… there was nothing “private” about either the king’s support of Buddhist communities, or the claims and requests that Buddhist intellectuals made of the king.

[Nāgārjuna] justifies his condescension to the king by his personal affection for him, as well as his compassion for the world, which would presumably be affected by the king’s policies

… the land granted by Gautamīputra Śrī Sātakarṇi did not produce the revenue it was intended to produce, because “the land is not cultivated and the village is not inhabited.” In exchange, another plot of land was granted, this time measuring 100 nivartanas

… a grant was made by Vāsiṣṭhīputra Śrī Puḷumāvi at Nāsik, but this land, too, had to be exchanged for a more productive village three years after the original gift. […] In all of these cases, the land appears to have been intended to provide Buddhist communities with rents

… the edicts [also] reserve the exclusive right to consume the natural produce of a “religious wilderness” to the ascetics who live there. In one of them a prohibition can be read: “…a non-ascetic is not to stay”

Buddhist structures were a major and conspicuous presence in almost all of the major Sātavāhana towns

… precisely because it was not the religion of the state, it took on some of the roles that are associated with civil society

… this kind of cultural hegemony might have been one of the main reasons why rulers, even those who might have been personally hostile to Buddhism, supported them.