Epigraphia Indica Vol 03

SR No.: 032557
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Jas Burgess
Publisher: Archaeological Survey of India
Publication Year: 1894
Total Pages: 472
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 25 MB

Page 215

168
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
(VOL. III.
king named Amðghavarsha. Now, here there is a plain anachronism; for, whereas, according to the Hosur and Nagamangala grants, Šivamâra's son came at least fifty years before A.D. 776-77, the earliest Amôghavarsha is the Rashtrakata king Amôghavarsha I., who commenced to reign in A.D. 814-15.
Sivamâra's son's son was named, according to the Hosur and Nagamangala grants, Sripurusha-Pfithuvi-Kongani; and they also imply that he had the birdas of Bhimakôps and R&jakesarin: but some genuine stone inscriptions disclose the fact that his real proper name was Muttarasa; and Sripurusha, therefore, must also be taken as a biruda. The Hobůr and Nagamangala grants both give him the title of Mahardja. Mr. Rice says that his wife was Śrija; but the passage, in the Nagamangala grant, on which this is based, says in reality that the grant was made by the Mahardjádhiraja and Paramétvara, the glorious Jasahita: whether this denotes Sripurusha, or someone else, I am not at present prepared to say. The Hosûr and Nagamangala grants both describe him as having his victorious camp at the town of Mânyapura; which place, whatever it may be, is certainly not the Mânyakhêts of the Rashtrakatas. And they give for him dates in A.D. 762 and 776-77; the later record also stating that A.D. 776-77 was the fiftieth year of his reign. The Udayêndiram grant, however, which can only be interpreted as naming him as M&rasimha (or else as not mentioning him at all), establishes a considerably later date; it makes him (or else some otherwise unknown brother or cousin) the father of Rajasimha, otherwise called Hastimalla, who received the Bâņa territory from the Chola king Parantaka I.; and it thus places him (from either point of view) only one generation before A. D. 920 or closely thereabouts.
I will take next certain internal evidence in the Merkara record. It mentions, withont naming him, the minister of a king Akalavarsha, and says, as far as the text can be properly construed at all, that in A.D. 466 he acquired from Avinita-Kongani a grant for & Jain temple at the city of Taļavanagara; at any rate, it asserts that there was a king named Akalavarsha in or shortly before A.D. 466. Mr. Rice says that no doubt & Rashtrakata king is intended ; and in this I quite agree. But, on the assumption that every Krishna of the Rashtrakūta family must have borne the biruda Akalavarsha, he goes on to identify this Akalavarsha with a R&shtrakata king Krishna, whose son Indra is said, in the Western Chalukya traditions of the eleventh century A.D., to have been conquered by Jayasimha I., the progenitor of the whole Chalukya stock, and who, in accordance with this statement, is to be allotted to about the end of the fifth or the beginning of the sixth century, A.D.,- 1.e. to a period that approximates to the date put forward in the Merkara grant; and here it is impossible to endorse his views. In the first place, the existence of this early Råshtrakůta king Kfishna is purely legendary, and is andoubtedly imaginary. The Western Chalukya records themselves contain no mention of him; and they do not record any specific victories at all by Jayasimha I., who seems, in fact, to have not enjoyed any regal power, and to be quoted simply as the grandfather of Pulikesin I., the founder of the dynasty. The Rashtrakūta records do not mention him. And, though certain coins have been obtained from the Násik District, which do give the name of a king Krishna, and may be allotted to the period in question just as well as to a somewhat later one, still they contain nothing that refers them to the Rashtra kůta dynasty; and my opinion now is that, in all probability, they are coins of king Kfishņa, father of Sam karagana, whose existence has recently been brought to notice by a copper-plate grant from Sankheda in the Baroda State, and that this person is an early Kalachuri king. The existence of an early Rashtrakata king Krishna, referable to approximately the period to which the Merkara grant pretends to belong, depends upon nothing but the tradition which first appears in the eleventh century A.D., after
See page 165 above, and note 1. * See the text a given in Caorg Inscriptions, p. 3. ..g. Ind. Ant. Vol. XVI. p. 17. . Epigraphia Indica, Vol. II. p. 22.
I id. Introd. p. 9.
Ind. Ant. Vol. XIV. p. 68