Brief notes on the origin and nativity of Satavahanas

Asoka, the Mauryan King, passed away in 232 BC and it was in c. 185 BC that the last of the Mauryas, namely, Brihadratha was killed by his own general Pushyamitra Sunga who thereby brought about a revolution ending Mauryan rule. So for a period of about half a century the Mauryan dynasty continued to rule North India after Asoka.

It may be plausibly held that the parts of Asokan kingdom lying in the Deccan plataeu including Kalinga in the East practically became independent after Asoka.

This independence commencing about 230 BC was merely a change from nominal loyalty and subjection to a distant power, to real autonomy. So the government of the Deccan split up among two major aspirants to power one in Kalinga and the other centering round the Western Ghats. The latter were the Satavahanas who ruled a good part of the Deccan for a period of nearly four and a half centuries.

There is, however, great difference of opinion as to how long the Satavahana dynasty ruled over the Deccan. The most liberal estimate would be for about four and a half centuries stretching from 230 BC to AD 225. The most conservative estimate contents itself with less than bare three centuries. The latter view is held by H.C. Ray-Chaudhuri. His opinion is accepted by A.L. Basham who has revised V.A. Smith on this point. Before one goes into the question of the chronology of the Satavahanas it is better to know who they were, and whence they came.

Nativity

Satavahanas are known to us through (1) the Puranas, and (2) the coins. The Matsya and the Vayu are the two Puranas which mention them in long lists and provide some periods of rule. There is a controversy regarding the place of their origin, some holding that they originally belonged to coastal Andhra, i.e., on the banks of the Godavari or the Krishna near the mouths of those rivers; and another view that they were natives of the Western Ghats and hailed from the neighbourhood of Pratishthana (modern Paithan).

There is no evidence to categorically prove an eastern homeland for them. They are known in the Puranas by two names: (1) The Andhras, and (2) the Andhrabhrityas. The mention of the Satavahanas as Andhras naturally inclines one to suppose that they were not Maharashtra but only Telugu; the word Andhrabhritya on the other hand literally means ‘the servants of the Andhras’ or ‘the Andhras who were servants’. If the latter were the meaning the Satavahanas could be taken to be Andhra feudatories of the Mauryan emperors originally residing in the East and having migrated to the West by the time they became independent.

If Andhrabhritya meant ‘servants of the Andhras’ it would mean that they were natives of western Deccan long ago somehow subservient to the Andhras and that they later shifted their allegiance to the Mauryas. Whatever it is, it is clear that the Satavahanas were a Kula, i.e., a family or a dynasty and that when history knew them definitely they had settled around Paithan. There is the possibility that the Satavahanas moved from the east to the west when the Mauryan Empire declined and offered their Deccanese feudatories a chance to become independent.

The Andhras were known to the Roman historian Pliny who speaks of their many walled towns, numerous villages and large armies consisting of foot soldiers, cavalry and elephants. Thus it will be evident that the Andhra Satavahanas were an ancient people ruling in the Deccan as Free states whenever possible and subject to external imperial authority whenever necessary.