Epigraphia Indica Vol 09

SR No.: 032563
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: E Hultzsch, Sten Konow
Publisher: Archaeological Survey of India
Publication Year: 1907
Total Pages: 498
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 28 MB

Page 400

No. 47.]
CHANDRAVATI PLATE OF CHANDRADEVA.
303
for abita-, 1. 1, -vamsa-for-vamsa-, 1. 2. There are several other misspellings and slips, especially towards the end.
After the invocation to Sri common in other plates of the same family, our inscription proceeds to give the genealogy of the donor in four verses, which are well known from other inscriptions. We are told that Yasovigraha had the son Mahichandra, whose son again was Chandradêva, the issuer of the present grant. The inscription then goes on in prose, stating that the victorious king Chandradeva issues the following order to all the people assembled, residing in the Vadagavd-village in the Våvana-pattala, and also to the Rajas, Rdjais, Yuvarájas, councillors, chaplains, warders of the gate, generals, treasurera, keepers of records, physicians, astrologers, superintendents of gynæceums, messengers, the officera in charge of elephants, horses, towns, mines, sthånas and gôkulas:
"Be it known to you that the aforesaid village, with its water and dry land, with its mines of iron and salt, with its fishing places, with its ravines and saline soil, with and including its groves of madhúka and mango, grass and pastare land, with what is above and below, defined as to its foar abattals, up to its proper boundaries, has today, on the
day of the bright fortnight of Karttika, Samvat 1148, been given by us for as long a time as moon and sun endure, with the pouring out of water from the palm of our hand, parified with gôkarnal and kusa-grass, to the Brahman Varanêsvayasarman (-svaraśarman), the son of Varahasvimi, the grandson of Anarudhs, of the Vasishtha gôtra, and whose only pravara is Vasishtha, for the increase of the merit and fame of our parents and ourselves, after having today batbed here in the neighbourhood of Sauri (sauri)-Ndri yaņa, after having duly satisfied the sacred texts, divinities, saints, men, beings, and groups of ancestors, after having worshipped the sun whose splendour is skilled in rending the veil of darkness, after having worshipped Vasudeva, the saviour of the three worlds, and after having sacrificed to the Fire an oblation with abundant milk, rice and sugar.'
The frst point here that is worthy of notice is the date, which is the earliest known for Chandraddva, the other copper plate of his time being dated in Sarhvat 1154.8 It will be seen that the portion of it containing the tithi and the week day is illegible. Mr. Chhote Lal, who has examined the original, writes about this point,
"Ordinarily, it might be thought that the excessive corrosion and incrustation of rust at this particular part of the plate was purely accidental, but from a minute examination of the imperfect and damaged letters which are still discernible, I am led to conclude that the excessive incrustation at this point was due to the fact that the surface of the plate was already damaged by somebody in his endeavour to make a correction in the date. It is remarkable that the name of the place or that of the stream in which the donor took his bath, is not mentioned in the inscription: Nor is there any mention of the occasion (oclipso, sariloranti, etc.) at which the gift was made. It would appear that Sauri-Narayana was in those days a very well-known place of pilgrimage requiring no further details to localise it, that the occasion presumably was the ordinary Karttika-onana, and that the date originally entered on the plate was panchadasyam gurau, but was afterwards attempted to be corrected into ekádaly&ih ravau. The 8 of the latter just overlaps the pan of the former; the ka of the latter being rather large has been so formed 88 to include the cha and to cover the space oocupied by da of the former; while the space occupied by byán of the former has been utilised for the rather olumsily large da of the latter. It will thus be seen that the space originally occupied by the word panchadafydth, which was of normal size, was subsequently ooonpied by the much larger letters, 2, kd and da, and there being no more space ayailable for the final syllable bydre, it was omitted. Similarly, the ra of
1 Compare Kielhorn, Ind. Ant. XV. p. 10, Note 57.
See ibidem, note 56.
• Ind. Ant. XVIII. pp. 9 and 1.