Maharaja Ikshvaku

Ikshvaku, son of Vaivasvata Manu, is the first king of Ayodhya and the founder of the Solar dynasty, which is also named after him. Vasishtha's recital of the line to King Janaka calls him the first king of Ayodhya [Ramayana, Bala Kanda 70]. Families who give Ikshvaku as their gotra, and the Suryavanshi clans, trace their descent to him.

The Vishnu Purana [IV.2] and the Bhagavata Purana [9.6.4] say he was born from Manu's nostril when Manu sneezed, and that he had a hundred sons. Three are named as the chief ones: Vikukshi, Nimi and Dandaka. The Vishnu Purana says fifty of the rest, under Shakuni, guarded the northern countries and forty-eight were princes of the south. The Valmiki Ramayana [Bala Kanda 70] gives his son as Kukshi, and Vikukshi as Kukshi's son. The Puranas make Vikukshi the son. The lists differ, and nothing settles it.

His name is old. Rigveda 10.60.4 is the only Rigvedic verse that names him, and scholars take it as the earliest mention. Buddhist and Jain writers explain the name from ikshu, sugar-cane. Modern scholars do not agree on where the word comes from: some read it as Indo-Aryan, others as borrowed from a non-Aryan language.

The line is claimed by more than one tradition. Pali texts call him Okkaka and trace the Shakya clan, and so the Buddha, to him; the Vishnu Purana [IV.22] lists Shakya, Shuddhodana and Ratula (Rahula) among his later descendants. Jain tradition counts Rishabhanatha, the first Tirthankara, in the Ikshvaku family. Hemachandra's Trishashtishalakapurusha-charitra says Ikshvaku was the family name taken when Shakra offered Rishabha a stalk of sugar-cane, and most of the Tirthankaras are said to be born in the line, the exceptions being Munisuvrata and Neminatha.

A separate dynasty, the Ikshvakus of Andhra, ruled from Vijayapuri (Nagarjunakonda) in the 3rd and early 4th centuries CE. Its founder was Vasishthiputra Chamtamula. The name is a claim of descent from the legendary line; the two are not the same family.

1. Son of Manu: born of Vaivasvata Manu, in the Puranas from his sneeze.
2. First king of Ayodhya: he founds the kingdom on the Sarayu. Vasishtha's recital in the Ramayana names him as the first of the Ayodhya kings.
3. Father of a hundred sons: in the Puranas his sons found many royal lines. Nimi founds Videha. After he dies the sages produce the first Janaka from his body, and the Janakas of Mithila follow [Vishnu Purana IV.5].
4. Vikukshi the hare-eater: while hunting for the offering to the ancestors, Vikukshi ate a hare. The priest Vasishtha declared the food impure, and Vikukshi was called Shashada, "hare-eater". His son Puranjaya succeeded him [Vishnu Purana IV.2].
5. The line to Rama: through Kakutstha, Mandhatri, Harishchandra, Sagara, Bhagiratha, Raghu and Dasharatha the line reaches Rama.

• Ayodhya on the Sarayu: the capital of Kosala.
• Videha (Mithila): the kingdom his son Nimi founds, in what is now north Bihar.