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524 POLITICAL HISTORY OF ANCIENT INDIA
under the Mahākshatrapa Rudradāman. The Amātyas Vishnupālita, Syāmaka, and Siva-skanda-datta successively governed the Āhāra or district of Govardhana (Nāsik) in the time of Gautamipntra Śātakarņi and Pulumāyi, while the neighbouring Ahāra of Māmāla (Poona District) was under an Amātya whose name ended in-Gupta. In the Far South, the chief officer of the Ahāra seems to have been called 'Vyūpļita.'1 The Janapadas, particularly those on vulnerable frontiers, were sometimes placed under the charge of military governors ( Strategos, Mahāsenāpati, Mahādandanāyaka, etc.). The Janapada of Sātavāhani-bāra was, for instance, under the Mahūsenapati Skandanāga. Part of Eastern Mālwa seems to have been governed by a Śakå Mahādandanāyaka shortly before its annexation by the Imperial Guptas and portions of the Indian borderland were governed by a line of Strategoi (Aspavarman, Sasa)3 under Azes and Gondophernes.
Desa, too, is often used as a synonym of Rūshtra or Janapada. It was under a Deśādhikrita, the Deshmukh of mediaeval times, an officer mentioned in the Hirahadagalli grant of Siva-Skanda-varman. The next smaller unit was apparently the Vishaya governed by the Vishayapati. 4 But sometimes even 'Vishaya' was used as a synonym of Deśa or Rāshtra, and there were cases in the Post-Gupta period of the use of the term to designate a larger area than a Rāshtra.5
The smallest administrative units were the villages called Grāma or Grāmāhāra, and the smaller towns or
1 Lüders, 1327. 1328. 2 Cf. the Myakadoni Inscription. .
3 For an amātya named Sasa, see the Kodavali Rock Inscription of the Sātavāhana king Siri Chamda Sāti or sāta (Ep. Ind, XVIII, 318).
4 929n (Lüders). 5 Fleet, CII, 32 n. 6 Lüders, Ins. No. 1195,
