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97
No. 17)
COPPER COIN OF HARIGUPTA Reverse: The bird Garuda (the emblem of the Guptas) standing, facing, with outspread
wings (without human arms with bracelets as seen on the first variety of these copper
coins); legend below the above reading Mahārāja-eri-Chandraguptah in one line. The size of the coins is about three quarters of an inch and weight between 36-5 and 101-5 grains. On the coin under study, the obverse does not clearly show the parasol in the hands of the attendant and the proper right side of the bird on the reverse is blurred, while the legend beneath the bird reads Mahārāja-sri-Hariguptasya in two lines in characters similar to those of the legend on the Ahichchhatrā coin. The size of our coin is 85 inch and its weight 49 grains, although its exact findspot seems to be unknown. We have no doubt that the same Mahārāja Harigupta also issued the Ahichchhatră coin, even though Allan doubted the reading of the name on it.
An inscription on a bronze image found in the ruins of Dhaneswar Kherà in the village of Ichchhāwar or Nichchāwar in the Banda District, U. P., was published by Smith and Hoey as early as 1895, although they could not decipher the record satisfactorily. The correct reading of this record in two lines is as follows
1 Dava-dharmmyasni*] Gupta-vanso(vams-5)dita-eri-Harirajasya ra(rä)jni-Mahādēvyä[b]
[l*] yad attra punya[m*] tad-bhavatu
2 sa[rvva]-sa[tvā(tivā)nā][m] māta(tā)-pitsi-pū[rvva]ngama(mē)na anuttara-pada-jñāna(n-ā).
vāptayē [l*]* It seems that the ruins of Dhanesar Khera referred to above represent the site of the headquaters of Harirāja mentioned in the inscription. We know that, about the fifth century A.D., the title Mahārāja was enjoyed by the subordinates and feudatories of the Gupta Mahārājādhirājas.: Our Harirāja, called Mahārāja in the legend on his coins, thus appears to have been a subordinate of the contemporary Gupta emperor. The first question now is: if Hariraja belonged to the Imperial Gupta family, why was he called Harirāja and rot Harigupta ? We know that from the assumption of imperial status by Chandragupta I about 320 A.D., his descendants assumed names ending in the word gupta. But we also know that the second name of Chandragupta II is sometimes quoted as both Dēvagupta and Devarāja. Thus mere mention of the ruler'a name as Harirāja instead of Harigupta does not prove anything. The second question to be answered then is : if Hariraja-Harigupta was a gcion of the Imperial Gupta family even from his mother's side, why is his family relationship with the contemporary Gupta emperor not specified in the inscription? The answer to this seems to be that the relationship was not a very close one.
Thus, even if the problem of the Ichchhāwar inscription can be solved, the Ahichchhatra and Allahabad Museum coins offer yet another difficult problem. The king enjoyed the feudatory title Mahārāja and there is no doubt that he imitated a type of the copper coins of Chandragupta II. The question now is whether a subordinate ruler was allowed by his Gupta suzerain to issue coing of his own. This seems to be extremely doubtful in the present state of our knowledge. As we have already seen, Mahārāja Harigupta of the Ahichchhatra and Allahabad Museum coins cannot be assigned to an age earlier than the expansion of Gupta supremacy in Malwa and Central India since he certainly imitated one of the types of the copper coins issued by Chandragupta II, the obverse design of which was itself a copy of the well-known Chhatra type of the same monarch's
1 JASB, Vol. LXIV, 1895, Part I, pp. 159 ff. and flate. • See JOR, Vol. XVIII, 1949, pp. 185 ff.
Cf. IHQ, Vol. XXII, pp. 64-65. Select Inscriptions, pp. 273, 420.
