History The Imperial Guptas

The Imperial Guptas
Ashoka’s death left a vacu-um in India for the next 600
years, during which, several
foreign tribes overran India.
With the ascent of the Gupta
power, the northern States were
merged into a single empire.
This national revival yielded an
excellent administration and
trade, all-round development
with prevailing order and

peace. The tax-burden was low
compared to the Mauryan rule
and the State provided for safe
roads for trade. The period saw
the revival of religion, sanskrit
literature, art and architecture
too.
1. After the Mauryas,
the two main powers were
the Satavahanas in the Dec-can and the Kushanas in the
north. They carried on brisk
trade with the Roman
empire. These powers were
replaced in the middle of the
3rd century A.D. by the Gup-tas.  The Guptas were
Vaishyas by caste and fol-lowed Vaishnavism.
2. The main centres of
Gupta activity were Magad-ha (Pataliputra), Prayag
(Allahabad), Ujjain (M.P.,
considered as their second
capital), Saket (Ayodhya,
U.P.), and Sarnath (Benaras,
Varanasi, U.P.).
3. Sri Gupta and his son
Ghatotkacha Gupta were the
first definite rulers of this
dynasty, who also used the
term ‘Maharaja’. However,
no definite place is assigned
to them over which they
ruled.
4. Chandragupta-I is
considered “real founder”.
He started the Gupta Era
(320 A.D.). His marriage
alliance with the Licchavi
(North Bihar) princess
Kumaradevi enhanced his
status and he ruled over
Oudh, Magadh and Prayag.
5. Samudra Gupta’s
campaigns have been men-tioned by his court poet
Harisena in the  Prayag
Prasasti, which is a valuable
source of information for the
various States, tribes and
their rulers. His victory over
the Nagas, Hunas,
Vakatakas, etc gave him the
title of “Indian Napoleon”
(for his conquests), especial-ly the Vakataka ruler
Pravarasena (of Berar, Dec-can) and Tamralipti (Bengal).
6. The Guptas were sec-ular rulers and offered reli-gious freedom to the society.
7. Chandra Gupta-II
(“Vikramaditya”) defeated
his elder brother Ramagupta
and the  Saka chief Basana,
because Ramagupta had
agreed to offer his wife
Dhruvadevi to save the
kingdom from Basana. To
strengthen his position fur-ther, he married his daugh-ter Prabhadevi, by his wife
Kuber Naga, to the Vakataka
king Rudrasena II.  The
Vakatakas helped him to end
the power of the Sakas of
Western India.
8. Vikramaditya is iden-tified with king Chandra of
the iron pillar inscription
near Qutab Minar, Delhi.
9. The reign of Vikrama-ditya also saw the visit of the
Chinese monk  Fahien,  who
wanted to secure some
copies of Buddhist manu-scripts from India.
10. Skanda Gupta is
famous for saving the
empire from the Huna tribe,
which had overran Asia and
Europe. They suffered a ter-rible defeat in India.
11. Skanda Gupta
appointed  Parnadatta as
governor to the Sakas at
Saurashtra. The famous
Junagarh rock inscription in
Girnar hills, Kathiawar, refer
to the repair of the embank-ment of the Sudarshan Lake
by Parnadatta and his son
Chakrapalita.
12. The last important
Gupta ruler was  Vishnu
Gupta.
13. Archaeological
sources of Gupta history are
available as  “prasastis”
(charters recording land
grants, etc). They are called
Tamra sasanas or Tamrapa-tras (copper plates).
14. Gupta coins were
first issued by Samudra
Gupta, as the golden
“Dinara”. He also issued
Chandragupta and Kumaradevi
type coins to commemorate his
father’s marriage to the Liccha-vi princess.
15. The first silver coins
were issued by Chandragup-ta-II, on imitation of the
western Satraps. Copper
coins were also issued.
16. Brahmanical faith,
which had been eclipsed for
long by the new sects of
Buddhism and Jainism,
achieved immense splen-dour under the Vaishnavite
Guptas,  who also encour-aged to revive use of Sans-krit.
17. Devi worship in var-ious forms achieved impor-tance during Gupta period.
Lakshmi was worshipped as
consort to Vishnu and Parvati
to Shiva.
18. Emergence of Bhakti
cult, stressing on worship,
devotion and love towards a
personal God, gained impor-tance during the Gupta
period.
19. Literature and intel-lectual progress also mani-fested unparalleled progress.
Sanskrit was honoured as
the State language.
20. Some important
scholars/works of the
period are:
( a ) Vishnusharma —
wrote  Panchatantra,  a col-lection of moral stories.
(b) Harisena—author of
Prayag (Allahabad) prasasti
(insciption)—gives account
of Samudragupta’s cam-paigns.
( c ) Vishakhadutta —
wrote Mudra Rakshas (on
Mauryas and Nandas) and
Devichandragupta (on
Chandragupta-II and Dhru-va Devi).
(d)  Shudraka—wrote
Mricchakatika (a drama on
a Brahmin merchant
Charudutt and a courtesan
Vasantsena, portrays city
life).
(e) Bharavi—epic poem
Kirtarjuneya (Arjuna and the
disguised hunter Shiva).
( f ) Dandin —Dasaku-557 ! JANUARY 2004 ! THE COMPETITION MASTER
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maracharita (stories of 10
princes).
(g) Subandhu—Vasav-datta (story of prince Kan-darpketu and princess
Vasavdatta).
(h) Banabhatta—a later
date writer—wrote  Har-shacharita and Kadambari—he
was court poet of Harsha
Vardhana.
(i) Amarsimha—a lexi-cographer—he wrote Ama-rakosa, he listed various
metals and alloys.
(j) Kamandaka—Nitis-ara (on Chandragupta-I’s
polity and administration)—
is parallel to Kautilya’s
Arthasastra.
(k) Puranas—religious
literature was made more
appealing. Puranas were
finally written down.
(l) Kalidasa—greatest
literary scholar—wrote the
dramas  Abhijnanasakuntalam
(Shakuntala), Vikramorvasiya,
Malvikagnimitra;  The epics
Raghuvamsa and  Kumara-sambhava; The poetries
Meghaduta and Ritusamhara.
21. Nalanda (Rajagriha,
Bihar) was founded by
Kumaragupta (A.D. 450) and
was famous for its tests.
There was free education. It
had 10,000 students, 1,500
teachers and 300 class-rooms, a big three-storeyed
library.  Huen Tsang who
came later, during Harsha,
studied here for five years.
Itsing (A.D. 675) records a
donation by Sri Gupta, for the
University.
22. Guptas started using
bricks for temples (E.g. Bhi-targaon temple, Kanpur). The
Dasavatara temple, dedicated
to Vishnu, at Deogarh, Jhansi
shows a transitory State from
flat roof temples to the
shikhara style.
23. In sculpture, purely
indigenous patterns were
adopted—instead of the
Kushana period Buddha
with shaven head, we have
the Buddha with curly hair
now, and transparent drap-ery was used along with var-ious  mudras  (postures).  The
main centres were Sarnath
(Benaras), Mathura, Patal-iputra (Patna).
24. Some famous sculp-tures of Gupta period are:
—The seated or  preach-ing Buddha,  giving his first
sermon, discovered in sand-stone, at Varanasi.
—The standing Buddha,
at Mathura, in red sand-stone.
—The great boar—as
Vishnu’s incarnation—Udai-giri caves.
25. The  art of painting
reached its zenith during the
Gupta period and is mani-fested at Bagh caves
(Gwalior, M.P.) and Ajanta
caves (Maharashtra).
26. Aryabhatta—math-ematician and astronomer of
Gupta period—wrote  Arya-bhattiya and Surya Sid-dhanta. He explained the
eclipses, shape of earth, its
rotation and revolution and
gave important results in
maths too.
27. Brahmagupta—of
Ujjain—had an observatory.
28. Varahmihir wrote
Jyotishsastra and Pancha sid-dhantika on astronomy.
29.  Vagabhatta—Physi-cian—wrote  Astangasangra-ha.
30. The central adminis-trative system of the Gupta
era comprised the
Mantri/Sachiv (modern Chief
Minister),  Bhatasvapati  (com-mander of infantry and cav-alry),  Kataka (commander of
elephants),  Dandapasadhi-karan (police chief),  Kumara-matyas and  Ayuktas (provin-cial heads).
31. Each province was
called bhukti and was under
such officials as uparikas, bho-jikas, goptas, rajasthaniyas, etc.
32.  The provinces were
divided into  vishyas, under
charge of  Vishyapatis. The
lowest division (village) was
under the  gramika (village
headman).
33. Land was properly
classified into  kshetra  (cul-tivable),  khila (wasteland),
donations for brahmins
(agrahara grants), donations
for religious purposes
(Devagrahara land grants)
and so on.
34. The land revenue
system was put in charge of
Dhruvadhikaranika. The
pustapala was an officer
especially appointed to
record various land transac-tions.
35. The receivers of land
grants had the right to enjoy
land revenue from the farm-ers. They could even punish
and try thieves.  Thus, there
was serfdom (forced work) and
oppression of the peasantry.
36.  A number of taxes
had to be paid to the king.
These were: Bhaga (1/6th of
produce).  Bhoga (taxes in
kind fruits, wood, flowers,
etc.).  Kara (periodic tax on
farmers).  Uparikara (extra
taxes).  Udianga (probably
water tax).  Sulka (modern
customs tax).  Klipta and
Upaklipta (purchase and
sales taxes).
37. There were two
classes of merchants—set-tled  (sresthi) and caravan
traders  (Sarthavaha).  The
group of merchants called as
“puga” constituted the advi-sory council in cities. Its
president was the  Nagar-sresthi. Town mayor was
called Purupala.
38.  The Guptas spread
Indian culture to the S.E.
Asian countries, especially
Mahayana Buddhism and
Hinduism.
39.  The  Srenis (traders
unions or guilds) had
immense powers. Not only
did they perform economic
functions but also judicial
and executive ones. Some of
them even issued seals and
coins and had their own
militia (called  Srenibala, in
the Kalachuri inscriptions).
40.  Narada and Brihas-pati smritis  lay down the
rules for merchants. The nor-mal rate of interest was 15%
per annum.
41.  The most important
metal of the Gupta age was
iron.
42. The blacksmith
acquired the second most
important place in the vil-lage economy. The iron pillar
(of Chandra Gupta-II) is a
fine example of iron workers
of Gupta period.
43. The term golden age
can be applied mainly for
the economically upper
classes, and that too in
Northern India only. Though
art and architecture flour-ished, it was confined as a
“State art”. There was  flour-ishing trade with the south-east, but, on the whole, there
was decline of trade centres
and towns. Sanskrit litera-ture, undoubtedly, made im-mense progress, but it was
more of a state language,
limited to the learned ones.
44.  The  caste-system
became rigid during this
period.  Manu, for instance,
had put several restrictions
on the woman and the  shu-dras.  In no way was the tax-burden on the common man
low. The flourishing mon-ey—economy during their
predecessors (Kushanas and
Satvahanas)—also slowly
broke down. Fahien men-tions use of “cowries”
(shells) as the “common
medium of exchange”, indi-cating shortage of coins.