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32
THE CHRONOLOGICAL SYSTEMS OF GUJARAT
name?. The earliest date of C. E. 618 (380 A. C.) is not specifically expressed in the Gupta Era. Further there is no specification of the era in the earlier records of the imperial Guptas. They simply mention particular years of the era as belonging to a particular monarch or to his reignto. It was later specifically attributed to the Guptas.11 The word Gupta-Kala seems to have been used in the sense of the Gupta Era like Saka-Kāla.
After the decline of the imperial Guptas especially in Western India their feudatories, the Maitrakas of
7. This is indeed the nature of all eras developed from the regnal
reckoning of a ruler continued by his successors (IE., p. 284). 8. Mathurā Pillar Inscription of Candragupta II (SI., Book III.
No. 9). 9. D. C. Sircar, Si., Book III, No. 10-12 10. Ibid., No. 15, Bilsad Stone Inscription of Kumāragup'a I, G.E.
96 (A. C. 415-16) 11. Bhandarkar's List Nos. 1281, 1283, 1285 (Saranath Stone inscription of the Time of Kumāragupta dated 154 G.E.-473 A. C)
As regards the phrase Guptasya Käläd in the Junagadh rock inscription of Skandagupta, the controversy arises about its meaning. Bhau Daji interpreted it as 'from the era of the Guptas' (JBBRAS., Vol. VI, p. 207), while Fleet rejected this interpretation and stated that the era had not been established by the Guptas por had it acquired the technical name of the 'Gupta era' (CII, Vol. III, p. 20). In the same way there occurs the word 'Gaupte' in the Morbi grant of Jaika. But here also it is interpreted simply as a protector and we are not suppo ed to have a clear information about the Gupta Era (CII., Vol. III, p. 21).
But the term seems to have been used specifically in this sense in the records of the Gupta kings (R. B. Pandey. Indian Palaeography, Part I, p. 211) and the Saindhava Kings (El., Vol. XXVI, pp. 185 ff.).
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