Answer the following questions in one or two words/sentences.
1. Why did the Pallava ruler of Kanchi form a confederacy against Samudragupta?
2. Why did Samudragupta not annex the south Indian kingdoms after defeating them?
3. Why did the frontier states of eastern and western India surrender to Samudragupta
4. Why did Samudragupta perform the Ashvamedha yagna?
5. What was the extent of Samudragupta's empire?
Answers
Answer:
1. The Pallava ruler of Kanchi form a confederacy against Samudragupta because he realized that he could not face Samudragupta alone. So he formed a confederacy of the kings of South India under his leadership.
2. Samudragupta. did not annex the south Indian kingdoms because he realized it would not be easy to control such a vast empire without proper transport and communication facilities.
3.The frontier states of east and the west surrender to Samundragupta because the ruler of these states accepted him as their overlord and paid large sum of money as a tribute.
4. He performed the Ashvamedha Yagna to mark his imperial sovereignty and in order to remain victorious all his life. The Ashvamedha Yagna is a ritual of horse sacrifice in which a horse along with the warriors of the king were released for a year
5. Thus, Samudragupta's campaign expanded the Gupta Empire far and wide. In the east, it included the whole of Bengal except its southeastern part. In the north, the confines of the empire ran along the Himalayas. In the west, it extended up to Punjab.