saṁvat 772 to 798 expired
(A.D. 850 to 876). As to this, I can only say that the Śaka era was used so rarely, if at all, in Gujarât
and Kâṭhiâwâḍ, except by the Gujarât branch of the Râshṭrakûṭa family, that probably the Gupta era
gives the real date for Śîlâchârya. And I would throw out a suggestion that possibly some mistake of
the same kind may account for the dates, Śaka-Saṁvat 400 and 417, of the apparently spurious Umêtâ
and Ilâô grants of Dadda II. (Ind. Ant. Vol. VII. p. 61 ff. ; and Vol. XIII. p. 115 ff.).—The passages,
however, are of some interest, in shewing that, in Śîlâchârya's time, there was still a recollection of the
fact that the era,—which must have been known best from its use by the rulers of Valabhî, and which
came eventually, in Kâṭhiâwâḍ, to be called the Valabhî era,—was connected originally and specially
with the Gupta kings, by whom it was introduced into Kâṭhiâwâḍ a. d the neighbouring parts.—After
writing this note, which appeared originally in the Ind. Ant. Vol. XV. p. 188, I found an allusion by
Dr. Bhau Daji, in 1864, to what is evidently the same manuscript, though he quoted only the Gupta
date. He wrote (Jour. Bo. Br. R. As. Soc. Vol. VIII. p. 246) “I have a Jaina manuscript which is
dated in the 772nd year of the Guptakâla ; but unfortunately the corresponding Vikrama or Śâli-
vāhana’s year is not given ; nor is it possible at present to ascertain the exact date of the author
from other sources.”
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