The Satavahanas and Ikshvakus

Andhra: Land and Early Identity

• Andhra was first the name of a people and later of their country, Andhradesa, centred on the Godavari and Krishna valleys.
• Older names include Andhrapatha, Andhramandala and Andhrabhumi.
• The Puranas call the Satavahanas Andhra, Andhrabhritya or Andhra-jatiya; the dynasty’s own records use Satavahana or Satakarni.
• The popular Trilinga (“three lingas”) explanation of the word Telugu is doubted by many scholars.

• Asmaka was the only one of the sixteen great states in South India; its capital Potana (Potali) is usually identified with Bodhan in Nizamabad district, Telangana.
• The Jatakas show Asmaka as a neighbour of Kalinga, whose capital was Dantapura.

Literary and Foreign Sources

• The Puranas were compiled long after the events and disagree on numbers, so they give names and traditions rather than firm dates.
• The Matsya Purana is read as listing thirty kings over about 460 years, but manuscripts name only 17 to 19 kings with different totals.

Archaeological, Inscriptional and Numismatic Sources

Excavated sites show how people lived, built and traded, and they fix the places where kings and monasteries stood.

Notice that the Telangana sites lie on or near the Godavari, while Amaravati, Nagarjunakonda and Ghantasala cluster on the Krishna.

Source: Boundaries: Local Government Directory states layer (compiled by Datameet); rivers: India-WRIS. Site positions are village or town points from published coordinates. Peddabankur, Dhulikatta and Phanigiri are not plotted because reliable coordinates were not confirmed.

Inscriptions

• Ashoka’s edicts in the Rayalaseema region, at Yerragudi, Rajula Mandagiri and Jonnagiri, mark the Mauryan frontier in the south.
• The Bhattiprolu relic caskets carry an early Brahmi script; Bühler argued the writing is not later than about 200 BCE.
• Satavahana records come mostly from Maharashtra and Karnataka, while Ikshvaku records come from Nagarjunakonda, Phanigiri and nearby sites.

Coins

• Punch-marked coins are the oldest local currency; Kotilingala yielded hundreds of coins, including many punch-marked pieces.
• Lead, potin, copper and a few silver coins carry Satavahana names, and some bear the Ujjain symbol.
• The Jogalthembi hoard near Nashik held silver coins of Nahapana restruck by Gautamiputra Satakarni.
• Ship coins of Pulumavi and Yajna Sri point to sea trade; the Ikshvakus issued lead coins.

Early Political Developments

• Ashoka’s Rock Edict XIII lists the Andhras with the Bhojas, Pitinikas and Pulindas among peoples near his frontier who followed his Dhamma instruction.
• This places the Andhras within or beside Mauryan influence, though how firmly the Mauryas ruled the far south is not clear.
• After the Mauryas, Kalinga became independent and Kharavela of Kalinga recorded a campaign towards the west in the Hathigumpha inscription.

Origin and Name

• The dynasty’s own records use Satavahana and the royal title Satakarni; Andhra is the label used by the Puranas.
• The meaning of Satavahana is debated: “one with a swift horse”, a Sanskrit form meaning “driven by seven”, and a Munda-language derivation for “horse” and “son” have all been proposed.
• Kings took names from their mothers, such as Gautamiputra and Vasishthiputra; this is the matronymic custom.

Varna claims

• The Puranas call the founder a vrishala, meaning low-born.
• Gautamiputra’s Nasik record calls him ekabrahmana, read as “peerless Brahmana”, “protector of Brahmanas” or “champion of Brahmanism”.
• Mirashi and Raychaudhuri take the dynasty as Brahmana, while Sircar argues that they were non-Brahmanas who later claimed Brahmana rank.

Chronology

• The Puranas give about 30 kings and 450 to 460 years, but their numbers conflict, so modern work leans on inscriptions and coins.¹1The range runs from the Puranic reckoning (about 271 BCE) to D. C. Sircar’s date of about 30 BCE, which rests on the story of the Kanvas; the Kanaganahalli slab favours about 110 BCE.
• Inscriptions use the regnal year of a king, not a fixed era, so calendar dates are inferred from outside links such as the Junagadh record.

Important Rulers

Gautamiputra Satakarni, restorer of the dynasty

• His achievements are known from the Nasik Cave 3 prasasti, composed by his mother Gautami Balasri in year 19 of Pulumavi.
• Titles include Rajaraja (king of kings), ekabrahmana, khatiya-dapa-mana-madana (crusher of Kshatriya pride) and Tisamuda-toya-pita-vahana (whose horses drank the waters of three seas).
• The “three seas” title is a poetic claim; there is no evidence that he conquered the far south.
• The prasasti lists lands he claimed: Asika, Asaka, Mulaka, Suratha, Kukura, Aparanta, Anupa, Vidarbha and Akara-Avanti.
• It also says he “restored the glory of the Satavahana family” and stopped the mixing of the four varnas, a phrase that one scholar reads as “social disorder”.

• Gautamiputra’s year 18 Nasik grant calls him lord of Benakataka; scholars place Benakataka near Nasik or at Pauni in Bhandara district.
• Whether he held coastal Andhra and Telangana is debated, because no Satavahana records from there are known before Pulumavi.

Pulumavi and Yajna Sri

• Pulumavi has Nasik Cave 3 records of years 19 and 22 and a Karle record of year 7, and issued ship-type lead coins.
• His bilingual coins use Prakrit on one side and a Dravidian language on the other; scholars differ on whether it is Old Telugu or closer to Tamil.
• Yajna Sri Satakarni issued ship coins and silver coins modelled on Kshatrapa issues; many scholars credit him with recovering part of the west.
• Towards the end of his reign the Abhiras seized the Nasik region.

Territory, Capitals and Relations

Notice the line from the Konkan ports through the Naneghat pass to Paithan, and then across the Deccan to the Krishna valley.

Source: Present-day state boundaries are shown for orientation only and do not mark the extent of any kingdom. Boundaries: Local Government Directory states layer (compiled by Datameet); rivers: India-WRIS. Site positions are village or town points from published coordinates.

• The main early centres lay in the western Deccan: Pratishthana (Paithan) on the Godavari, and possibly Junnar before it.
• Dhanyakataka (Dharanikota near Amaravati) is a later centre in the east; whether Pulumavi ruled from there is debated.
• The Satavahana capital is described as shifting between the two regions, but the evidence for each phase is incomplete.

Decline

• After about 225 CE the realm broke into regional powers: a late Satavahana branch, the Abhiras in the west, the Ikshvakus in the Krishna valley, the Chutus at Banavasi and the Pallavas in the south-east.
• Feudatories rose when the central power weakened after Yajna Sri.

Administration

• The use of mahamatra in the early records suggests Mauryan influence on Satavahana administration.
• Scholars describe the state as less centralised than the Mauryan one, relying on feudatories and religious donors.

Land Grants

• Gautamiputra’s year 18 Nasik grant gave the Ajakalakiya field of 200 nivartanas (a land measure) to ascetics at Tiranhu hill; a year 24 order exchanged it for other land.
• Gautami Balasri gave the village Pisajipadaka to Bhadayaniya monks (Nasik Cave 3).
• Pulumavi exchanged the village Sudasana for Samalipada (year 22) and Maharathi Somadeva gave a village to the Valuraka community at Karle (year 7).

• The Naneghat record mentions villages given as sacrificial fees, but whether this is a land grant or a revenue grant is debated.
• So the Nasik year-18 grant is the safer example of the first clear royal grant with immunities.

Society and Women

• Matronymics (Gautamiputra, Vasishthiputra) show that a king’s mother held high status; the reason for the custom is not explained in the records.
• Gautamiputra boasted of stopping the mixing of varnas, yet he formed a marriage alliance with Rudradaman’s kin.
• Kings took several wives, and marriage within a group (endogamy) was common, unlike the Brahmanical ideal.

• Artisans and merchants also appear as donors: Ananda, foreman of the artisans of King Satakarni, at Sanchi, and Yavana (Greek) donors at Karle.
• Whether Gautami Balasri governed in her son’s late years is debated; Sircar thinks so and Mirashi rejects it.

Agriculture, Guilds and Coinage

• The Gaha Sattasai shows farming as the main livelihood of village life.
• Scholars suggest the growth of the Satavahana economy involved wider farming, forest clearance and water storage, though the evidence is indirect.
• Excavations at Kotilingala and Peddabankur found iron tools, beads and a forge, so crafts supported town life.

Inland and Overseas Trade

• The Naneghat pass linked the Konkan ports of Sopara and Kalyan with Paithan and Nasik.
• In the Periplus period (mid-1st century CE) Barygaza was ruled by Nambanus, usually identified with Nahapana, so the port was under the Kshatrapas, not the Satavahanas.
• On the east coast, Ptolemy’s Maisolia is the Masulipatnam region and Kantakossyla is often identified with Ghantasala.
• A wooden wharf at Dharanikota and Roman amphorae and glass show port trade there in the Satavahana age.

Religion

This section covers only what is specific to the Satavahanas; Chapter 4 compares religion, language, literature and art across all ancient Andhra dynasties.

• Buddhist patronage went to named schools such as the Bhadayaniya monks at Nasik; Karle is linked with the Mahasamghika school.
• Early Buddhist worship at Nasik was without images of the Buddha, which suits the older schools (often called Hinayana).
• The kings supported Vedic rites and Buddhist monasteries together; this is best described as patronage of both, not conversion.

Language and Literature

• Prakrit, a Middle Indo-Aryan language written in Brahmi, was the language of Satavahana inscriptions and coin legends.
• Sanskrit was rare; the Nasik cave record of Ushavadata is among the earliest uses of Sanskrit in western India, in a mixed form.
• Some Telugu and other Dravidian words appear in names and coin legends, but this does not show that Telugu was already a written literary language.

Art and Architecture

Stupa, chaitya and vihara

Notice that the ayaka platform with five pillars projects from the drum, as at Amaravati and Nagarjunakonda.

Source: Schematic; not to scale. Drawn for this chapter from standard descriptions of early Buddhist stupas.

Notice how the aisle path lets worshippers walk round the stupa at the rounded end.

Source: Schematic; not to scale. Drawn for this chapter from standard descriptions of rock-cut chaitya halls such as Karle.

Amaravati

• The Mahachaitya at Amaravati was probably founded in the Mauryan age, according to the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), which says it is believed to have been founded by the monk Mahadeva, an emissary of Ashoka; no inscription shows this.
• The earliest remains of the stupa belong to about the 2nd century BCE; railing slabs of limestone with Jataka scenes, the Buddha’s life and lotus medallions belong to the later phases.
• Ayaka platforms project at the four directions, each with five pillars; they are found at Amaravati, Bhattiprolu, Ghantasala and Nagarjunakonda.
• Colin Mackenzie visited Amaravati in 1797; sculptures were later taken to Madras (the Elliot Marbles) and some reached London in 1859.

Cave sites of the western Deccan

• Karle is dated by some to the closing years of the 1st century BCE and by others to the early 2nd century CE; a dedication of the first quarter of the 2nd century CE is recorded.
• Ajanta is not attributed to the Satavahanas by the ASI; its earliest caves belong to about the 2nd century BCE.

Contributions and Significance

Origin and Chronology

• The Andhra Ikshvakus, or Ikshvakus of Vijayapuri, ruled the lower Krishna valley from Vijayapuri, modern Nagarjunakonda, in the 3rd and 4th centuries CE.
• The name separates them from the legendary Ikshvakus of Kosala (Ayodhya), whose link to this dynasty is not known.
• They rose in the Krishna–Guntur region as Satavahana power faded; whether they began as Satavahana feudatories is debated.
• The Matsya Purana’s Sriparvatiya Andhras may be the same people, but scholars differ on whether Sriparvatiya was their own name.

• Satavahana coins of Pulumavi and Yajna Sri, and a record of Vijaya Satakarni (year 6), were found at the site, so Vijayapuri was already a town in the late Satavahana age.
• The Ikshvakus kept using the same style of lead coins.

The four rulers follow in a clear father-to-son order, even where calendar dates differ.²2The Phanigiri record of year 18 extends the last reign beyond the year 11 once known, so ranges that end the dynasty about 309 CE may be too early.

Rulers

Administration and Territory

• The core of the kingdom was the lower Krishna valley around Vijayapuri; records at Phanigiri in Telangana suggest wider influence.
• The state is described as a group of allied ruling families held together by marriage, not a tightly centralised empire.
• Titles in the records include Mahasenapati, Mahatalavara and Dandanayaka, and kings used the royal title maharaja.

• The Saka marriage may have helped against the Abhiras; this motive is an inference.
• A hoard of Saka coins found at Petluripalem near Vijayapuri supports contact with the Western Kshatrapas.

Society and Economy

• Virapurushadatta married three daughters of his father’s sisters, a form of cross-cousin marriage that kept power within a small circle of families.
• Succession passed from father to son, yet royal women were prominent donors in the records.
• Coins were mostly lead, in the Satavahana style, and a lead-coin hoard was found at Phanigiri (see Section 1.1).
• The Krishna river and the Ujjain alliance gave access to wider trade, and Roman gold coins are reported from Nagarjunakonda.

Decline

Religion

• The Ikshvaku kings followed Vedic and Brahmanical rites: Chamtamula I performed the Ashvamedha, and later records name other sacrifices.
• Temples on the site include those of Pushpabhadraswamin (a form of Shiva), Kartikeya and Ashtabhuja Narayana (Vishnu).
• Buddhism flourished through the patronage of royal women and lay donors, so the royal house supported both traditions.

• Records show contact with Sri Lanka: a Sihala vihara and an apsidal shrine built by the lay donor Bodhisiri for Sri Lankan monks.
• Claims that Nagarjunakonda influenced Sri Lankan Buddhism or script rest on a single source and are left out.

Royal Women as Patrons

• Women are prominent among the donors in the Nagarjunakonda records, while kings mostly appear in Vedic and political roles.
• A common pattern is that kings supported Brahmanical shrines and royal women supported Buddhist monuments.

Nagarjunakonda

• Konda means hill; the valley held more than a hundred ancient sites before the dam, and many monasteries and shrines stood on the plain and on the hill.³3Discovery and early excavation years differ slightly between accounts; the dam dates are firmer.
• The Mahachaitya had a wheel-shaped plan, with ayaka platforms and pillars at the four cardinal directions; it probably held a relic of the Buddha.

• Monuments were rebuilt on the hilltop and at Anupu, where a brick amphitheatre and two large monastic units were also found.
• The sculpture is a late phase of the Amaravati style, in carved limestone slabs; activity at Amaravati faded as Nagarjunakonda rose.

Other Centres and Cultural Contributions

• Early Nagarjunakonda records are in Prakrit in Brahmi script, while Sanskrit appears in later Ikshvaku-period records; the Phanigiri record mixes both.
• Telugu-looking words and names are reported in the Nagarjunakonda records, though they are scattered.

Significance

• Nagarjunakonda was among the largest Buddhist centres in South India, with many monasteries and several Buddhist schools.
• The Ikshvakus joined Vedic kingship with generous support for Buddhism through royal women.
• Their records show Sanskrit coming into use beside Prakrit, and include a copper-plate grant.
• The rescue of the valley is a landmark of salvage archaeology in India.

Comparison of the Two Dynasties

Chronological Sequence

Notice that the Gautamiputra bars sit nearly 50 years apart, and the Ikshvaku ranges overlap but end between 309 and 340 CE.

Source: Ranges as reported by the scholars named; bars show the span each scholar gives, not firm dates.

Contributions

Causes, Consequences and Significance

• Both dynasties show that land, trade and religion were tied together in early Andhra and the Deccan.
• Their sites and records are the base of the later Buddhist and Brahmanical history of the Telugu country.
• They also show a shift from Prakrit towards Sanskrit and from cave sites towards free-standing temples.

Look for the numbered points and say which river each site lies on or near before checking the answer table.

Source: Boundaries: Local Government Directory states layer (compiled by Datameet); rivers: India-WRIS. Site positions are village or town points from published coordinates.

1. Name the places numbered 1 to 11 on the map above.
2. Say which of them lie close to the Godavari and which to the Krishna.
3. State one thing each place shows about the Satavahanas or Ikshvakus.

• Read the chapter once, then test yourself with the recall checks straight after the first reading.
• Repeat the three memory aids the next day, then again after about a week.
• Review the Rapid Revision Sheet after about a month, and redo the map practice.

Notes

1. 1The range runs from the Puranic reckoning (about 271 BCE) to D. C. Sircar’s date of about 30 BCE, which rests on the story of the Kanvas; the Kanaganahalli slab favours about 110 BCE.
2. 2The Phanigiri record of year 18 extends the last reign beyond the year 11 once known, so ranges that end the dynasty about 309 CE may be too early.
3. 3Discovery and early excavation years differ slightly between accounts; the dam dates are firmer.