Around 200 BC, Satavahana dynasty became powerful in Western India. Gautamiputra Shri Satakarni was the most significant ruler of this dynasty. We know about him from an inscription by his mother, Gautami Balashri.
He with other rulers of his dynasty came to be known as Lords of the Dakshinapatha. Dakshinapatha literally refers to the route leading to the South and entire South region was known by this name
Gautamiputra sent his army to the Eastern, Western and Southern coast.

The chiefs did not collect regular taxes instead they:
• demanded and received gifts from people.
• went on military expeditions and collected tribute from neighbouring areas.
• kept some wealth and distributed the rest between supporters, family members, poets etc.

The list of five things we buy from the market:
(i) Books Made in cities.
(ii) Note-books Made in cities.
(iii) Food grains Grown in villages. These are brought by traders from villages.
(iv) Vegetables Grown in villages. These are brought by traders to cities from where these produce.
(v) Garments Made in cities.

Advantages
(i) The sea route was a shorter route.
(ii) The rulers could not demand taxes.
Problems
(i) The ships could be attacked by pirates.
(ii) Sometime weather should be rough at sea.

India had a brisk trade with Roman Empire. The traders took precious stones, spices, especially pepper, gold, and carried them to Rome and sold these to Roman people and got Roman gold coins. With them these coins came to India.

The starting of the Bhakti became Central feature of later Hinduism. It was the time when certain deities were worshipped such as Shiva, Vishnu and Goddesses as Durga. Bhakti refers to a persons's devotion to his or her chosen deity. Anybody could follow the path of Bhakti, be it rich or poor, people belonging to 'high' or 'low' caste, man or woman. The concept of Bhakti is also present in sacred book of the Hindus i.e. 'Bhagavad Gita', included in the Mahabharata. This type of worship spread to various parts of the country. The people who followed Bhakti focused on devotion and individual worship of a God or Goddess and not on the performance of elaborate sacrifices.

Each pilgrim left experiences of their journies
• They wrote about the dangers they faced and experiences during their travels to the
 countries and the monasteries.
• They wrote about the books they carried back with them
• Xuan Zang went back China through the land route. He carried statues of Buddha made of
gold, silver and sandalwood
• He also took about 600 manuscripts loaded on about 20 horses He spent his life converting the manuscripts from Sanskrit to Chinese.
• Fa Xian also took many manuscripts with him He also gave us detailed description of his journey and contemporary Indian society.

Buddhism spread to Western and Southern India and caves were made out of hills for monks to live in. The caves were made on the order of kings and queens and also some of the caves are made by farmers and merchants.
Location of the caves were near passes through the Western Ghats. There were roads connecting these ports with cities in the Deccan ran through these passes. The traders used to stop in these caves while they were travelling. Buddhism also spread South Eastwards to Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand and other parts of South-East Asia including Indonesia. But Theravada Buddhism, the older form of Buddhism was more popular in these areas.