North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE CHANDELLAS OF JEJAKABHUKTI

each. The size of the letters ranges between 2 and 3 cms.; some of them are bigger than others, causing confusing in the reading. The record has also suffered from weather and some of the letters are damaged.

The characters are Nāgarī of the twelfth century A.D. With respect to palaeography, attention may be invited to the form of ch with an angular loop, see charaṇa-, l. 2 ; to the form of ṇ in the same example ; to that of dh which has developed a horn on its left limb, as in sūtradhāra, l. 7 ; to r which generally ends in a sharp tail, as in the same word ; and finally, to the mediaeval ū attached to r below, e.g., in rūpakara, ll. 7-8.

The language of the record is Sanskrit and it is entirely in prose, though there are some examples appearing as parts of verses, e.g., dhīmān-dharmma-parāyaṇō- in l. 3, which is the begin- ning of a foot of the Śārdūlavikṛīḍita metre, and Dēva-Śrī Nīlakaṇṭhasya, in ll. 6-7, which appears as a complete foot of the Anushṭubh metre. With respect to orthography, we may note the occasional use of the dental for the palatal sibilant, as in paramēsvara, l. 1, but not in Śrī throughout ; that of the sign for b to denote v also, as in –amvuja, l. 2, the reduplication of a consonant following r, e.g., in –varmma-, l. 2, and in one example the preceding t in –puttra, l. 5. Sandhi is not observed in Śrī-Udana in l. 6, and the influence of Prakrit while giving the names is also visible, as in Vachchha for Vatsa in l. 5. It may also be observed here that the person who prepared the draft of the document had a very poor knowledge of Sanskrit ; more in this concern will be said below, while studying its contents.

The record refers itself to the illustrious Madanavarman, the supreme lord of Kālañjar, who is endowed with the royal titles and is also called to have been a zealous devotee of Mahēśvara. The object of it is to record the installation of an image of Nīlakaṇṭha ; and the date, as given in the numerical figures only, is the eighth day of the bright half of kārttika of the (Vikrama) era, 1188, on Saturday. Kielhorn calculated the date and found it equivalent to 31st October, 1131 A.C. when there was a Saturday.^[1] Thus the date is quite regular and the year was Chaitradi expired.

The date of the record has no special interest since we know the Chandēlla Madanavarman to have occupied the throne from 1129 to 1163 A.C. And to summarise the contents of the record, we find that both Maisey and Cunningham expressed a wide difference of opinion, since the language used here is such as not to enable one to interpret the expressions quite satisfactorily, as to be seen below. Here it may also be observed, however, that both these scholars have missed the prominent floral design at the end of l. 5, which affords great help in solving the problem, showing the end of the first or the historical part of the inscription, as we find in several other cases which have often been noted by us. Here is introduced one Vatsaraja of the Kumara family, who is described as a son of Mahārāja, a general and a son of Sōlhaṇa. As his father’s name is explicitly mentioned to be Sōlhaṇa, he cannot be taken identical with Kīrtivarman’s general Vatsarāja mentioned in the Dēogaḍh inscription of the time of the king as a son of Mahīdhara.^[2] But from the tenor of the record he appears to have been a military officer under Madanavarman and governing some region around Kālañjar.

Here ends the first part of the inscription, separated by the flowery design, as stated above. But the expression occurring in the second part of it, viz., about the name of the deity whose image was installed and also about the persons who did it have been differently understood by both the above-named scholars. For example, whereas Cunningham took the image as of Lakshmīdhara, Maisey read the name as Varadā ; and following the rubbing before me, I agree with Cunningham in this respect, as to be shown below in the text. As for the names of the persons who installed the image, we find that whereas Maisey took them to be two persons, viz., Raja Dēva and Sōluṇa, Cunningham took them more in number. But considering that each of the names has a punctuation mark (daṇḍa) at its end, I am inclined to take the names as two, viz., kavi-Ghayaṁka-Achchhōda and the illustrious Rāüta Udana. After this the inscription tells us that the image was made by the mason (rūpakāra) Lāhaḍa, the son of the illustrious
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^[1] Ind. Ant., Vol. XIX, p. 23, No. 6.
^[2] Above, No. III, v. 5.