Epigraphia Indica Vol 26

SR No.: 032580
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Hirananda Shastri
Publisher: Archaeological Survey of India
Publication Year: 1945
Total Pages: 448
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 24 MB

Page 152

No. 12.)
TWO YUPA INS. FROM BARNALA: KRITA YEARS 284 AND 335.
121
Inscription on the Yüpa B. This inscriptijn does not begin with the auspicious word siddham, as does the inscription on the yüpa A; it traightway proceeds to give its date according to the Krita, i.e., Vikrama era. Its date is the fifteenth day, i. e., the full-moon day of the bright half of the month of Jy shtha of the Ksita year 335. The name of the month is spelt as Jasha; there can be, however, no doubt that the word is intended to stand for Jyäshtha. Jasha for Jyështha is but the first example of the carelessness of the engraver of this record. The date of the record is therefore 279 A. D.
It would be convenient to discuss the decipherment of the remaining portion of the record from its end; I therefore proceed to do so. The last four letters of the second line are very clear ; they read dharmmo vardhdha. It is clear that the last word is intended to be varddhatām ; the record ends with the hope that religion may prosper. The word preceding dharmmo is clearly priyatām ; the subscript of pri is faintly visible and its medial i mātrā is slightly damaged. The next preceding word clearly reads Vashța and there is a dot after the last letter, which is clearly a remnant of a visarga. I think we have to correct this word into Vishnuḥ. The subscript ţa can also be taken as an ill-executed na ; the medial é mātrā was left out in the word Jyestha in l. 1, and a similar mistake seems to have been repeated here. The concluding expression Vishnuh priyatāṁ dharmmo varddhatām would remind us of the expressions Priyant[@]m-Agnayah and punaḥ punah pritim=iyān=Maheśvara iti, which occur at the end of the inscriptions on the Isāpur and Allahabad Municipal Museum yüpas respectively. The royal sacrificer of the Allahabad Museum yüpa was a Saiva advocate of the Vedic sacrificial religion ; in the present case the sacrificer was a Vaishnava champion of the Vedic rites.
Immediately preceding the emended word Vishņu there is a triangular symbol, which is almost identical with the symbol occurring at the end of the inscription on the yūpa of Balavardhana, found at Badva'. This form is therefore not a letter but a mere symbol, marking the end of the main announcement of the record.
Immediately before this concluding symbol, there is another, which clearly stands for 90. Out of the five letters preceding 90, the first is clearly da, the second looks like a damaged kshi, the third is an with a subscript, the fourth is a da or da and the fifth is a ta. When we recollect how the Badvä yüpa inscriptions end with the expression Trirätra-sammitasya dakshinyan(n) gavāri sahasram, it will be at once clear that these five letters are intended to stand for dakshinyam(nā) dāta(dattā). The reading of the third letter only is rather doubtful here ; the subscript looks like that of ar; but the main letter is a n or n, and so the context as well as the use in the Badvă records would show that it was intended to be nya for an original nã.
These five letters therefore refer to the dakshina given to the priests on the occasion of the sacrifice and the symbol for 90 describes its amount. What then were the ninety objects that were given at the end of the sacrifice ?
The name and the description of the 90 things donated to the Brāhmaṇas is given in the preeeding seven letters; for the four letters preceding this group of seven clearly read yajña ishta to be corrected into yajñā ishţāḥ. The first of these seven letters is a să or sa ; the second one is va or vri; the third is a conjunct of which the second letter is ta and the first very probably $; the fourth is clearly an initial i; the fifth is certainly & va; the sixth is a vā; and the seventh a ga. But savvasta iva vägā as the description of the ninety articles given in dakshina gives no
* See ante, Vol. XXIII, Plate facing p. 52.