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The Indian Analyst
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North Indian Inscriptions |
INSCRIPTIONS OF THE CHANDELLAS OF JEJAKABHUKTI MAHŌBĀ COPPER-PLATE INSCRIPTION OF PARAMARDIDĒVA No. 130 ; PLATE CXVII MAHŌBĀ COPPER-PLATE INSCRIPTION OF PARAMARDIDĒVA [Vikrama] Year 1230 THE copper-plates which bear this inscription are stated to have been discovered in about 1920, in course of digging for earth to build a house, at Mahōba in the Hamīrpur District of Uttar Pradesh. The inscription was edited, with lithographs, by Rai Bahadur Hiralal in the Epigraphia Indica, Vol. XVI (1921-22), pp. 9 ff. The present whereabouts of the plates are not known, and no fresh impressions of the same are now possible ; and hence the record is edited here from the lithographs accompanying Hiralal’s article. The plates are two in number and about their discovery Hiralal has stated that they were “deposited in a stone-chest, about 30’ (9∙14 metres) below the surface. They were strung together with a ring having a seal, which the finder took for a lock and broke, inferring from the figure of Gajalakshmī (Goddess of wealth) in the middle of the first four lines, that the record dealt with some hidden treasure”. Each of the plates measured 39∙6 by 30∙5 cms. and their weight, as recorded by him, is equal to 3∙173 kilograms. The rims of both the plates are said to have been bordered with flat copper strips, about 6 cms. in breadth, fastened with nails ; and on cleaning, both the plates were found to be in a good state of preservation, as is also shown by the lithographs.
The record consists of 33 lines, 16 of which are inscribed on the first plate, and the remaining 17 on the second. The characters are of the Nāgarī alphabet, and generally resemble those of the Sēmrā and Ichchhāvar grants,1 which were written and engraved by the same persons as of the present grant ; and the palaeographical peculiarities are therefore almost the same. To pick up some examples from the present grant, we find that the vowel ē is formed as p ; see ēsha- in l. 7 ; the consonant ṅ continues to be devoid of its dot, as in –aṅka-,1. 16 ; Ch, dh and v are often not clearly distinguished, though dh in several cases shows a horn on its left limb, as in virōdhi, l. 2, but not in vadhū-, l. 7. R also occasionally resembles v, as in Viśvēśvara, l. 1, and its different form is to be noted in ṭhakkura, l. 21. The palatal ś sometimes begins with a loop and at others without it ; see Viśvēśvara, l. 1, where we have both the instances side by side. A notable peculiarity is that occasionally some of the letters are formed with their bends angular, e.g., v in vidhivat, l. 17, and shashṭyanvitā and pūrvva- both in l. 12. So far as technical execution is concerned, the letters are clear, but we find here the same type of mistakes as in the Sēmrā and other grants which were engraved by the same mason, e.g., often omitting parts of letters, the mātrās, and the signs of anusvāra and visarga, etc., as also noted by Hiralal. For example, m is cut as g in bhūmi-, l. 29 ; shṇ as pn in Kṛishṇa-, l. 16 ; v as ṭ in vijāyī, l. 6 and shṭ as vṛi in –chatushṭaya, l. 11. The transcript below will show slips of this type, all through. The language is Sanskrit ; and except for a verse in the beginning and two in ll. 30-33, which are all not numbered, the record is all in prose. As regards orthography, we may note the use of (1) v to denote b, e.g., in Vrāhmaṇa, l. 13 ; (2) of the dental for the palatal sibilant, and vice versa ; see sākhā-, and Śāṅkṛitya-, both in l. 20 ; (3) the doubling of a class-consonant after r, as in nirmmala-, l. 8 ; (4) the change of anusvāra to m as in samvat, l. 16 ; (5) the use of the pṛishṭhamātrā, and finally, not marking the final consonant in ll. 31 and 33. It is a royal charter, issued by the Chandēlla king Paramardin, the lord of Kālañjara ; and
its object is not record the bestowal of some land in the village Dhanaura, falling in the territorial
division of Ērachha, by the king, in order to promote the religious benefit of his parents as
of himself, from his temporary residence at a village named Gahilū (ll. 8-15). The date of the
record, as mentioned both in words and figures in ll. 16-17, is the fourth day of the dark half of
Māgh of 1230, Tuesday, when the Sun entered the zodiacal sign Makara. This date must plainly
be referred to the Vikrama era, and as calculated by Hiralal, it regularly corresponds to 25th of | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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