South Indian Inscriptions

INCRIPTIONS OF THE KALACHURIS OF TRIPURI

The language is Sanskrit. The first twenty-two lines contain twenty-four verses composed in the kāvya style, eulogizing the donor and his ancestors. They are followed by a prose portion (11.22-31), containing the formal part of the grant and the usual benedictive and imprecatory verses (11.31-44). The record ends with the mention of the writer’s name and the customary blessing, mangalam mahā-śrīh. The following orthographical peculiarities may also be noticed:- the palatal ś is generally written as the dental s (see, e.g., -rāsi- -sat-ōpabhōgyā-, both in 1.3), while the reverse also occurs in two places, -bhāsi, 1.19 and śalila-, 1.38; the sign for v is everywhere employed to denote b, see Vrahmanē, 1.1 and avdhi-, 1.2 the consonant following r is often reduplicated, see chamdr-ārkka-, 1.14 svarggē, 1.36; finally, the anusvāra before the dental s is wrongly changed to n in –vansa-, 1.6.

The plates were issued by Yaśahkarna of the Later Kalachuri Dynasty. His pedigree is traced to Vishnu. After the mythological and legendary ancestors Brahmā, Atri, the moon, Purūravas, Bharata and Kārtavīrya, the first historical personage mentioned here is Yuvarājadēva, who is identical with the second prince of that name mentioned in the Bilhāri stone inscription and the Banaras plates of Karna. His son Kōkalla (II) is said to have been placed on the throne by the chief ministers of the realm. Kōkkala’s son was Gāngēyadeva who became famous as Vikramāditya. In the course of his description we are told that wishing to run away from him the king of Kuntala ceased to wield his spear.¹ Gāngeya foot of the banyan tree at Prayāga. His son and successor was Karnadēva who constructed at Banaras a high temple which he named Karnamēru² after himself. He also established a settlement of the Brāhmanas called Karnāvāti He married a Hūna princess named Āvalladēvī. From her he had a son named Yaśahkarna whom he himself crowned king. Yaśahkarna routed the Andhra king and worshipped the god Bhīmēśvara near the Gōdavari.

The present plates were granted at Banaras³ by Yaśahkarna who is described in the formal portion exactly like his father Karna in the Goharwa plates. They record the royal donation of the village Deulā-Pañchēla situated in the pattalā of Dēvagrāma in the uddēśa (district?) of Vāsudēva. The done was a Brāhmana named Gangādhara, the son of Chhītapai and grandson of Sīā, who belonged to the Kānva gōtra with three pravaras,⁴ and was a student of the Rigvēda. The grant was made on the occasion of a sankrānti on Sunday, the fourteenth tithi of the bright fortnight of Phālguna in the year 823 (expressed in numerical figures only) of an unspecified era. The record was written by Vāchchhūka, the writer of religious documents.

The date of the present grant must evidently be referred to the Kalachuri era, but the details do not work out correctly. The fourteenth tithi of the bright fortnight of Phālguna in the Kalachuri year 823, if we take it to be expired as usual, fell on the 6th March 1072 A.C., when the week-day was Tuesday, not Sunday as required. Besides of that year which was a Wednesday. Taking the year as current, we find that the aforementioned tithi fell on Wednesday (the 16th February 1071 A.C), and not on Sunday
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¹Hiralal took the sentence yasmād….. va(ba) bhāra to mean that Gāngēyadēva restored Kuntala to its king (Ep. Ind., Vol. XII, p.207). But his interpretation is wrong, see below p.207, n.4. The king of Kuntala defeated by Gāngēyadēva was probably Jayasimha-Jagadēkamalla, who ruled from about 1015 to 1042 A.C. and was thus a contemporary of Gāngēyadēva.
²See below, p.297, n.5.
³See the words ‘here in Kāsī’ in verse 13 of the text.
⁴Only two of these are named in 11.29-30, viz., Āpla (na)va (vā) na and Jāmadagni (gnya). The third was probably Aurva. See below , p.295, n.6.