Match List – I with List – II.

Choose the correct answer from the options given below:

(A) - (II), (B) - (I), (C) - (IV), (D) - (III)

The correct answer is Option (1) - (A) - (II), (B) - (I), (C) - (IV), (D) - (III)

The correct match is:

Explanation:

Colossal statues of Kushana rulers have been found installed in a shrine at Mat near Mathura (Uttar Pradesh). Similar statues have been found in a shrine in Afghanistan as well. Some historians feel this indicates that the Kushanas considered themselves godlike. Many Kushana rulers also adopted the title devaputra, or “son of god”,  possibly inspired by Chinese rulers who called themselves sons of heaven.

James Prinsep, an officer in the mint of the East India Company, deciphered Brahmi and Kharosthi, two scripts used in the earliest inscriptions and coins. He found that most of these mentioned a king referred to as Piyadassi – meaning “pleasant to behold”; there were a few inscriptions which also referred to the king as Asoka, one of the most famous rulers known from Buddhist texts.

The Prayaga Prashasti (also known as the Allahabad Pillar Inscription) composed in Sanskrit by Harishena, the court poet of Samudragupta, arguably the most powerful of the Gupta rulers (c. fourth century CE), is a case in point. The Prayaga Prashasti praises the Gupta ruler Samudragupta.