North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE CHANDELLAS OF JEJAKABHUKTI

GWĀLIOR STONE INSCRIPTION OF THE TIME OF MAHĪPĀLA

in a good state of preservation and indicates that the letters were beautifully formed and carefully engraved. Their average size with the mātrās is between l.2 and l.5 cms.

The characters are Nāgarī of the beginning of the twelfth century A.C. and show a sort of affinity with those of the preceding inscription which too is from the same place ; but some of the forms of letters of the present inscription are rather archaic. To note some of their peculiarities, we find that g and ṭh, when subscripts of a conjunct consonant, lose their vertical ; see respectively, -aṅga, l. 1 and kaṇṭha- and adhishṭhāya, both in l. 2, but there are exceptions, e.g., the akshara g retains its vertical in –aṅgināṁ-, l. 5. Th is represented by two hollow circles placed vertically and sometimes assuming the form of the modern sh, as in patha and Manōratha, both in l. 4. The letter ṇṇ appears as ṇl, for which see –arṇṇava-, l. 5. N is by mistake often engraved as t ; cf. Manōratha and vipināṁvu, both in l. 4. The slightly different varieties of the form of r, as noted while editing the preceding inscription, may be illustrated in dharitrīṁ, l. 2, where the letter shows a wedge, in kurutē, l. 3, where a horizontal stroke is attached to the left of the vertical, and in kshatriya, l. 2, where it appears almost as modern. This very letter, when the latter member of a conjunct consonant, is sometimes complete with the preceding letter half-drawn, as in kshatriya, and is sometimes shown by a serif, as in pratāpa, both these words to be found in l. 2.

The language is Sanskrit ; and with the exception of the concluding portion containing the date, the record in its preserved portion is composed in verses. In all there are 24 stanzas, composed in different metres ; and the rare metres like Bhujaṅgaprayāta and Pṛithvī, and Atitōṭaka, which is still seldom to be seen, have been used, showing the poet’s skill in versification. The verses are not numbered, but are marked in the end by two vertical strokes and their first halves are marked by one vertical stroke, as usual.

With respect to orthography, we notice (1) the use of the sign of v to denote b as well, e.g., in vabhau, l. 2 ; (2) reduplication of a consonant following r, as in vārttā, l. 3 ; (3) the use of the dental sibilant in place of the palatal to be found only five times in the extant portion of the record, viz., in –asmavēsma, l. 5, visadī-, l. 6, and śasvat, occurring twice in l. 7 ; (4) the sporadic use of the pṛishṭha- and the ūrdhva-mātrās ; (5) the tendency to use a para-savarṇa more often than an anusvāra ; (6) the use of h for gh in aṅghri, l. 2 ; and (7) the marking of final consonants regularly, including m, which is rightly used at the end of a word, excepting only two instances showing its wrong use by its change to an anusvāra at the end of both the hemistiches in verse 21.

The object of the inscription is to record the construction of a temple dedicated to Hara (Śiva), by Āśāchandra, who is said to have been a younger brother of Madhusūdana, a son of Māṇichandra and a grandson of Manōratha of the Māthura Kāyastha clan, who was in charge of recording the income and expenditure of king Bhuvanapāla. The date of the pratishṭhā of the temple when the liṅga was set up in it, is recorded in words in the last line ; it was the sixth day of the bright half of the month of Māgha when eleven hundred and sixty-one years had elapsed from the time of the king Vikrama. The date cannot be verified ; but taking the year to be the Chaitrādi Vikrama expired (atīta), it corresponds to Tuesday, 5th January, 1104 A.C., when the tithi ended ar ∙45 after mean sunrise, and for the Kārttikādi, to Monday, 23rd January, 1105 A.C., when the tithi ended at ∙55 after mean sunrise.

As stated above, the inscription is fragmentary. Its contents, as can be known from the extant portion thereof, may now be reviewed briefly. The first stanza, of which only the third quarter is preserved, introduces a king of the name of Bhuvanapāla, and the second, which too is fragmentary, mentions his son whose name is unfortunately lost.¹ Stanza 3 is rather better preserved ; it gives the name of Padmapāla and states that he was a grandson of Bhuvanapāla and a son of Dēvapāla, thus supplying the name which has been lost in the second stanza.² This
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¹ The beginning too may have contained a sentence in prose paying obeisance to Śiva ; this portion too is now lost.
² Verse 2 has the reading “aparājitaḥ” at the end of the hemistiches ; and, as observed by D. R. Bhandarkar, it is possible to take Aparājita as an elder brother of Dēvapāla, or, as the Yamaka shows a biruda of Dēvapāla himself, whose name occurs in stanza 3. See his List of Inscriptions, No. 169, n. Bhuvanapāla is the same as Mūladēva of the preceding record, as said in its verse 12.