date of kalidasa

[Guest guest]

Dear all, The date of Kalidasa is taken to be during the reign of chandragupta II (375 CE-410 CE). Mirashi [1] considers various dates between 2nd bce and 7th CE and concludes that Kalidasa belongs to the above period.

The main argument here pertained to identification of one Kuntateswara, to whose court Kalidasa was sent as an ambassador, as mentioned in the Sringara prakasa of Bhoja and works of Ksemendra. There are many claimants for this character but Mirashi identifies him with Devaraja, to whose court Kalidasa has gone as an ambassador and was insulted by not being offered a proper seat.

As per Katha Saritsagara and Brihat Katha manjari , the sanskrit versions of the lost Paisacika story Brihatkatha by Gunadhya, Kalidasa was in the Royal Court of Vikramaditya. Vikramaditya was the son of Mahendraditya. The story continues to mention that Vikramaditya (perhaps also called Chandra) have conquered the countries of Aparanta (north Konkan/Gujarat), Dakshinapatha (Deccan), Madhya desha (Malwa), Vanga (Bengal) and Anga (South Bihar). (The Allahabad inscription envisages Chandra to have conquered Bengal)

This story has been told to Naravahana datta, who has been mentioned by Tiloyapannatti, a Jain work. [2] It states that Naravahana has ruled Avanti for 40 years just before Andhra Bhrityus. These Andhra bhrityus are the remnants of the earlier Andhra Bhrityus who have ruled Magadha between 766 bce and 316 bce. They are variously called Satavahanas, Satakarnis etc, which names can also be ascribed to Magadhan Andhra bhrityus but importantly, Matsya purana distinguishes these two sets of rulers by calling the later Andhra bhrityus as Sreeparvateeya andhras. [3]

Naravahana datta can be thus identified with Nahapana or Nambanus [3], who has been defeated by Gautamiputra Satakarni (125 bce)[4] That Satakarni has defeated Nahapana has been doubly evidenced by the inscriptions of Satakarni [5] as well as the numismatic evidence, where Satakarni outstruck the coins of Nahapana. [6] This date is not final but certainly is the exterior limit for the date of Nahapana.

Thus, it is abundantly clear that Kalidasa has lived only before 125 CE and not after. Right now, I am not trying to identify the king who has been served by Kalidasa but I am restricting my self only to prove that Kalidasa lived prior to 125 CE.

best regards, Kishore patnaik [1] http://tinyurl.com/3w85an[2] http://tinyurl.com/4gkuet

[3] Chapter 272 , Matsya Puranan[4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nahapana[5] History of Andhras upto 1565 AD by Durga prasad[6] http://preview.tinyurl.com/4w5r2b