North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE CHANDELLAS OF JEJAKABHUKTI

GARRĀ COPPER-PLATE INSCRIPTIONS OF TRAILŌKYAVARMAN

No. 141 ; PLATE CXXVIII

GARRĀ COPPER-PLATE INSCRIPTIONS OF TRAILŌKYAVARMAN

[ Vikrama ] Year 1261

THESE two copper-plates, each of which bears a complete record in itself, are stated to have been found in a tank near the village of Garrā (locally known as Gaḍhā), situated to the south-east of Chhatarpur, formerly the capital of a State and now the chief town of a tehsīl and district of the same name in the Vindhya region of Madhya Pradesh. The places were sent by Pt. Shukdeo Bihari Mishra, then the Diwān of the State, to Rao Bahadur K. N. Dikshit, who edited both the inscriptions together, with lithographs, in the Epigraphia Indica, Vol. XVI (for 1921-22), pp. 272 ff., and while doing so, he also stated that the plates were then “exhibited on loan in the Provincial Museum, Lucknow”. Despite my constant attempts, however, I failed to know anything about the plates, and as fresh impressions could not be obtained, I edit the inscriptions here from the facsimiles accompanying K. N. Dikshit’s article.¹

The plates measure 34∙2 by 20∙95 cms. and 32∙38 by 20 cms., respectively. Each plate is inscribed on one side only, and each of them has a small round hole of the diameter of ∙95 cm., at the top, indicating that originally they were held together by a ring, which is now missing. In the middle of the first four lines on each of them is engraved the figure of the seated goddess Lakshmī, with four arms, holding a lotus in each of the upper hands, as we find on the Chandēlla charters. The writing on both the plates is protected by flat copper-bands, about ∙95 cm. in breadth and ∙3 to ∙45 cm. in thickness, rivetted along the edges of the inscribed surface, approach- ing quite close to it and sometimes hiding beneath them a letter or two and completely also the last line on the first plate. The writing is well preserved, as to be judged from the facsimiles. Each of the records consists of 17 lines, but the last line on the second plate is damaged. The plates are stated to weigh 124 and 122 tolas, approximating to 1 kgm. and 45 grms., and 1 kgm. and 43 grms., respectively.

The characters are of the Nāgarī alphabet. They are slightly advanced than those of the Sēmrā grant of Paramardin, with the Mahōbā and Bhārat Kalā Bhavan grants of the same king marking the intermediate state.² The noteworthy peculiarity of the alphabet in which these plates are engraved, is that the angular forms of the aksharas of the chronologically preceding inscriptions give place to their round forms. To note some of the more progressive forms of letters in the present inscriptions, the vowel i gives us its earliest form of the modern Nāgarī; see iva-, ll. 1 and 2, respectively (of both the plates); the vowel ē continues to be much similar to the consonant p, cf. ēsha-, ll. 5 and 6, respectively; the left-hand limb of kh begin with a loop as we have in the palatal ś see khani, l. 13 (first plate); ch has occasionally developed an angular loop, as in chāṭa-, l. 10 (Second plate); dh, with its horn developed, has assumed its form as in the modern Nāgarī, see madhūka-, l. 13; and lastly, r occasionally resembles ch, as in rā (rāüta), l. 11 (second plate).

The language is Sanskrit, which is almost correct and except for one verse in the beginning and one towards the end, each of the inscriptions is in prose throughout. The orthography presents more or less the same peculiarities as to be found in the contemporary inscriptions, e.g., (1) the use of the same sign to denote v and b; (2) the occasional reduplication of a class-consonant following r. (3) the wrong use of the consonant m for anusvāra in samavidita-¸ l. 8, but not in saṁvat in ll. 9 and 10, respectively in the first and the second plates ; (4) the correct use of the sibilants, perhaps excepting two instances, viz., -āśana- (for āsana) and –asva- (for aśva), both in l. 13 in each plate. And lastly, we find in ll. 10-11 of the first plate a daṇḍa used to show that the preceding rā is the initial letter of Rāüta.

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¹ Lastly, the plates were known to exist in the Lucknow museum. Subsequently. I had an opportunity to examine the plates in the Museum, and I found that they are not very thick, but the engraving being rather not very deep, the letters do not show themselves through on the reverse side. In the last line of the second plates, parts of letters already put by me in brackets, in the text, are lost with the copper.
² See Nos. 126, 130 and 138, respectively.