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INSCRIPTIONS OF THE MAHISMATI
Om! Hail! From the city of Māhusmati—Mahārāja Subandhu, being in good
health issues the (following)order to Śthānalakas1 (?) Dityōdrāhakas,2 Āyuktakas,Viniyukatakas, Chātas, Bhatas, Gōshthikas3 Gamāgamikas4 Dūtrapreshanikas,5 and others as well as
villagers at . . . . in the pathaka of Dāsilakapalli
(Line 4) Be it known to you that for the increase of the religious merit of my parents
and myself, this village has been granted by me together with udranga6 and uparikara,7 as
an agrahāra according to the maxim of waste land8 in order that it may be used for (defraying the expenses of ) perfume, frankincense, flowers and offerings as well as for Maintaining as alms-house, for reparing broken and rent portions (of the vihāra) and for providing the ommunity of Venerable monks coming from (all) the four quarters with cloth-
ing, food nursing of the sick, beds, seats as well a medicine in the Monastery called
Kalaāyana (the Abode of Art) caused to be constructed by dattaka as long as the moon,
the sun, the oceans, planet, constellations and the earth would endure.
(L.10) Having known this, our officers and rulers of other countries should not
cause obstruction out of their love [for religion] and regard for us, while the monks (of
this Vihāra) are enjoying (the village).
(Here occurs a bendictive and imprecatory verse)
(L. 12) my own command . . . . . . . .in (the month) srāvana…..
(In the margin) Of the Mahārāja Subandhu
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1 I have not come across the name of this officer elsewhere. His name appears like that of the
officer purillaka mentioned in the recently discovered plates of the Rashtrakuta Nannaraja
2 Dityodrahaka was the collector of the royal cess ditya which is mentioned in the records of
the Guriras. for chata and bhata see below, p. 43, n 12
3 Gōsthikas were members of the Managing committee See Ep. Ind., VoI. XXIV, pp. 332 f.
4 Gamāgamaikas were officers who issued passports for agress and ingress. See also No. 25, 1. 19.
5 Dūtaprēshanikas were officers who dispatched dūtas.
6 The meaning of udranga is still uncertain Monier Williams in his Sanskrit Dictionary gives inter aliā
the following meaning:—the place where anything is kept, a store-room or receptacle s-ōdranga in this
sense would correspond to sa-śivarm in 1. 12 of No. 20 . below: but it is noteworthy that it is mentioned
there in addition to the later. S-ōdranga and s-ōparika which occur in a similar context in other
records. In line 17 of the Hyderabad places of western Chālukya king Pulakēśin II (Ind. Ant., VoI.
VI, p. 73) the expression sa-kliptah s-ōparikarah is used in place of s-ōdrangah s-ōparilarah which shows
that udranga has the same meaning as klipta. kautilya’s Artjasastra (second ed. by Shama sastry p. 60)
mentions klipta as one of the sources of royal income. Its derivation from Klip to fix seems to point
to the meaning of ;fixed assessment; Udranga which, as shown above, is a synonym of klipta, has there-
fore probably the meaning of a land-tax.
7 Uparikara is the counterparty of antah-kara or antar-āya, which is mentioned in some southern records. See Ep. Ind., VoI XXII., p. 27 . It seems therefore to denote an external or additional tax, probably levied in kind such as is mentioned in the MSM., adhyāya VII, vv. 130-32 It corresponds to bhōga
mentioned in some early records. Cf. Ep. Ind., VoI. XXII, p. 175 n.
8 Bhūmi-chchidra is explained in the lexicon Vajjayanti as krishy-āgya-bhūb i.e, land unit for cultivation. The person, who brought such land under cultivation by cutting down trees etc., became the owner
of it. Cf. stānu-chchh ēdasya kēdārm in Msm., adb. IX., V. 44. Bhumi-chchhidra-nyayena therefore means
with full propeirtary rights
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