Samudragupta

He was married to Dattadevi.

He ruled the Gupta Dynasty till his death in 380 AD and was succeeded by his son, Chandragupta II, also known as Vikramaditya, under whom the Empire continued to prosper and flourish.

Samudragupta was born as the son of King Chandragupta I, founder of the Gupta Dynasty, and his Licchavi princess, Kumaradevi.

He was declared the next ruler of the Gupta Dynasty by his father a few years before the latter’s death. However, the decision was not accepted by the rivals to the throne and hence, led to a struggle, which Samudragupta ultimately won.

He ascended the throne as the second emperor of the Gupta Dynasty in 335 AD and began his journey of invading the neighboring kingdoms to increase his influence and conquer as many parts of India as possible.

To start off with, he succeeded in sujugating his immediate neighbors – Achyuta Naga from Ahichchatra, Naga Sena from Padmavati and Ganapati Naga from Mathura, marking his victory over the three major northern powers.

He restored southern kings as tributary kings after defeating them, thereby becoming a real statesman and adopted the ‘Dharma Vijaya’ policy as against the ‘Digvijaya’ prevailing in the north.

Since the southern kings were given their authority and supremacy to rule their kingdoms, he shifted complete focus on expanding his empire in the north, following which his second northern campaign began.

The war, which started for the control the northern basin, stretching from present-Allahabad to the borders of Bengal, ended with the entire Ganges Valley, Assam, Nepal, and parts of east Bengal, Punjab, and Rajasthan falling into his kitty.

While embarking on his southern campaign, he traveled along the Bay of Bengal conquering 12 princes in the districts of coastal Odisha, Godavari, Ganjam, Vishakhapatnam, Nellore, Krishna and reaching as far as Kancheepuram.

He defeated and extinguished the kingdoms of nine kings, namely, Matila, Nagadatta, Ganapati Naga, Nandin, Rudradeva, Balavarman, Naga Sena, and Achyuta, and subjugated 12 more in Aryavata to increase the extent of the Gupta Empire.