著者

石川 寛

出版者

東洋文庫

雑誌

東洋学報 = The Toyo Gakuho (ISSN:03869067)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.84, no.2, pp.255-276, 2002-09

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It is well known fact that the regime of the Rāshṭrakūṭas who extended their power throughout the Deccan and beyond between the 8th and 10th centuries was characterised by dynamic temple-building, including the Kailāsanātha temple of Ellora, and the promotion of Kannaḍa literature. However, a debate still exists over the original homeland and the capital・of the Rāshṭrakūṭas in their early days. A. S. Altekar holds the idea in his reputed “Rāshṭrakūṭas and their Times” (1967) that Dantidurga, the founder of the dynasty, originally hailed from Laṭṭalūra, (modern day Laāṭūr in the Osmānābād district, Mahārāshṭra state) and was a local chieftain under the overlordship of the Chālukyas of Bādāmi. By the time of independence he had migrated to the northern region of Mahārāshṭra where Elichpur, a proposed earlier capital by Altaka, was located.Judging from related records, including a new Kandhār inscription,it is clear that the Rāshṭrakūṭas had never migrated, and that they came from south-eastern and central Mahārāshṭra, the so called “Marāṭhavāḍā” regions, that they comprise the modern day districts of Osmānābād, Nānḍed, Parbhanī, Bīr and Auragabād, and that they used the Kannaḍa language as their mother tongue.Some inscriptions dearly show that Mānyakhēṭa in Gulbarga district, Karnātaka state was the capital city from the days of Amōghsvarsha I, the dynasty’s 6th king. Many scholars have expressed their opinions about an earlier capital. Altekar opines that Achalapura, (modern day Elichpur in Amarāvatī district, Mahārāshṭra state) was the earlier capital. Ellora was regarded as the capital by H. Cousens. But the present state of our knowledge, makes it impossible to identify the earlier capital of the Rāshṭrakūṭas as before establishing Mānyakhēṭa as the permanent capital, even though such locations as Ellora and Mayūrakhaṇḍī seem to have been temporary capitals. The author is of the opinion that Ellora was the capital during the reigns of Dantidurga and Kṛehṇe I, the 1st and 2nd kings, and that Mayūrakhaṇḍī occupied the same position during the time of the 5th king Gōvinda III.