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20 of Chandragupta Maurya, as determined by his identification with Sandrakottos, the contemporary of Seleukos Nikator, according to Greek authors. By the subsequent establishment of the synchronism of Chandragupta's grandson, Asoka, with Antiochos Theos, grandson of Seleukos, and four other Hellenistic princes, the chronology of the Maurya dynasty was placed upon a firm basis, and it is no longer open to doubt in its main outlines.

A great step in advance was gained by Doctor Fleet's determination of the Gupta era, which had been the subject of much wild conjecture. His demonstration that the year 1 of that era is 319-20 fixed the chronological position of a most important dynasty, and reduced chaos to order. Fa-hien's account of the civil administration of the Ganges provinces at the beginning of the fourth century thus became an important historical document illustrating the reign of Chandragupta II, Vikramaditya, one of the greatest of Indian kings. Most of the difficulties which continued to embarrass the chronology of the Gupta period, even after the announcement of Doctor Fleet's discovery in 1887, have been removed by M. Sylvain Levi's publication of the synchronism of Samudragupta with King Meghavarna of Ceylon (304 to 332 ).

A connected history of the Andhra dynasty has been rendered possible by the establishment of synchronisms between the Andhra kings and the western satraps.

In short, the labours of many scholars have succeeded in tracing in firm lines the outline of the history