The Chronology of the Sena Kings

·期刊原文
The Chronology of the Sena Kings

R.C.MAJUMDAR
JOURNAL OF THE ASIATIC SOCIETY OF BENGAL
VOL.17
1921
PP.7-16

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P.7

The chronology of the Sena kings has formed the
subject of a keen and protracted discussion for a
long time past. The earlier views on this very
important question possess at present but an academic
interest and have been summarised by Mr. N. Basu in
J.A.S.B. Vol. LXV, part I, pp. 16 ff. The
determination of the true epoch of the Lak.sma.nasena
era by Dr. Kielhorn(1) has placed the question on an
altogether new basis, and the theories that are at
present held on the subject may be broadly divided
into two classes.
1. That the initial date of the era, 1118-19 A.D,
is the date of the accession of Lak.sma.nasena, the
grandson of Vijayasena, the founder of the greatness
of the dynasty.
2. That Lak.sma.nasena ascended the throne long
after the initial date of the era which commemorates
either his birth or the accession of one of his
predecessors.
The date of Lak.sma.nasena is thus the crucial
point, and before we proceed further we must examine
the validity of the contention that the epoch of the
Lak.sma.nasena era must be the date of his accession.
Mr. R. D. Banerji, the staunchest and the most
consistent supporter of this theory states his case
in the following words(2): " None of the Indian eras,
now known, seem to have been started by one king and
adopted and renamed by any one of his successors."
The evident implication, of course, is that the era
which is associated with the name of Lak.sma.nasena
must have been started by him.
It is no use discussing the general principle
laid down by Mr. Banerji, for the truth of the matter
seems to be that the era was not started by any king
at all. Ke'savasena and Vi'svaruupasena were the last
kings of this dynasty, but their inscriptions are
dated in their regnal years and no reference is made
to any era. As a matter of fact not a single
instance of the official use of this era has been
discovered as yet and it seems to have been almost
unknown in the home provinces of the Senas. These
considerations are decidedly against the assumption
that the era was ever formally started by any king of
the Sena dynasty. It cannot thus be maintained, from
general considerations alone, that the initial date
of the era is the date of Lak.sms.nasena's accession.
_____________________________________________________

1. Ind. Ant., 1890, p. 1 ff.

2. J.A.S,B., Vol, IX, p. 277.

p.8

There are, however, two inscriptions of a king
A'sokacalladeva of Gayaa which have been relied upon
to prove that Lak.sma.nasena ceased to rule before
the year 51 of the era. It is, of course, evident
that if this conclusion is true, a very strong case
is made in favour of the view that the epoch of the
era is synchronous with the initial date of
Lak.sma.nasena.
A brief summary of these inscriptions together
with all the relevant points has been given by Mr
Banerji in his paper on Lak.sma.nasena (op. cit.).
The important points about them are the dates which
run as follows(1):--

(i) 'Sriimal-Lakhva.nasenasy=aatiita-raajye sa^m
51.
(ii) 'Sriimal-Lak.sma.nasena-deva-paadaanaam-ati-
ita-raajye-sa^m 74. Vai'saalja vadi 12 Gurau.

Dr. Kielhorn at first held, on the basis of the
word atiita prefixed to the word raajye, that
although the years were still counted from the
cominencement of the reign of Lak.sma.nasena, that
reign itself was a thing of the past.(2) This theory
was ultimately abandoned by Dr. Kielhorn,(3) but has
been re-stated by Mr. Banerji(4) and upheld by other
scholars.(5)
Before we discuss the true significance of the
expression atiita-raajye we shall point out the
hopelessly irreconcilable results that ensue if the
above view is accepted. Mr. Banerji says:--" We know
from the Bodh-Gayaa inscription of the 51st year of
the Lak.sma.nasena era, that Bodh-Gayaa and its
adjacent parts were in the possession of the Sena
kings. This is indicated by the use of the era of
Lak.sma.nesena, which could not have been used by a
king of a distant country like A'sokacalla of
Sapaadalak.sa, if Gayaa did not happen to be included
in the territory of the Senas. The Gayaa inscription
of V.S. 1232, on the other hand, shows that once the
country belonged to Govindapaala, but it had ceased
to do so in the 14th year of his reign. So one can
immediately infer that Gayaa and its adjacent parts
were wrested from Gocindapaala by one of the Sena
kings......... The Bodh-Gayaa inscription of La-Sa^m
74 proves that Gayaa and the country around it
continued in the possession of the Sena kings of
Bengal."(6)
It must be remembered in the first place, that
the expression denoting dates in the two Bodh-Gayaa
inscriptions is exactly similar a series of
expressions denoting dates with
_____________________________________________________

1. Ep. Ind. Xii, p. 27 ff. Mr. Banerji's text has
'raajya-sa^m' in both the records and the date as
72 in the last. ( Op. cit., p. 272 ). Evidently
hese are due to oversight.

2. Op. cit, p, 2, note 3.

3. Synchronistic List for Northern India, Ep. Ind.
Vol. VIII.

4. Op. cit.

5. Mr. S. Kumar in Ind.Ant., 1913, p. 185; Dr.
Hoernle in a private letter to Mr. Banerji
(Baa^nglaar Itihaasa, p. 304).

6. Op. cit, p. 280.

p.9

reference to Govindapaala. This will be quite evident
if we arrange below the dated portions of his
inscriptions, and the colophons of manuscripts
referring to his reign.'(1)
(i) 'sriimad-Govindapaaladevaanaa^m gata-raajye
Caturdda'sa-samvatsare.
(ii) 'Sriimad-Govindapaala-devasy=aaliita sa^mvat
18.
(iii) 'Sriimad-Govindapaala-devaanaa^m vina.s.ta-
raajye A.s.ta-tri^m-'sat-samvatasre.

No reasonable doubts can be entertained that all
these phrases are but different expressions for
denoting the same thing. Now the phrase used in No.
i, is almost identical with that of the two
Bodh-Gayaa inscriptions referred to above, and, in
any case, it is not permissible to attach different
interpretations to them. But this is exactly what Mr.
Banerji has done. He infers from the words atiita
raajye sa^mvat in the Bodh-Gavaa inscriptions that
Lak.sma.nasena had cessed to reign, although Gayaa
was still under the Sena kings; but in spite of the
expressions gata-raajye and atiita samvat used with
reference to the 14th and the 18th years of
Govindapaala, he holds that the latter reigned till
the 38th year, although there was a cessation of his
rule in those parts of the country in which the
expresion gata-raajye or atiita samvat was used with
reference to him! But let us examine the point a
little more closely. As the above extract will show,
Mr. Banerji holds:--
(i) That Govindepaala ruled over Gayaa sometime
between 1162 and 1175 A.D.
(ii) That the Bodh-Gayaa inscriptions show that
in the 51st year of the Lak'sma.nasena era,
Bodh-Gayaa and its adjacent parts were in the
possession of the Sena kings and that these
territories continued in the possession of the Sena
kings till the 74th year of that era.
As the years 51 and 74 of the Lak.sma.nasena era
would give us respectively the years 1180 and li83
A.D., it seems to he somewhat difficult to reconcile
the above two points.
Then there is another important question. If,as
Mr. Banerji holds, Lak.sma.nasena died before the
year 51 of his era, his sons must have been on the
throne between this date and the final conquest of
the territory round Gayaa by the Musulmans. How is
it, then, that not only in the two BodhGayaa
inscriptions of the years 51 and 74 A.D, but also in
a newly discovered inscription(2) of the 83rd year of
that era found in the neighbourhood, the name of
Lak.sma.nasenrt alone is invoked and not that of any
his successors? Again, what force is there in stating
that Lak.sma.nasena had ceased to reign, (assuming
the interpretation of Mr. Banerji to be
_____________________________________________________

1. Quoted in Mr. Banerji's article, op. cit, pp.
278-9.

2. J.B.O.R.S, 1918, p. 273.

p.10

correct). about forty years after that was an
accomplished fact? On the analogy of other
inscriptions dated, say in the Gupta or Kushan era,
we should expect the name of the reigning king with
the year of the era. We find for example the
expressions "Huvi.skasya sa^m 38, "(1) and
"'Srii-Kumaaraguptasya.... sa^mvatsare 96."(2) In
both these cases the name of the reigning king is
mentioned along with the years of the era founded by
his predecessor, and this seems to have been the
standard practice in ancient India.
These considerations raise grave doubts about the
correctness of the deduction that the epoch of the
Lak.sma.naeena era is the year of the accession of
that monarch. There are, however, positive evidences
which seem to demonstrate the impossibility of this
view.
The Deopaaraa inscription of Vijayasena(3) proves
that he was master of Varendra. Now the Manhali grant
of Madanapaala(4) shows that he occupied Varendra
till at least the eighth year of his reign, for he
made some land-grants in the Pu.n.dravardhana bhukti
in that year. It would thus follom that Vijayasena
must have ceased to reign after the eighth year of
Madanapaala, a conclusion which has been accepted by
Mr. Banerji in his latest writing on the subject.(5)
We can arrive at the upper limit of the date of
Madanapaala by counting the reign-periods of his
predecessors as far as Mahiipala X, one of whose
known dates is 1026 A.D. This will be quite
intelligible from the following table:-

Mahiipaala I .. .. 1026 A.D.
Nayapaala .. .. 15 years
Vigrahapala III .. .. 13 "
Mahiipaala II .. .. a. "
'Suurapaala II .. .. b "
Raamapaala .. .. 42 years
Kumaarapaala .. .. 4 "
Gopaala III .. .. c "
Madanapaala .. .. ..

It will be evident from the above table that
Madanapaala ascended the throne in 1100 + (a + b + c
+ d) A.D., these letters representing respectively
the unknown reign periods of Mahiipaala II,
Suurapaala II, and Gopaala III, and the excess of the
actual reign-periods of the rest over those known at
present. The initial date of Madanapaala's reign must
therefore fall some years, probably a good many
years, after 1100 A.D.
As we have seen above, Vijayasena must have
ceased to reign after the eighth year of Madanapaala.
His successor
_____________________________________________________

1. L乨er's List, No. 41.

2 Fleet's Gupta Inscriptions, No. 10.

3. Ep. Ind. Vol. I, p. 305.

4. J.A.S.B, 1900, p. 66.

5. Baa^nglaar Itihaasa, p. 284.

p.11

Ballaalasena could not therefore have come to the
throne till some years after 1108 A.D. As the Naihati
grant(1) of Ballaalasena is dated in the 11th year of
his reign, he must have ruled for at least 11 years,
and his son and successor Lak.sma.nasena could not
therefore begin to reign till some years after 1119
, A.D. It is thus obviously impossible that the epoch
of the Lak.sma.nasena era, viz. 1118-1119 A.D. is the
year of the accession of that monarch.
So far we have definitelly established two
important points, viz.:--
1. Neither the epoch of the Lak.sma.nasena era
nor the wordings used in connection with it
necessarily place the accession of that monarch in
1118-19 A.D.
2. There are positive evidences which show that
Lak.sma.nasena did not come to the throne till some
years, possibly a good many years, after 1118-19 A.D.
Having settled these preliminary points we are
now in a position to take into consideration such
other evidences as are expected to throw light on the
problem.
I. There are still extant two learned works
composed by Ballaalasena, viz. Daanasaagara and
Adbhutasaagara. Some manuscripts of these two works
contain verses denoting the time of their
composition.(2) Thus we have in some manuscripts of
Adbhutasaagara: --
(a) Bhuja-vasu-da'sa-1081-mita-'sake
'sriimad-Ballaalasena-raajy-aadau(3).
(b) 'Saake kha-nava-kh-endv=abde aarebhe
Abdhutasaagaram / Gau.dendra-Kunjar-aalaana-stambha-
vaahur=mahiipati.h //.(4)

Again we have in some manuscripts of
Daanasaagara:--
(c) Nikhila-cakra-tilaka-'sriimad-Ballaalasenena-
puur.ne / 'Sa'si-nava-da'sa-mite 'Sakavar.se
Daanasaagaro racita.h(5) //

The first of these extracts places the accession
of king Ballaalasena in or shortly before 1159
A.D.(6), while the second and the third refer the
composition of two of his works respect-
_____________________________________________________

1. Ep. Ind., Vol. XIV, p. 156.

2. Cf. the description of these works given by Mr.
Banerji, op.cit., pp. 274 ff.

3. This passage is not noticed by Mr. Banerji,
although it was pointed out as early as 1906 by
Mr. M. Chakravarty. (J.A.S.B. 1906, p. 17, note
1).

4. Bhendarker's Report on the search for Sanskrit
Manuacripts during 1887-88 and 1890-91, p. LXXXV.

5. J.A S.B. 1896, Part I, p. 23. Gau.daraajamaataa,
p. 61 footnote.

6. Mr. Manomohan Chakravarty op. cit. and following:
him Mr. Rameprasad Chanda (Gau.da-raaja-maalaa, p.
62) have taken the word aadau to mean the 'first
year, and thus placed the accession of
Ballaalasena in the year 1159 A.D. on the strength
of this verse. it appears to me, however, that the
word might as well mean the 'first part' and thus
the accession of Ballaalasena would be pieced in
or sometime before that date.

p.12

ively to 1168 and 1169 A.D. These three verses are
therefore perfectly consistent in themselves.(1)
Mr. R. D. Banerji, however, ignores their value
mainly on the two following grounds:--

(i) That the extracts (b) and (c) are not to be
found in all the available manuscripts of these two
works, and that they are therefore to be looked upon
as interpolations.
(ii) Even supposing that they are genuine,
evidence based on very modern copies of manuscripts
can hardly be put forward against the testimony of
contemporary epigraphical records.
As regards the first point, it is no doubt true
that in the absence of these verses from some of the
manuscripts, conclusions based upon them cannot be
regarded as final unless corroborated by other
evidence, but it is certainly going too far to say
that they are to be looked upon as interpolations
merely on that account.(2)

As regards the second point, the principle
advanced is quite all right, but its application in
the particular instance does not seem to be correct;
for, as we have seen above, there is nothing in the
contemporary epigraphic records that is really in
conflict with the verses quoted above.
II. The statement of the Moslem historian
Minhaaj that Rai Lakhmaniya was defeated by Muhammad,
son of Bakhtiyar, within a few years of 1200 A.D.
(the dates proposed by Raverty. Cunningham and
Blochmann being respectively 1194, 1195, and 1198-9
A.D.) corroborates and is corroborated by the
testimony of the verses quoted above; for the
identity of Lakhmaniya and Lak.sma.nasena is evident
and has been recognised long ago, and with a date for
Ballaalasena in about 1160-1170 A.D., the reign of
Lak.sma.nasene naturally falls towards the end of the
twelfth century A.D
_____________________________________________________

1. The doubts raised on this point by Mr.
Nagendranath Vasu seem to be due to a
misunderstanding. We learn from some verses in
Adbhutasaagara which follow the extract (b), that
Ballaalasena died before he could complete the
book, and that it was finished by his son
Lak.sma.nasena.. Mr. Vasu argues that if
Ballaalasena died in 1090 'Saka without being able
to complete Adbhutsaagara, how is it possible that
he himself composed Daanasaagara in 1091 'Saka as
testified to by the extract (c) above. The fact,
however, is that the passage in Adbhutasaagara
does by no means indicate that Ballaalasena died
in 1090 'Saka.It simply tells us that the book was
begun in that year and was left incomplete when
its author died. It may be readily supposed that
the royal author commenced his work in 1090 'Saka
and was engaged over it for a few years when he
died. In the meantime another work, Daanasaagara,
which was probably begun earlier, was brought to
completion in the year 1091 'Saka. The statements
made in Adbhutasaagara and Daanasaagara are not
therefore inconsistent with each other.

2. Mr. Banerji unduly minimises the significance of
the fact that three isolated passages in two
different works corroborate one an another. The
arguments advanced by Mr. Chanda (
Gau.da-raaja-maalaa, p. 62) to prove the
genuineness of these passages are very reasonable
and have not, so far as I know, been met by Mr.
Banerji.

p.13

III. The date of A'sokacalla is also in full
accord with the above view if we correctly interpret
the data we possess about him. Now one of his
inscriptions is dated in the year 1813 of the
Nirvaa.na era. The late Dr. Fleet has shown that
although different views were current about the date
of the Nirvaa.na in Ceylon, all these were
superseded, towards the end of the twelfth century
A.D. or a little earlier, by the assumption that the
event was to be placed at 544-543 B.C.(1) Mr. Taw
Sein Ko says that this era was known to the Burmese
long before the 12th century A.D.(2) About the
particular inscription of A'sokacalladeva and its
date in the Nirvaa.na era, Fleet remarked: --"
Treating this date as a date in the reckoning of
B.C. 544, and taking Kaarttika as the Puur.nimaanta
month, ending with the full moon, which is what we
should expect, I find that the given details are
correct for Wednesday, 1 October, A.D. 1270."
With this date of A'sokacalla in view, the
meaning of the dated portions of his other two
inscriptions becomes self evident. These are:(i)
Lakhva.nasenasy=aatiita-raajye sasa^m 51 (ii)
Lak.sma.nasena-deva-paadaanaam = atita-raajye sa^m 74
Vai'saakha vadi 12 Gurau.
Now if there are reasons to believe that
A'sokacalla flourished about 1270 A.D., naturally the
dates in the above two inscriptions would be taken as
counted from the cessation of the reign of
Lak.sma.nasena, that event itself being placed
towards the end of the twelfth century A.D. Taking
Blochman's date for this event, the second
inscription, which alone admits of verification.
regularly corresponds to 1271 A.D., May 7, Thursday.
(With dates proposed by Cunningham and Raverty it
would correspond respectively to 1267 A.D., April 21
Thursday, and 1268 A.D., May 10 Thursday (3)).
No reasonable objections can be urged against
this view. On the analogy of such expressions as
Vijaya-raajye sa^m 4 which means '4 years having
elapsed (or 4th year being current), counted from the
commencement of Vijayaraajya,' atiita-raajye sa^m 51
may easily be taken to mean that 50 or 51 years had
elapsed since the atiitaraajya or the cessation of
reign. The sense is made quite clear by the
corresponding expressions "gata-raajye, "
"vina.s.ta-raajye, etc., which occur in the place of
atiila samvat in some of the inscriptions of
Govindapaaladeva. There can be no reasonable doubt
that these expressions easily lend themselves to the
interpretation that the reckoning was made from the
end of a king's reign or the destruction of a
kingdom.
_____________________________________________________

1. J.R.A.S., 1009, p. 323 ff. Also cf. J.R.A.S. 1910,
pp. 474 ff, 857 ff; J.R.A.S. 1911, p. 216 ff. 2.
J.R.A.S, 1911, p. 212.

2. According to the calculations of Swamikannu Pillai
with which Prof. D. R. Bhandarkar was kind enough
to supply me.

p.14

The possibility of such a reckoning is
indisputably proved by the inscriptions of
Govindapaaladeva, notably the two following
installces:--
(i) Govindapaala-devaanaa^m vina.s.ta-raajye
A.s.ta-tri^m'sat-sa^m-valsare.
(ii) Govindapaala-devaanaa^m sa^m 39.

Even according to the interpretation of Mr.
Banerji, the kingdom of Govindapaala was destroyed in
the 38th year. The second instance therefore shows
that reckoning was still made with reference to his
reign. Mr. Banerji has himself noticed this point and
his remarks are worth quoting. "The reference," says
he, " in a record to the reign of a king who had
ceased to reign over those parts is curious. Probably
Buddhists did not want to refer to the reign of a
king who, though king de facto, was not a Buddhist in
faith. When the king had finally ceased to reign,
and all Indian kingdoms had been indiscriminately
destroyed in Bihar and Bengal, the scribe had only to
indicate the date of the dethroned prince with
abridged titles and adjectives denoting that his
reign was already a thing of the past."(1)
And this is indeed the key to the true
explanation. It is probable that when the Paala
kingdom was finally destroyed by the Senas, the
Buddhists, unwilling to refer to the reign of a
non-Buddhist king, continued to count their dates
with reference to the destruction of the last Paala
king, viz. Govindapaaladeva. Again, when the Indian
kingdoms had been indiscriminately destroyed in
Bengal and Bihaar by the Islamic invaders, the
scribe, unwilling to refer to the pravardhamaanavi
jaya-raajya of the Moslem conquerors, counted the
dates with reference to the destruction of the last
independent native kingdom.
Reference may be made in this connection to the
fact that even less than two hundred years ago, there
were current in Bengal, eras, known as Balaali San or
Parganaati San.(2) The colophon of a manuscript gives
the date as 1176 Banglaa San, 570 Balaali San and
1692 'Saka. The epoch of this era would thus fall in
1199 A.D. All the documents, which are dated in the
Parganaati San along with a known era, show that its
initial year corresponds to 1202-3 A.D., there being
only one exception according to which the initial year
would correspond to 1203-4 A.D.
I do not, of course, go so far as to assert
positively that
_____________________________________________________

1. OP. cit., p. 280.

2. For a detailed account of this era of. Mr. J.
Roy's 'Dhaakaar Itihaasa' Vol. II, p. 393 ff. and
Mr. Bha.t.ta'saali's paper in Ind.Ant. 1912, p.
169ff. Mr Bha.t.ta'saali seems to have been wrong
in reading the name of the era. as 'parganaatiit'
rather than 'parganaati.

p.15

the years of the Gayaa inscriptions are to be counted
with reference to one of these eras; but the fact
that their epochs fall so closely to the end of
Lak.sma.nasena's reign, and the names given them,
viz. Balaali, evidently contracted form of Ballaali,
i.e. pertaining to Ballaa1 (Sen), seem to me to lend
strength to the conclusion, we have independently
arrived at above, that there was a practice, in
different parts of the country, of counting dates
with reference to the end of the last independent
Hindu dynasty.
Thus three independent lines of evidence, viz.
the dates given in Daanasaagara and Adbhutasaagara,
the account of the Muhammadan historian Minhaaj and
the dated inscriptions of A'sokacalladeva, all lead
to the conclusion that Lak.sma.nasena flourished
towards the end of the twelfth century A.D. This view
again is in full agreement with what we know about
the relations of the Paala and the Sena kings. For,
as we have seen above, Madanapaala could not possibly
have flourished earlier than the first quarter of
the twelfth century A.D., and he was in possession of
Varendra which was afterwards conquered by
Vijayasena.(1)
The date given in Daanasaagara and Adbhutasaagara
being thus corroborated by external evidence, we may
provisionally accept the statement in Adbhutasaagara
that Ballaalasena ascended the throne in or shortly
before 1159 A.D. As one of the inscriptions of
Vijayasena is dated in the 32nd year of his reign(2)
he must be held to have engoyed a long reign. Thus
his accession is placed quite close to the year 1119
A.D., the epoch of the so-called Lak.sma.nasena, era.
This naturally gives rise to a strong presumption
that the era commemorates the accession of that
monarch. The fact seems to be that with the
destruction of the Hindu monarchy the reckoning was
made from the end of Lak.sma.nasena's reign, and it
mav be held, on the analogy of the inscriptions of
Govindapaaladeva, that the expressions used in
connection with this reckoning would be either such
full titles as Lak.sma.nasenasy = aatiita-raajye or
simply Lak.sma.niiya sa^m or even sa^mvat.(3) It is
easy to infer that the second expression came to be
contracted as La Sa^m. The earlier La Sa^m therefore
seems to have commemorated the end of Hindu monarchy.
Later on, however, the people probably came to the
right conclusion, that the best way of commemorating
the rule of the Sena kings is not
_____________________________________________________

1. That the contemporaneity of Vijayasena and
Naanyadeva leads to the same conclusion has been
shown in the accompanying Paper on paala
Chronology.

2. Ep. Ind., Vol XV, p. 278.

3. For the are associated with Govindapaala is
variously known as
(1) Govindapaala-devasy-aatita-samvat,
(2) Govindapaaliya-Samvat.
(3) Govindapaala-devaanaam-sa^m.

p.16

to reckon the date from their destruction but from
the foundation of their greatness. An artificial era
was therefore set in with the date of the accession
of Vijayasena, the founder of the greatness of the
family, as the initial year. It may be that there was
some difference of opinion on this point. some
looking upon the date of accession of Hemantasena as
the true starting point of the era. This might
explain the different mode of counting the era in
Mithila, with an initial point in about 1106-7 A. D.
It appears that this era was confounded with the true
La Sa^m and both came to be indifferently called by
this name till the earlier one was altogether
superseded by the later.
For the present, however, all this is mere
conjecture, and it is to be distinctly understood
that the main proposition advanced in this paper
about the date: of Lak.sma.nasena, rests absolutely
independent of this or any other similar hypothesis
to explain the origin of the era of 1118-9 A.D., or
its association with the name of Lak.sma.nasena. For
the matter of that, other explanations are equally
likely, and may be urged with equal cogency. One
might, for example, hold that the era commemorates
the conquest of Mithilaa by Vijayasena and was at
first current in that locality, till it was
confounded with the other current in Gayaa and its
neighbourhood and came to be associated with the name
of Lak.sma.nasena. It is useless to speculate on
these hypothetical explanations, but they show the
possibility of the association of the name of
Lak.sma.nasena with an era which had at first nothing
to do with him or his reign.
On the basis of the foregoing considerations the
chronology c,E the Sena kings may be laid down as
follows:--

Name of the King Name of the Queen Approximate
year of
accession.

Saamantasena .. ..
Hemantasena Ya'sodevii 1106 A.D.
Vijayasena Vilaasadevii 1118-9 A.D.(1)
Ballaalasena Raamadevii 1159 A.D.
Lak.sma.nasena Taa.daadevii 1175 A.D.
Vi'svaruupasena .. 1200 A.D.
ke'savasena .. 1225 A.D.
_____________________________________________________

1. My friend Mr. N. K. Bhattasali suggests that the
date of the newly discovered inscription of
Vijaysena referred to on p. 9 above is not 32, as
read by Mr. Banerji but 61. In that case the
accession of Vijaysena has to be placed before
1118-19 A.D. and the theory that the era of
1118-19 A.D. commemorates his accession must be
abandoned. It is needless to point out that Mr.
Banerji's theory that Lak.sma.nasena ascended the
throne in 1118-19 A.D. is quite incompatible with
this new reading of the date.