The Great Gupta Empire
A.D. 308 TO A.D. 450
The curtain rises again upon a wedding; the wedding of Princess Kumari
Devi. Eight hundred years before, King Bimbi-sara of the Sesu-naga
dynasty had strengthened his hold on Magadha by marrying her
ancestress, a princess of that Lichchavi clan which for centuries has
held strong grip on a vast tract of country spreading far into the
Nepaul hills.
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This kingdom of the Lichchavis had given Bimbi-sara much trouble. It
was to check the inroads of the bold hill folk that he first built the
watch fort of Pataliputra, the modern Patna. Of the history of the
warlike clan during these long intervening years nothing is known; but
they must have kept their independence, for Princess Kumari Devi
(which, by the way, is tautological, since Kumari means princess, the
whole name therefore standing as Princess-Goddess) appears from the
obscure as a person of importance, apparently an heiress. Whether she
was the reigning princess history sayeth not; but it appears not
unlikely that this was the case, and that at the time the Lichchavis,
instead of being checked by, were in possession of, Pataliputra.
Be that as it may, the Goddess-Princess chose to marry one
Chandra-gupta, a mere local chief of whose father and grandfather only
the names have been preserved. Possibly he was good-looking; let us
hope so! From the character of his son, Samudra-gupta, it is
reasonable to suppose that he rose above the common herd of
princelings in both intelligence and accomplishments; though, on the
other hand, these might have been derived from the princess.
Scarcely, however; unless the fairy god-mother had worked hard, since
the bride's race warrants us in presupposing beauty. Even now, says a
contemporary witness, "the delicate features and brilliantly fair
complexion of the Lichchavi women are remarkable."
Anyhow, the immediate result of what must have been a love match was
the appearance for the first and last time in Indian History of a
veritable Prince Consort, who, though calling himself king, struck
coins which bore the name of his queen as well as his own, and whose
son claimed succession as the "son of the daughter of the Lichchavis."
Indeed, save as husband and father, Chandra-gupta, the first of the
Gupta race, has little claim on attention. After the fashion of Prince
Consorts, he is more or less of a figure-head, though the prospects of
his dynasty were considered sufficiently dignified and secure to
permit of his coronation date being made the beginning of yet another
of the many Indian eras; one which has, however, passed entirely out
of use.
Chandra-gupta seems to have died when still quite a young man, leaving
his son, apparently quite a boy, to reign in his stead.
A precocious stripling this Samudra-gupta, who was to fill the throne
of India as it has seldom been filled for more than half a century.
Possibly there may have been some interval of Regency with the
Queen-Mother at its back, but one of the most curious features in this
fifty-year-long reign, is that we know nothing of it from the words of
any historian, that we gather no allusion to it from any
contemporaneous literature. Our knowledge, which year by year
increases, comes from coins, from inscriptions; notably from a pillar
which now stands in the fort at Allahabad. Originally incised and set
up by Asoka six centuries earlier, Samudra-gupta's court panegyrist
has used its waste space for a record of his master's great deeds. A
quaint contrast; since these were chiefly bloody wars, and Asoka
everywhere was a peace propagandist.
In truth, Samudra-gupta appears to have been an Indian Alexander. What
he saw he coveted, what he coveted he conquered. From this same pillar
we learn that his empire included all India as far south as Malabar,
as far north as Assam and Nepaul. It was thus larger than any since
the days of Asoka, though the southward sweep of Samudra-gupta's
victorious armies cannot, in the nature of things, have been much more
than a raid. A campaign, involving fully 3,000 miles of marching,
which cannot have occupied less than three years, and the furthest
limit of which lands one more than 1,200 miles from one's base, must
be a mere march to victory and a retreat with spoils.
The record of this march is fairly complete. The courtly panegyrist's
stilted verses tell us in detail of Tiger-Kings subdued, of homage and
tribute; but, so far as this slight history is concerned, all we need
picture to ourselves is an apparently invincible hero, laden with loot
from all the treasures of the south.
With honour also, for he made many treaties with foreign powers.
One gives us a quaint picture of the time. The Buddhist king of Ceylon
sent two monks, one the king's brother, to visit the monastery which
pious King Asoka of olden days had built by the sacred Bo tree at
Bodh-Gya.
Now, India being at this time Brahmanical, the worthy brothers met
with scant courtesy, and on return complained that they had literally
found no place at the holy shrine wherein to lay their heads. The
Buddhist king, therefore, anxious to redress this anomaly, despatched
an embassy to Samudra-gupta, asking leave to found a rest-house for
the use of pious pilgrims, and sent with it rich jewels and gifts
galore. These were duly accepted by the Hindoo as tribute, and
gracious permission given. Whereupon the decision to build a special
monastery close to the sacred tree was duly engraved on a copper
plate, and, in due time, carried out by the erection of what was
described two centuries later by the Chinese pilgrim, Hiuen T'sang (to
whose literary labours we of to-day owe nearly all our knowledge of
India in these far ages), as having three stories, six halls, three
towers, and accommodation for a thousand monks,
"on which the utmost skill of the artist has been employed; the
ornamentation is in the richest colours, and the statue of Buddha is
cast of gold and silver, decorated with gems and precious stones."
Natheless this was the golden age of the Hindoo, not of the Buddhist,
and, imitating Push[^y]a-mitra, who overset the Buddhist Maurya
dynasty, Samudra-gupta determined to proclaim his supremacy by the
ancient Horse sacrifice. So once more the doomed charger, followed by
an army, set out on its wanderings for a year. This we know by reason
of a few rare coins bearing the effigy of the victim standing before
the altar, encircled by an explanatory legend, which have survived
time, to be discovered of late years. There is also a rudely-carven
stone horse now standing at the door of the Museum in Lucknow, which
some archaeologists label as belonging to Samudra-gupta's great
sacrifice.
But the coins of this king are somewhat lavish of information.
Several, which represent him playing on a lyre, remain a proof that
the court panegyrist was not a wholesale flatterer in counting him
musician. This, again, gives ground for belief that he was also, as is
claimed for him, a poet. That he took delight in patronising art of
all kinds is proved beyond doubt by the great number of eminent
men whose works date from the reign of Samudra-gupta, and his
son Chandra-gupta II., who, on his coronation, took the name of
Vikramaditya; the latter being, of course, the one associated in the
mind of every Hindu of to-day with the splendid renaissance of national
learning and art, on which they love to dwell. To them Vikramaditya is
synonymous with the zenith of Hindu glory; but it is open to doubt
whether the hero's father may not lay claim to a lion's share of the
record of great achievements. We know of a certainty that he was
sufficiently notable as musician to warrant his coins being stamped
with majesty in that role; his poet-laureate tells us of keen
intellect, love of study, and skill in argument. Is not this sufficient
to make us at any rate date the beginning of the Renaissance from the
days of Samudra-gupta?
Be that as it may, it is abundantly clear that in him we are dealing
with another of those rare kings, who are kings indeed by right of
their personal supremacy.
India is curiously fruitful in them, and, so far as we have come in
Indian history, their individualities stand forth all the stronger in
contrast with the mists and shadows which surround them. Bhishma,
Chandra-gupta, Asoka, Kanishka, Samudra-gupta--we gauge our admiring
interest by our desire to know what manner of men these were in
feature and form. But Fate, for the most part, denies us even the
scant suggestion of a rude coin. She does so here. Whether Samudra
inherited his mother's beauty is for the present an unanswerable
question. We do not know even the year of his passing, still
less the manner of it: the story goes on without a pause to
Chandra-gupta-Vikramaditya, his son, whose fame, until lately, quite
overwhelmed all memory of his father; that father who conquered India,
who allied himself with foreign powers, who made the subsequent
achievements of his son possible.
The question which besets us now is the extent to which
Chandra-gupta-Vikramaditya's fame is really his own; how much of it is
due to the fact that we possess of his reign and administration an
almost unique record in the account given of his travels and sojourn
in India by the Buddhist pilgrim from China, Fa-Hien? This gives us
information which fails us in the reigns of other kings. How much,
again, of this Vikramaditya's fame belongs by right to that other
mythical Vikramaditya of before-Christ days? That nameless king who
flits like a Will-o'-the-Wisp through the mists of early Indian
history?
How much, again, is rightfully due to his father--that striking
personality which historians have forgotten, but which now comes
surging through the shadows, a veritable man indeed?
Who can say? All we know is that the Gupta dynasty was a mighty one;
that it still serves the modern Hindu as a model of good government,
just as the Mahomedan still points with pride to Akbar's rule.
What, then, were the salient points of this beloved control? Judging
by Fa-Hien's account they may be summed up in personal liberty. The
subject was left largely to follow his own intentions, and the
criminal law was singularly lenient. This was rendered possible by the
wide acceptation amongst the masses of Buddha's gospel of good-will;
for although Brahmanical Hinduism had ousted Buddhist dogma, it had
scarcely touched its ethics. Capital punishment was unknown; there was
no need for an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. "Throughout the
country," we read, "no one kills any living thing."
An easy kingdom in good sooth to rule! According to our traveller, the
people seem to have vied with each other in virtue. All sorts of
charitable institutions existed, and the description of a free
hospital, endowed by benevolence, is worth quoting:--
"Hither come all poor or helpless patients suffering from every sort
of infirmity. They are well taken care of, and a doctor attends to
them, food and medicine being given according to their wants. Thus
they are made quite comfortable, and when they are well they may go
away."
Thus, once more, the East saw light sooner than the West; for the
first hospital in Europe only struggled into existence more than five
hundred years after this one at Magadha.
But the chief glory of the Gupta empire was its patronage of the arts
and sciences. Every pundit in India knows the verse which names the
"nine gems of Vikramaditya's court"; those learned men amongst whom
Kalidasa, the author of "Sakuntala" (so far as fame goes, the
Shakspeare of India), stood foremost. Poets, astronomers, grammarians,
physicians, helped to make up the nawa-ratani, as it is called, and
the extraordinary literary activity of the century and a quarter (from
A.D. 330 to 455), during which long period Samudra, Chandra, and his
son, Kumara, reigned, is most remarkable. The revival of Sanskrit, the
sacred language of the Brahmans, points to an upheaval of Hindu
religious thought, and so does the almost endless sacred literature,
which, still surviving, is referred to the golden age of the Guptas.
The Puranas in their present form, the metrical version of the Code of
Manu, some of the Dharm-shastras, and, in fact, most of the classical
Sanskrit literature, belong to this period.
Architecture was also revolutionised. As Buddhism slipped from the
grip of the people under pressure from the ever-growing power of the
Brahmans, the very forms of its sacred buildings gave way to something
which, more ornate, less self-evident, served to reflect the new and
elaborate pretensions of the priesthood. Mr Cunningham gives us
somewhere the seven characteristics of the Gupta style of
architecture; but it is more easily summed up for the average beholder
in the words "cucumber and gourd." These names serve well to recall
the tall, curved vimanas, or towers, exactly like two-thirds of a
cucumber stuck in the ground, and surmounted by a flat, gourd-like
"Amalika," so called because of its resemblance to the fruit of that
name.
That such buildings are interesting may be conceded, but that any one
can call the collection of pickle-bottles (for that is practically the
effect of them) at-let us say-Bhuvan-eshwar beautiful, passes
comprehension.
Exquisite they are in detail, perfect in the design and execution of
their ornamentation, but the form of these temples leaves much to be
desired. The flat blob at the top seems to crush down the vague
aspirings of the cucumber, which, even if unstopped, must ere long
have ended in an earthward curve again.
To return to history.
Chandra-gupta-Vikramaditya died in A.D. 413. His greatest military
achievement was the overthrow of the Saka dynasty in Kathiawar, and
the annexation of Malwa to the already enormous empire left him by his
father. In other ways we have large choice of prowess. All the tales
which linger to this day on the lips of India concerning Rajah
Bikra- or Vikra-majit are at our disposal.
Of his son Kumara we at present know little, save that he reigned
successfully for not less than forty years, keeping his kingdom
intact, remaining true to its traditions.
Perhaps some day his fame also will rise from its grave, and coin or
inscription may prove him true unit of the Great Trio of Gupta
emperors. This much we may guess: he was his grandmother's darling,
for he bears her name in masculine dress.