Indian Antiquary Vol 15

SR No.: 032507
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: John Faithfull Fleet, Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications
Publication Year: 1984
Total Pages: 446
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 20 MB

Page 321

SEPTEMBER, 1886.)
MISCELLANEA.
279
By whom it was founded is the point that still by the careful record of the name of Kumaradevi remains to be determined; and, if the era was herself and of her family on some of his coins,' devised in India itself, this point can only be and by the epithet of Lichchhavi-dauhitra, "the settled by ascertaining who were the paramount daughter's son of Lichchhavi, or of a Lichchhavi," sovereigns to whom the Maharajas Gupta and that is always applied to Samudragupta in the Ghatotkacha were feudatory. Mr. Fergusson's genealogical inscriptions. And I have perhaps opinion on this point, was in the direction of been wrong in speaking, on previous occasions, the era having been established by the Andhra of a conquest of Nepal by Samudragupta ; the king Gautamiputra-Śåtakaiņi, whom he placed exact reference, in the Allahabad inscription, is between A.D. 312 and 333. Dr. R. G. Bhandar- to Népala pratyanta-nripati, which may mean kar, however,' places this king between A.D. 133 either "the frontier-king of Nepala," or "the and 154; and, according to his view of the kings of the countries on the frontiers of Nepala." history of the period, we should have to refer It is quite possible that the Early Guptas did not the establishment of the Gupta era to some event extend their dominions actually into Nepal; and connected with either the downfall of the Satraps that, in that direction, they and the Lichchhavis of Saurashtra, or the history of the Rashtraktas reigned in amity side by side on equal terms. of the Dekkan.
J. F. FLEET. Our knowledge of the early history is not yet 3rd August 1886. such as, to enable us to work out this point fully; and I refer to it chiefly in order to shew THE UPANISHADS AND THEIR LATEST the direction in which researches might be made.
TRANSLATION. But I would add here that, though I have Under this heading, a valuable article is contreated the era as having been invented in India
tributed to the First Part of Vol. VII. of the itself, and as having been introduced into Nepal
American Journal of Philology, by Professor by the Early Guptas, still it is equally possible W. D. Whitney, of Yale College, an American that the era was obtained by them from Nepal,
Sanskritist and philologist of deservedly high and is in reality the Lichchhavi era, founded by repute. It consists, for the most part, of a critique the Lichchhavi kings, at a time, perhaps, when on the first and fifteenth volumes of the Sacred their republican or tribal constitution was abolish.
Books of the East, its handling of which may be ed in favour of a monarchy. The writings of Fa
regarded as a sample of the "wholesome severity" hian and Hiuen Teiang prove the great anti- which the writer advocates in interpreting the quity of the Lichchhavi clan in the direction Upanishads ! of Nepal. And, as regards their epigraphical Many of the criticisms of individual passages records, I have shewn that the first historical
are characterized by considerable acumen and king, Jayadeva I., must, by the ordinary allow.
accurate scholarship, and cannot fail to be of ance of time for each generation, be referred to value to students of these philosophical tracts; A.D. 330-355, and it needs but little adjustment but the general effect is not a little marred by to carry him back to A.D. 318, 319, or 320. This the sweeping condemnation of the volumes as a supposition would explain, perhaps better than any whole, in which the critic indulges. other, why, even after the introduction of the Considering that the work under review is from Harsha era into Nepál not later than A.D. 640-41 the pen of one whom all know to be a scholar of und its adoption by the Thakuri family of Kailano mean order, such comments as the following sakatabhavana, the Lichchhavi rulers of Måna- are almost unseemly :-"The whole body of them griha clung to the earlier era, and continued [i. e of the notes] is to be condemned, as the use of it down to at least the year 435 or furnishing a minimum of valuable and helpful A.D. 754-55, and in all probability for a century context, even when they are not altogether longer. And all the other facts will fit in misleading. There is not, it is believed, a single just as well with this supposition, as with the instance where a really difficult passage is seriously other theory. The friendly relations between and competently discussed." Again :-" If there the Early Guptas and the Lichchhavis, and the were in any part of these two volumes a passage pride in them felt by the former, are shewn by of a different character from those we have been the intermarriage in the time of Chandragupta I., reviewing-a passage showing signs of a sound
Jour. R. As. Soç. F. S., Vol. IV. p. 128f. • Early History of the Dekkan, p. 27.
• Bee Beal's Buddhist Records of the Western World, Vol. I. pp. xiii. lii. lv., and Vol. II. pp. 67 note, 70, 79, 77 note, 81.
. ante, Vol. XIV. p. 350f.
.. Page 194 above, and ante, Vol. XIV. p. 345, Inscrip tions N. and P.
1 On the king and queen' type of Mr. V. A. Smith's arrangement; Jour. Beng. As. Soc., Vol. LIII. Part I. p. 171, and Plate ii. No. 2.