Battle Of Sondani

The Battle of Sondani was a large military encounter fought in 528 CE, between the Alchon Hun emperor Mihirakula and a confederation of Indian rulers led by king Yashodharman of Malwa.

Background

The Alchon Huns under their able leader Toramana invaded the mainland of the Indian subcontinent. The Huns extensively weakened the Gupta Empire by their devastating raids. Toramana was finally vanquished with certainty by an Indian ruler of the Aulikara dynasty of Malwa, after nearly 20 years in India. According to the Rīsthal stone-slab inscription, discovered in 1983, King Prakashadharma defeated Toramana in 515 CE. The First Hunnic War thus ended with a Hunnic defeat, and Hunnic troops apparently retreated to the area of Punjab.

Mihirakula, the eldest son and successor of Toramana, again invaded India. He was even crueler and caused more destruction than his predecessor. Yashodharman, the ruler of Malwa and the son of King Prakashadharma, created an alliance with the other Indian rulers to defeat the Huns.

Result

A confederacy of Indian rulers led by Yashodharman, and possibly even supported by the Gupta emperor Narasimhagupta, decisively defeated the Hunnic armies at Sondani in 528 CE.

This resulted in the loss of Alchon possessions in the Punjab and north India by 542. The Sondani inscription in Sondani, near Mandsaur, records the submission by the Hunas, and claims that Yasodharman had rescued the earth from rude and cruel kings,"The earth betook itself (for succour), when it was afflicted by kings of the present age, who manifested pride; who were cruel through want of proper training; who,from delusion, transgressed the path of good conduct; (and) who were destitute of virtuous delights " from and that he "had bent the head of Mihirakula". In a part of the Sondani inscription Yasodharman thus praises himself for having defeated king Mihirakula:Coin Cabinet of the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna
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The Gupta Empire emperor Narasimhagupta is also credited in helping repulse Mihirakula, after the latter had conquered most of India, according to the reports of Chinese monk Xuanzang.

In a fanciful account, Xuanzang, who wrote a century later in 630 CE, reported that Mihirakula had conquered all India except for an island where the king of Magadha named Baladitya (who could be Gupta ruler Narasimhagupta Baladitya) took refuge, but that was finally captured by the Indian king. He later spared Mihirakula's life on the intercession of his mother, as she perceived the Hun ruler "as a man of remarkable beauty and vast wisdom". Mihirakula is then said to have returned to Kashmir to retake the throne.

Aftermath

After the war was over, Yashodharman conquered vast territories and established a short-lived empire.

In the Mandsaur pillar inscription, Yashodharman claims he vanquished his enemies and now controls the territory from the neighbourhood of the (river) Lauhitya (Brahmaputra River) to the "Western Ocean" (Western Indian Ocean), and from the Himalayas to mountain Mahendra.Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum Vol
p.145
/ref>Foreign Influence on Ancient India by Krishna Chandra Saga
p.216
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Yashodharman thus conquered vast territories from the Hunas and the Guptas,Tribal Culture, Faith, History And Literature, Narayan Singh Rao, Mittal Publications, 200
p.18
/ref> although his short-lived empire would ultimately disintegrate between c. 530-540 CE.

References

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Malwa