Chronology of Gujarat

SR No.: 006799
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: M R Majumdar
Publisher: Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda
Publication Year: 1960
Total Pages: 494
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 10 MB

Page 83

B.C.
252-1
15
33
Junagadh Edicts are a set of fourteen rock-edicts of Aśoka incised on a rock situated on the right-hand side leading to the hill, about a mile to the east of modern Junagadh, the headquarter of Surāṣṭra. It is the earliest epigraphic record as yet discovered in Gujarat which is unique for the history of India also, as it bears side by side inscriptions of kings of three dynasties-Aśoka Maurya, Mahākṣatrapa Rudradāman and the Gupta Emperor Skandagupta. It thus reveals a glimpse of the early history of Gujarat from the third century. B.C. to the fifth century A.D.
MAURYAN PERIOD
These Aśokan edicts are incised on the eastern side of the rock. The characters of the edicts are clearly and deeply cut. They are about" in height and uniform in size. A portion of the rock bearing parts of Edicts V and XIII had been blasted with gunpowder to furnish materials for the adjoining road. Two fragments of the missing portion which were discovered later on, are now preserved in the Junagadh Museum.
Since these edicts are inscribed in a form of Prakrit' closely allied to Pāli, containing dialectical peculiarities of the province, and are recorded in the Brahmi alphabet which is the prototpye of almost all modern Indian Scripts unlike those at Shahbazgarhi which are inscribed in the Kharosthi script, it can be presumed that it was current in Gujarat as early as the Mauryan period. The language of this version differs from that of the other versions in using some peculiar forms, such as the locative singular in mhi instead of si. There are also differences in the forms of the letters, especially in that of r, which is here formed by a wavy line instead of the rigidly straight upright stroke on the other rocks. (Cunningham, CII, I, pp. 14 f.)
Among the many inscriptions and minor edicts of Asoka, the 14 Rock-Edicts are found in seven more or less complete versions at Girnär, Kälsi, Shahbazgarhi, Mansehra, Dhauli, Jaugada and Yerraguḍi, not to speak of the small fragments of the 8th and the 9th rock-edicts found in Sopara. These were issued about the 14th year (252-1 B.C.) after his coronation.
Sopara Edicts were known through the discovery of a broken block of basalt bearing a fragment of Edict VIII also in Prakrit language and Brahmi script from Sopara, the ancient Sürpäraka, the headquarter of Aparanta. (D. R. Bhandarkar, Asoka, pp. 270 f.).
Another fragment of Aśoka's IXth Edict was recently discovered (1956), (Impression published in Indian Archaeology, 1956-57, Plate LXXXIX and also in Lalit Kala, Nos. 3-4, 1957, by S. N. Chakravarty). The two stones. bearing fragmentary edicts at Sopara prove that a copy of the 14 Edicts existed there. These are now preserved in the Prince of Wales Museum, Bombay.