Damodaragupta’s battle against the Maukharis

01The verse

The family prashasti at Aphsad uses the poet’s way of saying a king died in battle. Damodaragupta, it says, broke apart the proud array of the Maukhari elephants, which had thrown Huna soldiers into the air, and then swooned, to be chosen by the women of heaven. The reference to the Hunas tells us the Maukharis had fought and beaten Huna troops before this. No place is named and no date is given.

02Avenger or defender

The list behind this entry calls it Sarvavarman avenging his father, and that is the common reading: Sarvavarman, Ishanavarman’s son, was the Maukhari king of these years, and his Asirgarh seal shows a ruler of wide reach. Some historians would put Ishanavarman himself on the other side. Either way, the Later Guptas lost a king, and Magadha seems to have passed under Maukhari influence until Mahasenagupta’s time.

Dynasty · c. 510–606 CE (Kannauj line)Maukhari dynasty of KannaujThe Maukharis rose as Gupta feudatories and, under Ishanavarman, became independent kings ruling from Kannauj. They made Kannauj the prize of north India for the next five centuries; the last of them, Grahavarman, married Harsha’s sister Rajyashri.Read →