Consider the following pairs: King — Dynasty 1. Lakshmikarna : Pala 2. Bhima I : Chalukyas of Gujarat 3. Jayapala : Shahiya dynasty 4. Lalitaditya Muktapida : Utpala dynasty of Kashmir How many pairs given above are correctly matched?

Correct — B, 2. Pairs 2 and 3 are right. Bhima I, who ruled Gujarat from 1022 to 1064 and whose reign saw Mahmud of Ghazni's raid on Somnath, belonged to the Chaulukya or Solanki house that older books call the Chalukyas of Gujarat. Jayapala was the Hindu Shahi ruler of the Kabul valley and the Punjab who fought Sabuktigin and Mahmud and ended his life on a pyre after his defeat. The other two are misfiled. Lakshmikarna, usually simply Karna, was the Kalachuri king of Tripuri and the son of Gangeyadeva, not a Pala of Bengal; and Lalitaditya Muktapida, the eighth-century conqueror who built the Martand sun temple, was a Karkota, the dynasty that preceded the Utpalas of Avantivarman in Kashmir.

• (a)1 — Too few. Bhima I with the Chaulukyas of Gujarat and Jayapala with the Shahis are both standard pairings that appear in every account of the eleventh-century Ghaznavid raids.
• (c)3 — Requires either Lakshmikarna to be a Pala or Lalitaditya to be an Utpala. He was a Kalachuri of Tripuri and Lalitaditya a Karkota, so both of those pairs fail and only two remain.
• (d)4 — Two of the four dynasties are wrong. The Palas ruled Bengal and Bihar and their great names are Dharmapala, Devapala and Mahipala; the Utpalas of Kashmir begin with Avantivarman in 855.

The two centuries before the Turkish conquest are a map of regional houses rather than one empire: Palas in Bengal, Pratiharas and then Chandelas and Kalachuris in the centre, Chaulukyas in Gujarat, Paramaras in Malwa, Karkotas and Utpalas in Kashmir, Shahis on the northwest frontier. Prelims tests this period almost entirely through king-to-dynasty and king-to-monument pairs, because the political narrative is too tangled to ask about directly.

Two of these kings have a hook that fixes them without any list-learning. Jayapala's whole significance is that he stood on the frontier against Ghazni, and 'Shahi' is a frontier word. Lalitaditya is the Kashmiri conqueror of the Martand temple, and Kashmir's dynastic order runs Karkota then Utpala then Lohara — putting him in the second slot moves him about a century too late. Lakshmikarna is the least familiar name of the four, which is exactly why the examiner attached it to the most familiar dynasty on the list.

• Lakshmikarna, son of Gangeyadeva, was the Kalachuri king of Tripuri in the eleventh century.
• Bhima I ruled Gujarat from 1022 to 1064 as a Chaulukya, the house older books call the Chalukyas of Gujarat; Somnath was sacked in his reign.
• Jayapala was the Hindu Shahi ruler defeated by Sabuktigin and Mahmud of Ghazni.
• Lalitaditya Muktapida of the Karkota dynasty ruled Kashmir in the eighth century and built the Martand sun temple.
• The Utpala dynasty of Kashmir begins with Avantivarman in 855, after the Karkotas.

• Reading 'Chalukyas of Gujarat' as an error for the Deccan Chalukyas; it is an accepted name for the Solankis.
• Placing Lalitaditya among the Utpalas because both are Kashmiri dynasties.
• Attaching an unfamiliar king to the most famous dynasty on offer.

A king-to-dynasty count in which the two hardest names carry the two false pairings.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Martand Sun Temple in Kashmir was built by which ruler?

  • (a)Avantivarman
  • (b)Lalitaditya Muktapida
  • (c)Harsha of Kashmir
  • (d)Didda

  Answer(b) Lalitaditya Muktapida — the Karkota king of the eighth century.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Jayapala, defeated by Sabuktigin and Mahmud of Ghazni, belonged to which dynasty?

  • (a)Hindu Shahi
  • (b)Pratihara
  • (c)Chandela
  • (d)Paramara

  Answer(a) Hindu Shahi — the frontier dynasty of the Kabul valley and the Punjab.