|
The Indian Analyst
|
|
North Indian Inscriptions |
INSCRIPTIONS OF THE CHANDELLAS OF JEJAKABHUKTI
No. 108 ; PLATE C – B CHARKHĀRĪ COPPER-PLATE INSCRIPTION OF DĒVAVARMAN [Vikrama] Year 1108 THIS plate, together with some others,5 is stated to have been in the possession of the ruling Chief of Charkhāri, formerly a State in Bundelkhand, Central India Agency, but now included in the Hamīrpur District of Uttar Pradesh. Its original find-spot is unknown and there is no information as to how and under what circumstances it was obtained. The inscription on it was edited by R. B. Hiralal, with text in Nāgarī characters but without a lithograph, in the Epigraphia Indica, Vol. XX (1929-30), pp. 125 ff.6 It is edited here from an inked estampage kindly furnished by the Chief Epigraphist of the Archaeological Survey of India.7 It is a large plate of copper, with its corners rounded off. Its dimensions, as recorded by Hiralal, are 18¾” by 12⅜” which are equivalent to 47∙63 and 30∙48 cms. respectively, and it is stated to weight 360½ tolas, or 4∙20 kgms. Hiralal described the plate as “surmounted by a copper-hook, 2¾” (6∙85 cms.) long, which is rivetted to it and holds a ring 2⅝” (5∙80 cms.) in diameters”. The plate is inscribed on one side only. The writing covers a space measuring 42 cms.
broad by 28 cms. high and consists of 23 lines, the last of which is only 19∙5 cms. long. At the
top of the plate is engraved a representation of the four-armed goddess Lakshmi, being sprinkled by an elephant holding a pot in its trunk raised up, on either side. The figure is seated
1 Kielhorn explained this as niyat-āniyata, in the sense of ‘fixed and not fixed’. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| > |
|
>
|
, so as to suit the metre.