Gautamiputra Satakarni defeats Nahapana

Before his reign the Kshaharata satraps had taken much of the western Deccan from the Satavahanas: Nahapana held Malwa, southern Gujarat and the northern Konkan, from Bharuch to Sopara, together with the Nashik and Pune districts, and his son-in-law Ushavadata (Rishabhadatta) made gifts to the Buddhist monks of the caves near Nashik. Gautamiputra’s victory is known from three kinds of evidence. An inscription of his 18th regnal year in these caves confirms to the monks a grant of land that had formerly belonged to Ushavadata. A coin hoard found at Jogalthembi in the Nashik district contains Nahapana’s silver coins restruck with Gautamiputra’s name and symbols. And the eulogy (prashasti) of his mother, Queen Gautami Balashri, carved at Nashik in the 19th year of her grandson Vasishthiputra Pulumavi, says that he “rooted out the Kshaharata family” and destroyed the Shakas, Yavanas and Pahlavas — the Western Satraps, Indo-Greeks and Indo-Parthians.

The date depends on the Satavahana chronology, which is still disputed. M. K. Dhavalikar placed the victory in about 124, which he took to be Gautamiputra’s 18th regnal year, reading Nahapana’s dates 41–46 in the Shaka era (AD 119–124); R. C. C. Fynes dated it to some time after 71, and Shailendra Bhandare to 78, placing Gautamiputra’s whole reign in c. 60–85. If his reign is dated 112–136, as some works do, his 18th year falls in 129/130. Where the decisive fighting took place is not known. The Satavahana recovery did not last: according to the Junagadh inscription, Rudradaman I of the Kardamaka house twice defeated a Satakarni, lord of the Deccan.