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In the latter half of the tenth century Jaipal was the great Rajput king of Western India, and his dominions stretched from Delhi to Lahore. Jaipal faught against Sabaktagin and then against Mahmud of Ghazni bravely but in vain ; and his son Anangapal and all the . 238 PAURANIK PERIOD. [BOOK Vv. princes of Northern India made a combined and deter- mined effort to oppose and vanquish the invader from Ghazni. _The result was the same. The determined bravery and devotion of the Rajputs were unavailing against the skill and discipline of the Moslems. We next come to Shahabuddin Ghori, the real Mahommedan conqueror of India. Western India was ruled by three great Rajput kings at the latter end of the twelfth century. Prithu Rai Chohan ruled Delhi and Ajmir, and in both these places the ruins of his forts are still visible. Jaya Chandra Rathore was the king of Kanouj and held Allahabad, Oude, and Benares under his sway. Bhima Deva was the ruler of Gujrat and of Central India. : . Shahabuddin attacked Prithu Rai in r1r91in the field of Tirouri, and for once the Moslems were beaten, But their game was not lost. Shahabuddin defeated Prithy Rai in 1193, and Jayachandra in 1194 A.D., and conquered the whole of Northern India from the Punjab to Benares. And the haughtiest of the Rajputs left the conquered region and retreated to their desert home in Rajputana. ‘The heroism of the Rajputs was like a gleam of sun- [ shine preceding the gloom of Hindu subjection and ‘national death.. In personal bravery, in patriotism, in a determination to conquer or to die, the Rajputs who resisted Kasim and Mahmud and Shahabuddin were not inferior to their enemies or to any nation on the CHAP, II] “VALABHIS. AND RAJPUTS. 239 face of the earth. But in military discipline, as well as in strategy and matured plans:of operations, the Hindus were not equal to their more experienced and trained enemies. Superstition too often changed the heroism - of the Hindus into cowardice ; while their dealings with the foe were often marked by a “simplicity derived from a want of intercourse with other nations, which rendered them inferior in practical ability, and even in military efficiency to men actuated by much less. elevated sentiments than theirs.” * It is remarkable that during the six centuries that . the Mahommedans remained masters of India, scarcely one serious attempt was made to reassert Hindu inde- . pendence. At first the number of the Mahommedan conquerors must have been exceedingly small, and it is acurious fact that the millions of brave Hindus from the Punjab to Behar made ho exertion to throw off the yoke. But political life was extinct in Northern India except among the Rajputs. With the fall of the old nations and dynasties during the 8th and goth centuries was witnessed the fall of all dynastic pride, all -national vigour among races. The people were brave, but bravery is of small avail without political life. The only living race there. fore, the Rajputs, had naturally taken up the position’ which there was no one else to take up, and had be- come masters of Delhi, Kanouj, Benares,—all capitals * Elphinstone’s History of India, Ed. Cowell, 1874, p. 362. ; 240 PAURANIK PERIOD. . [BOOK v. of ancient but effete races. And when the Rajputs were hurled from their proud position, the races of Northen India submitted to the new invaders, as they had submitted to the Rajputs. For political life was extinct, and subjection and national death ensued. Such are the political causes which account for the easy subjugation of a great confederacy of nations by a handful of invaders. There were other causes, reli- gious and social, which prostrated the Hindu nation, and made them feeble, superstitious, disunited, and in- _ capable of exertion. These causes too were in active operation during the centuries immediately before the Mahommedan conquest. But of this we will speak elsewhere. CHAPTER III. BENGAL AND ORISSA. IN the second or Epic Period, the kingdoms of Maga- dha and Anga, ze. South and East Behar, were scarcely yet within the Aryan pale, although slowly imbibing Aryan civilization. “It was in the Rationalistic Period, after 1000 B.C. that Magadha became completely Aryanized, and rose in power and civilization, until it eclipsed and even subdued the more ancient Aryan kingdoms in the Gangetic Valley. And it was then,| probably in the 5th or 6th centuries B. C. that Bengal proper and Orissa received from the flourishing king- dom of Magadha the first rays of Aryan civilization.” During the sixth and’ fifth centuries B. C., Bengal and Orissa gave little indication of progress and learning. Satra schools were founded in the monarchy of the Andhras in Southern India at this time, but we hear of no such schools in Bengal or Orissa. In the fourth cen- tury B.C., when the Greeks visited India, they found powerful kingdoms founded in Bengal and Orissa which they called by the general name of Kalinga. ‘In the third: century B. C. Kalinga was* conquered: by Asoka the Great, as we learn from his inscriptions, ‘and this conquest probably facilitated the spread-of Buddhism i in R. C. D., A. LI. 16 242 , PAURANIK PERIOD. [BOOK Vv. these provinces, and also brought Benga: and Orissa ia closer connexion with the civilization cf Northern india. Slowly and obscurely Bengal rose in impo ‘tance and in civilization, and by the close of the Buddh:st Period, Bengal was a recognized power in India. Sasdnka (Narendra Gupta) king of Karna Suvarna, near Gour, defeated and killed in war the elder brother of “he great Siladitya.. about the commencement of the seventh century; and when about 640 A. D. Houer Tsang came to Bengal, he found civilized and powerful king- doms in Pundra or Northern Bengal, Samatata oi East- ern Bengal, Kamarapa or Assam, and Tamral: ti or Southern Bengal, as well asin Karna Suvarna or We stern Bengal. These kingdoms correspond, roughly, with the present Rajshahi, Dacca,Assam,Burdwan,and Preside.acy divisions, Houen Tsang’s account of these kingdo ns has been given elsewhere, and need not be repeated hee. _ After this we scarcely hear anything of Bengal til pear ‘the time of the Mahommedan conquest. Indeed i Bengal was in olden times so barren of literary culture, ‘talent or genius, of architecture or striking works of | art, or even of great political transactions in connection _ with Northern India, that but for the visits paid by the ’ Greeks and the Chinese, we should have known little or nothing of the country fram its first colonization by the Aryans in the Rationalistic Period to the time of the Mahommedan conquest, oat 1 CHAP. 111] BENGAL AND ORISSA. 2d. A number of copper-platea grants which have been’ discovered in recent times shew that races of kings known as the Pala kings and) Sena kings ruled in Ben- gal for about three centuries before the Mahommedan conquest. Dr. Rajendra Lala ‘Mitra has carefully con- densed and arranged the information on this subject in his essay on the Pala and Sena Dynasties, now published | in the second volume of his Indo-Aryans, and we take the following lists from that essyy. It will be seen Dr. Mitra allows generally an av2rage of 20 years for each reign : ‘ PALA KINGS, SENA KINGS. In Western & Northern Bengal. In Easten & Littoral Bengal. I, Gopala . 855 A.D. I, ViraSena .-. 986 A.D, — Il, ‘Dharmapala 875° 45 TE SAameaata Sena tc06 yg III Devapala ... 895 ” III. HemaitaSena 1026, IV. Vigrahapala... 915 55 In the whole of Bengal. V. Narfyanapala 935 2 IV. Vijaya dias Sukha VI. Rajapala ... 955 9 - Seng). 1046 yy VII. —~— Pala .. 975 9 V. Ballala Sena 1066 VIII. Vigrahapala IF 995 — VI. Lakshman IX, Mahipala ... YOIS = 99° Sena soe TI06 95 X. Nayapila ... 1040 , VIL. Madhava Sena 136, Expelled from Bengal by the Senas) VIII. Kesava Sena i 1138 gy - 1X, L&kshmaneya) | alias PRCT ae 3 Mahommedan conquest about 1204 4° “Very little is known of the Pala kings except that they were Buddhists, but were toletant towards Hindus, employed Hindu officials and gave lands 244 PAURANIK PERIOD. [BOOK Vv. for religious purposes to the Hindus, They never pos- sessed East Bengal, but ruled as Dr. Mitra says “on the . west of the Bhagirathi certainly as far as the boundary of Behar, and probably further, taking the whole of the ancient kingdom of Magidha. On the north it included Tirhut, Malda, Rajshahi; Dinajpur, Rangpur, and Bagu- ra, which constituted the great ancient kingdom of Pun- dra Vardhana. The balk of the delta seems not to have belonged to them.” . _ Of the first king Gop4la a short inscription has been {ound in Nalanda, proving that the great king had con- ~ quered Magadha ; ind this fact is confirmed by T4ra- nath who tells us that Gopéla “began to reign in “Bengal, and afterwards conquered Magadha.” Accord- ing to General Canningham*, he began his reign in 815 A. D, which is 40 years earlier than the date _ assigned by Dr, Mitra, Gopala’s successor Dharmapala conquered - ‘Indra’ Raja, which General Cunningham ‘takes to mean Barendra ; “and he married Kanna Devi, daughter of Prabala, “Raja of many countries.” Dharma- pala’s successor Devapala was ‘a great conqueror; the inscriptions assign to him the conquest of Kamardpa an Orissa, and T4ran4th ascribes to him the subjugation of the whole of Northern India from the Himalaya to the .Vindhya mountains, AH these warlike expedi- tions of Devap4la are said in one inscription to have been conducted by his brother Jayapala, whose son * Archeological Survey of India, Vol. XV, p. 148. CHAP. lL] BENGAL AND ORISSA. 245 Vigrahapala eventually succeeded to the throne after one or two short reigns omitted in Dr. Mitrals list.