204 Report of the Archeological Survey. [No. 4, 
proximity to Kanoj is in favour of the sovereignty which they claim 
for their ancestors over the whole of the Gangetic Doab from Delhi to 
Allahabad. But their genealogical lists are too imperfect, and most 
probably also too incorrect, to enable us to identify any of their recorded 
ancestors with the Princes of Harsha Vardhana’s family. 
252. The vast empire which Harsha Vardhana raised during his 
long reign of 44 years, between A. D. 607 and 650, is described by — 
Hwen Thsang as extending from the foot of the Kashmir hills to 
Assam, and from Nepal to the Narbada River. He intimidated the 
Raja of Kashmir into surrendering the tooth of Buddha, and his 
triumphal procession from Pataliputra to Kanoj was attended by no 
less than 20 tributary Rajas from Assam and Magadha on the east, 
to Jalandhar on the west. In the plenitude of his power, Harsha 
Vardhana invaded the countries to the south of the Narbada, where 
he was successfully opposed by Raja Pulakesi, and after many repulses — 
was obliged to retire to his own kingdom. This account of Hwen 
Thsang is most singularly corroborated in every particular by several 
ancient inscriptions of the Chdlukya Rajas of Kalydn. According to 
these inscriptions, Raja Vikramaditya, the grandson of Pulakesi Val- 
labha, gained the title of Parameswara, ‘“ by the defeat of Sri Harsha 
Vardhana, famous in the north countries.*“ Now Vikramaditya’s 
reign is known to have commenced in Sake 514, or A. D. 592, as one | 
of his inscriptions is dated in Sake 530, or A. D. 608, which is called’ 
the 16th year of his reign ; + and as his grandson did not succeed to the 
throne until the Sake year 618, or A. D. 696, it is certain that Vikrama- 
ditya must have been a contemporary of Harsha Vardhana throughout 
the greater part, if not the whole, of his reign, The unusually long 
reigns of the earlier Chdlukya Princes have led Mr. Walter Elliot to 
suspect the accuracy of the dates, although, as he points out,‘‘ the 
succeeding dates tally with each other in a way that affords the strongest — 
presumption of their freedom from any material error.” The question 
of the accuracy of these dates is now most satisfactorily confirmed by 
the unimpeachable testimony of the contemporary record of Hwen — 
Thsang which I have quoted above. a 





* Bombay Asiatic Society’s Journal, ITT. 206. 
t+ Royal Asiatic Society’s Journal IV. 10. 
