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Quick recap: India after the Mauryas and the Sangam age on one page

India after the Mauryas and the Sangam age · Quick recap · Fact-checked on 9 November 2026 · how we check

Written with AI from the sources listed at the bottom of this page, then fact-checked by a separate AI.

All three parts condensed for quick revision: the Shungas, Kanvas, Satavahanas and Kharavela; the Indo-Greeks, Shakas, Parthians and Kushanas, with the art schools and trade of the age; and the Sangam age of the far south, with one table at a glance.

When the last Mauryan king, Brihadratha, was killed by his Brahmana commander Pushyamitra Shunga around 185 BCE, no single power replaced the empire until the Guptas. The Shungas ruled the Ganga valley and Malwa; an Ayodhya record left by a later ruler, Dhanadeva, tells us that Pushyamitra performed the horse sacrifice twice, and his son Agnimitra is the hero of Kalidasa's Malavikagnimitram. Buddhist art flourished all the same: the railings of Bharhut and the stone casing of the Sanchi stupa show the Buddha only through symbols. At Besnagar, Heliodorus, envoy of the Indo-Greek king Antialcidas, set up a Garuda pillar to Vasudeva and called himself a Bhagavata. The Kanvas replaced the last Shunga, Devabhuti, and were soon ended by the Satavahanas. In Kalinga, the Jain king Kharavela recorded his reign year by year in the Hathigumpha inscription near Bhubaneswar (Part 1).

The Satavahanas, the Andhras of the Puranas, held the Deccan from their capital Pratishthana (Paithan). The Naneghat inscription of queen Naganika records the Vedic sacrifices of Satakarni I's family, and at Nasik his mother Gautami Balashri had an inscription carved hailing Gautamiputra Satakarni as the king who crushed the Shakas, Greeks and Parthians and wiped out Nahapana's Kshaharata line; Nahapana's silver coins were restruck in his name. Satavahana kings carried their mothers' names, used Prakrit for their records, issued coins of lead and potin (Yajna Sri's coins show ships), and made the earliest known tax-free land grants to Brahmanas and Buddhist monks. The rock-cut chaityas and viharas of Bhaja, Karle, Nasik and Kanheri and the stupa at Amaravati belong to their age.

Through the northwest came four waves of rulers (Part 2). The Indo-Greeks of Bactria, led into India by Demetrius, are best remembered through Menander (Milinda) of Sakala, who questions the monk Nagasena in the Milindapanha, and through portrait coins with Greek and Kharoshthi legends. The Shakas followed; their Western Kshatrapas ruled Gujarat and Malwa, and at Junagadh, around 150 CE, Rudradaman I left one of the first lengthy records written in Sanskrit, telling how he restored the Sudarshana lake first built under Chandragupta Maurya. The Parthian Gondophares is known from the Takht-i-Bahi inscription and the St Thomas tradition. The Kushanas, a branch of the Yuezhi, rose under Kujula and Vima Kadphises, whose gold coins show Shiva; the Rabatak inscription lists Kanishka's ancestors. Kanishka ruled from Purushapura, and the fourth Buddhist council met in Kashmir under him. The Shaka era (78 CE) and the Vikrama Samvat (57 BCE) both date from these centuries.

The age was rich in art and trade. The Gandhara school of art of the northwest carved grey schist with Greco-Roman features, the Mathura school of art used red sandstone and made Buddhist, Jain and Brahmanical images, and the Amaravati school of art of the Krishna valley produced narrative reliefs in white limestone; all three showed the Buddha in human form. Guilds of artisans also acted as bankers. The Kushanas controlled the overland routes to Central Asia, while ships using the monsoon winds carried pepper, cotton cloth and gems to the Roman world and brought back gold and silver coins, wine and glass, as the Periplus, Pliny and the finds at Arikamedu show. In religion, Mahayana Buddhism with its bodhisattva ideal grew strong, and devotion to Vasudeva-Krishna and Shiva spread, often under foreign patrons.

In the far south the Sangam age (Part 3) is known from the Sangam literature: a grammar work called the Tolkappiyam, two big poetry collections (Ettuttogai, eight books, and Pattuppattu, ten long songs), the later Tirukkural, and the twin epics Silappadikaram and Manimekalai, with Tamil-Brahmi cave inscriptions, Ashoka's edicts and Roman writers as further evidence. Three crowned kingdoms shared the land: the Cheras (Vanji, the port Muziris, the bow), the Cholas (Uraiyur, Puhar, the tiger, Karikala) and the Pandyas (Madurai, Korkai, the fish, Nedunjeliyan), with velir chiefs below them. Poets sorted the land into five tinai (landscape) and their verse into akam (love) and puram (war and public life). Kings were hereditary, warriors were honoured with hero stones, Murugan was the chief god, and Roman ships came for pepper. The Kalabhras ended the age, until the Pandyas and Pallavas rose in the late sixth century.

Exam traps

• Agnimitra, not Pushyamitra, is the hero of Kalidasa's Malavikagnimitram; Pushyamitra's horse sacrifices are known from the Ayodhya inscription of Dhanadeva.
• The Heliodorus pillar at Besnagar was set up by a Greek envoy who called himself a Bhagavata, to honour Vasudeva; it is not an Ashokan pillar.
• The Nasik inscription praising Gautamiputra Satakarni was set up by his mother Gautami Balashri; the Naneghat inscription is of queen Naganika.
• Rudradaman's Junagadh inscription is in Sanskrit; the Sudarshana lake was first built under Chandragupta Maurya by Pushyagupta.
• Vikrama Samvat begins in 57 BCE and the Shaka era in 78 CE; the national calendar (from 22 March 1957) follows the Shaka era.
• Gandhara used grey schist; Mathura used red sandstone and also made Jain and Hindu images; Amaravati used white limestone.
• Manimekalai is a Buddhist epic; the Tirukkural belongs to the later eighteen minor works, not the eight anthologies.
• Emblems: Cheras bow, Cholas tiger, Pandyas fish; Karikala won at Venni, Nedunjeliyan at Talaiyalanganam.

Recap

• About 185 BCE to the early fourth century CE: regional powers between the Mauryas and the Guptas.
• Shungas and Kanvas in the Ganga valley; Bharhut, Sanchi and the Heliodorus pillar.
• Satavahanas in the Deccan: Naneghat and Nasik inscriptions, Gautamiputra Satakarni, land grants, rock-cut caves.
• Kharavela of Kalinga: Jain king, Hathigumpha inscription.
• Indo-Greeks (Menander), Shakas (Rudradaman, Junagadh), Parthians (Gondophares), Kushanas (Kanishka).
• Eras: Vikrama Samvat 57 BCE; Shaka era 78 CE, base of the national calendar.
• Gandhara, Mathura and Amaravati schools; guilds; Indo-Roman trade; Mahayana and bhakti.
• Sangam age: Tolkappiyam, eight anthologies, ten idylls, twin epics; Cheras, Cholas, Pandyas; five tinai; Kalabhras.

Practice questions

Sources

• Centre for Cultural Resources and Training (Ministry of Culture): material on India after the Mauryas, early Indian art and trade, and the Sangam age — https://ccrtindia.gov.in
• Archaeological Survey of India: site notes on Bharhut, Sanchi, Besnagar, Naneghat, Nasik, Udayagiri-Khandagiri, Taxila, Mathura, Amaravati and Arikamedu — https://asi.nic.in
• National Portal of India (Know India): National Calendar based on the Saka era, in use from 22 March 1957 — https://knowindia.india.gov.in