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542 POLITICAL HISTORY OF ANCIENT INDIA
Now as Vyāghra of the Nāchnä and Ganj records acknowedges the supremacy of the Vākāțaka Prithivisheņa, this Prithivisheņa can only be Prithivisheņa I, who ruled before the establishment of the Gupta supremacy in Central India by Samudra Gupta and Chandra Gupta II" and not Prithivisheņa II during whose rule the Guptas, and not the Vākāțakas, were apparently the acknowledged suzerains of the Central Provinces as we learn from the records of the Parivrājaka Mahārājas:?
The absence of any clear reference to Prithivishena I in Harisbeņa's Prašasti is explained by the fact that Samudra Gupta's operations were actually confined to the eastern part of Trans-Vindhyan India. There is no reliable evidence that the Gupta conqueror carried his arms to the central and western parts of the Deccan proper, i.e., the territory ruled by Prithivisheņa I himself. Professor Dubreuil has shown that the identification of Devarāshtra with Mahārāshtra and of Erandapalla with Erandol in Khandesh is probably wrong.
Though Samudra Gupta did not invade the Western Deccan it is clear from his Era Inscription that he did deprive the Vākātakas of their possessions in Central India. These territories were not, however, directly governed by the Vākāțaka monarch, but were under a vassal prince. In the time of Prithivisheņa this prince was Vyāghra. We should naturally expect a conflict between the Vākāțaka feudatory and the Gupta
and with the modern Padampur near Amgaon in the Bhandārā District of the Central Provinces. IHQ., 1935, 299; Ep. Ind. xxii, 207 ff. The Basim grant implies control of a branch of the family over the part of Berar south of the Ajanta range.
1 The Eran and Udayagiri Inscriptions. For evidence of Palaeography see JRASB, xii. 2. 1946. 73.
2 Cf. Modern Review, April, 1921, p. 475. For Dubreuil's views, see Ind. Ant., June, 1926.
3 Cf. Modern Review, 1921, p. 457. -
