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INTRODUCTION
105
Uddyotana refers to a contemporary king Vatsarāja (whom he calls raņahatthi) who crushed the frowny soldiers of the enemy and who was a source of joy to his own people. The word jaïyā only shows that Vatsarāja was the king at that time; Jalor was possibly a part of his territory; and it cannot be inferred, without additional evidence, that he was ruling at Jalor.
This title, rana-hastin, of Vatsarāja is quite important. Some nine coins bearing the Brāhmi legend Sri Ranahastin have come to light. One was found in Kana uj; one was discovered in Rajasthan; five of unknown locality, now in the Indian Museum, Calcutta; one obtained from somewhere in Saurashtra, and one more coming from Uttara Pradesh or Rajasthan. The characters appear post Gupta-Brāhmi. According to P. L. GUPTA 'the characters are not earlier than eighth century A.D.' RAPSON suggested once that this ruler is identical with Mahārāja Hastin of the Parivrājaka family. Dr. DASHARATH SHARMA has already suggested that this Raņahastin is the same as Vatsarāja who is qualified with the adjective Ranahastin by Uddyotana. This identification is accepted as quite plausible by P. L. GUPTA. The provenance of the coins points to Vatsarāja having ruled in the West.
King Dhruva of the Rāstrakūta dynasty prided himself on his defeat of Vatsarāja whom he made to enter upon the path of misfortune in the centre of the desert of Maru. He despoiled Vatsarāja of two white umbrellas taken by him from the king of Gauda, perhaps Gopāla, who had suffered defeat at the hands of Vatsarāja, the Gurjara king of Bhinmāl. There is no doubt that Uddyotana is referring to this Vatsarāja in A.D. 779. Five years later, in Saka 705 (c. 783-4), when Jinasena completed his Harivassa at Vardhamāna-pura,"
1 Journal of the Numismatic Society of India, XVI. 282-3, XVIII. 222-3 and XX. 189-91, Bombay 1954-58.
2 V. A. SMITH: The Early History of India (4th ed.), pp. 413, 445, Oxford 1957. For more details about Vatsarāja, B. N. PURI: The History of the Gurjara-Pratihāras. Bombay 1957. D. SHARMA: Rajasthan through the Ages, pp. 124 ff., Bikaner 1966.
3 Seeing that the earlier expressions are in the Acc. sing. (uttarām, daksinām, pārvām and aparām), the Saurāņām adhimandalam is quite in order, and need not be amended into Loc. sing. -adhimandale as some scholars seem to propose. Both the editions of the Harivamsa (Manikachandra D. J. Granthamālā, Bombay 1930 and Bhāratiya Jñānapītha, Varanasi 1962) have the form in Acc. sing.
4 The identification of Vardhamāna-pura has become a matter of controversy which is linked with the interpretation of the famous verse from the Harivansa of Jinasena on which the scholars have differed. After much thought and studying respectfully the views of my predecessors (For my earlier observations, see Brhat-Kathākoša, Bombay 1943, Intro. pp. 121 ff.), I would understand the verse as noted above. Jinasena, in my opinion, is speaking in general and noting the directions without any particular locality in view. He has in view four rulers in the four directions in general: Indrāyudha in the North; Srivallabha, the son of Krishộa in the South; the king of Avanti in the East; and the king Vatsarāja in the West. Some have taken Avanti-bhūbhrt, -rāja or -nātha as the name of the king himself, and parallels can be quoted from literature (For instance, Raghuvamsa, VI 32: Avantinātho'yamudagrabāhuḥ etc.). Or politically it was a period of instability, and no outstanding ruler could be specified. * Jinasena does not stop here, but goes on further to add that Sauramandala was ruled by Jaya Varāha. The reason why he is not satisfied by merely mentioning four rulers in foạr directions
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