1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Vikramaditya

VIKRAMADITYA, a legendary Hindu king of Uzjain, who is supposed to have given his name to the Vikram Samvat, the era which is used all over northern India, except in Bengal, and at whose court the “nine gems” of Sanskrit literature are also supposed to have flourished. The Vikram era is reckoned from the vernal equinox of the year 57 B.C., but there is no evidence that that date corresponds with any event in the life of an actual king. As a matter of fact, all dates in this era down to the 10th century never use the word Vikram, but that of Malava instead, that being the tribe that gives its name to Malwa. The name Vikramaditya simply means “sun of power,” and was adopted by several Hindu kings, of whom Chandragupta II. (Chandragupta Vikramaditya), who ascended the throne of the Guptas about A.D. 375, approaches most nearly to the legend.

See Alexander Cunningham, Book of Indian Eras (1883); and Vincent Smith, Early History of India, 1904).