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No. 11.1 GH GRAHATI COPPER-PHATE INSCRIPTION OF SAMACHARA-DEVA. 81
(2) Samåchåra must, on paleographic grounds, be placed earlier than Sasanka in chronology; also because there is no place for Samachara in chronology after Sasanka whose immediate Successors in Eastern India were tirst Harsha and then Aditya-Sena and his descendants.
(3) He was a devout Suiva. The continuance of the Bull Symbol by Sasanka, as well as the facts (a) that the Räjalilà coin was found with a coin of Sasanka, (b) that Sasanka's lineage and parentage have never yet been satisfactorily established, make it almost certain that Samachara was a predecessor of Saśžáka in the kingdom of Gauda and of the same lineago, perhaps his father.
(4) The Räjalilá coin may be later than the other coin, as it shows a distinctly greater change from the almost conventional type of the latter.
Two other kings stand connected with Samachara-dēva, viz. Maharajadhiraja Dharmmiditya and Maharajadhiraja Gopa-Chandra of the Faridpur plates published by Yr. Pargiter. In order, therefore, to locate the position of these kings in the chronology of the country, it is necessary to clear up, if possible, some doubtful points in the chronology of the Gupta kings and their successors during the sixth century A.D. The publication by Prof. Basak of the five plates of the Gupta kings Kumara-Gapta, Budha-Gupta and Bhanu (?)-Gupta (Above, Vol. xv., No. 7) has given all students interested, the opportunity of rediscussing the matter.
The evidence of the Bharsar hoard (Allan, Gupt. Coins, Intro., li), in which coins of Samudra-Gupta, Chandra-Gupta II, Kumara-Gupta I, Skanda-Gupta and Prakasaditya were found buried together, made possible the natural deduction that Prakásiditya succeeded Skanda-Gupta and the hoard was buried in Prakasaditya's reign. No one has yet succeeded in solving the problem who this Prakāśaditya was, and the purity of gold in his gold coins has been a puzzle. It may be now accepted that Kumara-Gupta II was the son and successor of Skanda-Gupta and so we must see if he can be connected with the coins bearing the legend Prakā aditya. These coins are all of the horseman' type and the letter which signifies the king's name on the obverse has been taken to be an otherwise inexplicable Ru (Allan, pp. 135-36, Plate XXII, Nos. 1-6). I think, however, that this reading will have to be revised. The letter on coin No. 1 is almost certainly Ku, the matrā or the top horizontal line being very prominent, though unfortunately mixed up with a band hanging from the saddle of the horse. On coins Nos. 3 and 4, this letter is indistinct, while on coins 2 and 6 the letter certainly looks like ru. The letter on coin No. 5 has been made in one stroke, thus * and it is hardly possible to read it as ru. This, I think, will have to be taken as K16, and the letters on Nos. 2 and 6 also as Ku, executed as badly as the horse and the horseman on the coins are.
Several scholars have attempted to identify this Kumara-Gupta with Kumăra-Gupta. the son and successor of Narasimha-Gupta, and to thrust in the reigns of Nara and Pura between G.E. 148=467 A.D., the last known date of Skanda-Gupta, and G.E. 154=473 A.D., the first known date of Kumāra-Gupta. By this arrangement, Budha and Bhanu are to be placed after Pura, Nara and Kumāra. This is a rather risky proposal. There is no certainty that 467 A.D. is the last date of Skanda. Similarly 473 A.D. may not be the first date of Kumāra. If these two dates approach each other by even one year, Pura and Nara have barely four years left between them. The find of coins, which presupposes their currency in a locality, is more or less & sure measure of the importance and duration of the reign of kings represented by them and the extent of their kingdom. The British Museum Catalogue describes 12 coins and the Indian Museum Catalogue 6 coins of Nara; 4 and 3 coins respectively of Pura are described in the British Museum Oatalogue and in the Lucknow Museum Catalogue. I have seen a number of coins of Nara in the Nåhär Collections of Calcutta and in the collection of the Vangiya Sahitya Parishat of Calcutta. Sonte more coins of Nars are to be found in the possession of Rai Mrityunjay Choudhuri Bahadur of Rangpar. To escribe a reign of only two or three years
