Origin of the Rajputs and Early Dynasties of Rajasthan

The word Rajput comes from rajaputra, the son of a king, and it appears as the name of a ruling class in western and northern India from about the seventh century onwards. Where that class came from has been argued over for two hundred years, and Rajasthan Police, RPSC, Patwari and REET papers test the argument itself: which theory rests on which text, and which historian held which view. The chapter then moves to the first Rajput houses of Rajasthan, the Gurjara Pratiharas, the Chauhans and the Guhils, whose genealogies are fixed by stone inscriptions rather than by bardic tales.

The theories of Rajput origin

The Agnikula or fire born theory comes from the Prithviraj Raso of Chand Bardai, which says that four clans, the Pratihara, the Chauhan, the Solanki and the Parmar, rose from a fire pit at Mount Abu where the sage Vashishtha performed a sacrifice. It is a bardic account, not an inscriptional one, and later scholars treated it as a legend of purification rather than of birth. The foreign origin theory was put by Colonel James Tod in his Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, who traced the Rajputs to the Scythians of Central Asia on the strength of similarities in warfare, horsemanship and funeral custom; William Crooke supported him. A related view, argued by D. R. Bhandarkar, made the Rajputs, especially the Pratiharas, descendants of the Gurjaras, a people he held to be of foreign stock, and Vincent Smith settled on a mixed origin. Against all of them stood the Kshatriya origin theory, whose strongest voice was Gauri Shankar Hirachand Ojha, the author of Rajputane ka Itihas, with C. V. Vaidya, Dashratha Sharma and Gopinath Sharma beside him; they held that the Rajputs were the descendants of the Vedic Kshatriyas of the solar and lunar lines, and pointed to inscriptions in which the clans call themselves Kshatriya or even Brahmin. A fourth, smaller view derived some clans from Brahmin families, since the Bijoliya inscription calls the Chauhans Brahmins of the Vatsa gotra.

Who held which view

Lineages and the thirty six clans

Rajput houses are classified by lineage. The Suryavanshi or solar line holds the Guhil and Sisodia of Mewar, the Kachhwaha of Amer, the Rathore of Marwar and the Bada Gujar. The Chandravanshi or lunar line holds the Bhati of Jaisalmer, who call themselves Yaduvanshi, and the Tomar or Tanwar. The Agnivanshi line holds the four clans of the Agnikula story. Lists of thirty six royal clans, the chhattis rajkul, appear in the Prithviraj Raso and in the Kumarpala Charita of Hemchandra, and the lists do not agree with one another, which is itself a favourite question.

The Gurjara Pratiharas

The Pratiharas were the first great Rajput power of the region. Nagabhata I, who ruled in about the middle of the eighth century from Bhinmal in the Jalore region, is remembered for checking the Arab advance from Sindh, a service the Rashtrakuta records themselves acknowledge. Vatsaraja and then Nagabhata II carried the house into the long tripartite struggle with the Palas of Bengal and the Rashtrakutas of the Deccan for Kannauj, which Nagabhata II finally took. His grandson Mihir Bhoja, the greatest of the line, ruled from Kannauj and struck coins with the title Adivaraha; he also used the title Prabhas, and the Arab traveller Sulaiman wrote of the strength of his cavalry. Mahendrapala I kept the empire together, and the Sanskrit poet and grammarian Rajashekhara was attached to this court. A branch of the family ruled at Mandore in Marwar, whose Ghatiyala inscription of Kakkuka, dated 861, records the rebuilding of the town, and the Rajorgarh inscription of Mathanadeva of 959 calls its ruler a Gurjara Pratihara.

The Chauhans of Sapadalaksha

The Chahamanas, called Chauhans, ruled the tract known as Sapadalaksha from Shakambhari, that is Sambhar. The Bijoliya inscription names Vasudeva as the founder of the house in about the sixth century. Ajayaraja founded the city of Ajayameru, now Ajmer, early in the twelfth century; Arnoraja had the Anasagar lake dug at Ajmer; and Vigraharaja IV, called Bisaldev, extended the kingdom and is credited with the building later known as Adhai Din ka Jhonpra. Prithviraj Chauhan III, who came to the throne as a boy, defeated Muhammad Ghori in the First Battle of Tarain in 1191 and was defeated and killed after the Second Battle of Tarain in 1192; his court held Chand Bardai, author of the Prithviraj Raso, and Jayanak, author of the Prithviraj Vijaya. Branches of the clan outlived the main line. At Ranthambore Hammir Dev fell to Alauddin Khalji in 1301; at Jalore the Songara Chauhan Kanhadadev was overcome in 1311; at Siwana Satal Dev held out until 1308; and the Hada branch founded Bundi in the thirteenth century, from which Kota later separated.

The Guhils of Mewar

The Guhils take their name from Guhil or Guhadatta, placed in the middle of the sixth century, and their early seat was Nagda near Udaipur. Bappa Rawal, of about the eighth century, is the founder figure of Mewar's power and is linked with the Eklingji temple at Nagda and with the fort of Chittor. The Samoli inscription of 646, from the reign of Shiladitya, is the earliest record of the house, and the Atpur or Ahar inscription of 977, of the time of Shaktikumar, gives its genealogy; the Chirwa inscription of 1273 carries the line further. Jaitra Singh beat back the army of Iltutmish, and Rawal Ratan Singh faced Alauddin Khalji's siege of Chittor in 1303. After that loss Rana Hammir recovered Chittor in the fourteenth century and founded the Sisodia branch, from which every later Maharana of Mewar descends.

Other early houses and the inscriptions

The Rathores of Marwar begin with Rao Siha, whose tradition brings the family from Kannauj in the thirteenth century; the Kachhwahas of Amer with Dulha Rai, who took Dausa in about the twelfth century; the Bhatis of Jaisalmer with Rawal Jaisal, who founded the city in the middle of the twelfth century; and the Parmars with their branches at Abu, Kiradu, Jalore and Vagad. For the examination, the inscriptions matter as much as the kings: Samoli of 646 and Atpur of 977 for the Guhils, Ghatiyala of 861 for the Mandore Pratiharas, Rajorgarh of 959 for the Gurjara Pratihara name, Bijoliya of 1170 for the Chauhans, and Chirwa of 1273 for Mewar.