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AN EARLY HISTORY OF ORISSA
It is almost a hopeless task to fix with anything like certainty the chronology of the caves. This is evinced by the wide divergence in chronological order fixed by various scholars. Happily for us, a great flood of light is thrown by the famous inscription of king Khāravela in the Hāthigumphā here. The date ascribed to the inscription is in the last quarter of the first century B. C. Khāravela was by faith a Jaina and appears to have been personally interested in the priestly community, who had selected these hills as a place of retreat. It is just possible, opines Percy Brown,- that the small group of Ajivaka hermits responsible for the excavated chapels in the Brabar hills, having lost the protection of Asoka on the death of that monarch, migrated to Orissa not only to be under a Jaina ruler but in order to continue their system of living in cells cut in the rock, so that they might conduct their · observances undisturbed by the distractions of any human environments.
The Hāthigumphā
The Hāthigumphā is a large natural cavern of irregular shape slightly improved and enlarged by artificial means. It can boast of no artistic and architectural features. The walls, however, have been chiselled straight and at places are beautifully polished as those of the Brabar caves. At its widest and longest, the cave measures 28 ft. x 59 ft. inside while the mouth is 12 feet in height. The roof
1. Refer Ch. X, pp. 264 supra.
2. Cf. Epithete like Bhikhurūja and Dhammaröja' ascribed to Khāravela in line 16 of his inscription.
3. "Terasame cha vase supavata chake kumāri pavate arahalehi pakhina sansitehi kāya nisidiyiya ya pujavakchi rijbhitini chinavatini vā sasituni pujinurata uvasarı khiravel 1sirini jivad ehasayikā parikhuta", -as per record of the 13th regnal year.
4. Indian Architecture, Chap. VI, p. 36.
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