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PART B
TRANSLATION :
The dhenachhaka (?) at the foot of (Mount) Naḍoda.
Barua-Sinha boldly identify dhenachhako with dhonasākho which in J. 353, 4 seems to be
a name of the banyan tree. The meaning of dhonasākha is obscure. Instead of dhona- the
Ceylonese manuscripts read also yona- and dona-, the Burmese manuscripts constantly vena-, and I should consider it not quite improbable that the original reading was poṇasākho = Sk.
pravaṇaśākhaḥ, ‘ with sloping branches ’. But even granting that dhena- of the inscription
is a misreading for dhona-, or that dhona- of the Pāli text is a corruption of dhena-, it
seems to me impossbile that –chhako should be the equivalent of P. –sākho, Sk. –śākhaḥ. As
we know from the inscriptions Nos. B 73 and B 74 several things producing miracles such as
a jambū tree granting food and a tattered cloth that could be milked, existed on Mount
Naḍoda, and one might be tempted to take dhenachhako as a misreading for dhenuchhako, which may represent dhenūtsakaḥ, the ‘ cow-well ’, i.e. a well which yielded milk like a cow;
but in the absence of the sculpture all conjectures are practically futile.
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