Pushyamitra Shunga

Pushyamitra Shunga (IAST: ) or Pushpamitra Shunga (IAST: ) (ruled 185-149 BCE) was the co-founder and the first or second ruler of the Shunga Empire which he and Gopāla established to succeed the Maurya Empire. His original name was Puṣpaka or Puṣpamitra and the confusion between Puṣyamitra and Puṣpamitra arose because of the erroneous readings of 'p' and 'y' in the manuscripts. Pushyamitra is recorded to have performed the Ashvamedha ritual to legitimize his right to rule. Inscriptions of the Shungas have been found as far as the Ayodhya (the Dhanadeva–Ayodhya inscription), and the Divyavadana mentions that his empire stretched as far as Sakala (now Sialkot) in the northwestern Punjab region. Buddhist texts claim that Pushyamitra persecuted Buddhists; scholars have rejected these claims. According to the Puranas, Pushyamitra became the king after killing his master Brihadratha, the last Mauryan king. However, the Buddhist text Divyavadana names Pushyamitra as the last Mauryan king. This text appears to have confused Brihadratha with Pushyamitra. H. C. Raychaudhuri theorized that the name "Shunga" is derived from the Sanskrit word for the fig tree. Buddhist texts claim that Pushyamitra cruelly persecuted the Buddhists. The earliest source to mention this is the 2nd Century CE text Ashokavadana (a part of Divyavadana). According to this account, Pushyamitra (described as the last Mauryan king) wanted to be famous. His ministers advised him that as long as Buddhism remained the dominant faith, he would never be as famous as his ancestor Ashoka, who had commissioned 84,000 stupas. One advisor told him that he could become famous by destroying Buddhism. Pushyamitra then tried to destroy the Kukkutarama monastery, but it was saved by chance. He then proceeded to Shakala in the north-west, where he offered a prize of one hundred Roman denarii (coins) for every head of a Buddhist monk brought to him. Next, he proceeded to the Koshthaka kingdom, where a Buddhist yaksha named Damshtranivasin killed him and his army with help of another yaksha named Krimisha.