Pushyamitra Shunga's Coup
In 185 BCE Pushyamitra Shunga, senapati (commander-in-chief) of the enfeebled Mauryan army, killed the emperor Brihadratha during a military review and founded the Shunga dynasty in his place. The coup drew on a Brahmin backlash against two generations of Buddhist-favouring royal patronage that had eroded Brahminical access to grants and exemptions. Shunga is reported to have performed the ashvamedha horse sacrifice — a Brahminical royal legitimation ritual abandoned under Ashoka — signalling that the seizure of power was an explicit counter-reformation. The coup ended the first pan-Indian empire and exposed the limits of personal-authority governance once Ashoka's combination of military and religious legitimacy could no longer be reproduced by his successors.
- Year: 185 BCE
- Category: Political
