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No. 25.)
INSCRIPTIONS AT ABLUR.
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oblation of the god, and for the occasions, among others, of the purificatory ceremony of the month Chaitra and the festival of spring, and for the giving of food and the imparting of knowledge, - saying that the village was to belong to that god, with the very greatest devotion, having put forward Mallidêve, the chieftain of the kampana, (to manage the grant), and having laved the feet of Ekantada-Ramayya, gave, with libations of water, (by) a copperplate charter, as a grant to the god Paramêśvara (Siva), the village of Abbalûru in the Negarakhanda seventy which was a kampana of the Bansvase twelve-thousand, together with the customs-duty called mélaţike-manneya of that village, and with the right to) fines and punishments and buried treasure, and with its boundaries established in former times and with the tribhoga; and he seated him on an elephant and paraded him in public, and thus with the very greatest devotion maintained (religion).
(L. 80)-Om! Ékantada-Ráma, who worshipped the water-lilies that are the feet of Śrîkantha with thoughts free from any perplexity, and who became famous in being considered to be the bulwark of the Saiva rites, delighted in devotion to Siva !
(L. 81) May the holy god Vira-Soma - who is the greatest among all the gods; who carries the moon on his forehead); and who wears the garb of an actor in the dance of amorous dalliance which is lovely on account of the beauty imparted to it by the smiling, white, trembling, full glances of the sweet smiles of (Pårvati) the danghter of the mountain (Himalaya), day by day confer fortune and long life and fame upon Kamadeva, upon him who is endowed with nobility!
(L. 82)- Hail! When the illustrious Mahamandalesvara Kåmadêvarasa, - possessed of the string of dames of, among others, the Mahamandalesvara who attained the pañchamahasabda ; the supreme lord of Banavåsi, the best of towns; he who acquired the excellent favour of the god Madhukosvars of Jayanti (Banavasi); the delight of learned people; the ornament of the family of Mayuravarman; the lion of the Kadambas; the fierce in fight; he who excelled in andacity; the elephant-goad of brave men; & very Radhêya (Karna) in truth; a very cage of thanderbolts to protect) those who sought refage with him; & very cow of plenty to petitioners, - was governing the Panungal five-hundred, punishing the wicked and protecting the good, he came and saw the god Vira-Somanåtha of Abbaluru, and beheld the temple, as large as a mountain, which Ramayya had had made according to the precepts of the Saiva traditions, and listened in detail to the daring that he had displayed, and was pleased, and took him along with himself with the very greatest affection, and went away; and,- when his ministers and himself, together with the Mandalika Madukeya, were seated in assembly) at the capital of Panumgal with the pleasure of an agreeable interchange of communications, with the very greatest devotion he made the village named Mallavalli, on the north of Jôgêears which is near to Mundagôd in the Hollaned seventy which is a kampana in the Panungal fivehundred, together with its established boundaries and including the tribhôga, into a namasyagrant for the god Vira-Somanátha, and laved the feet of Ramayya, and gave it, with libations of water, with the very greatest devotion, for the repairs of whatever might become broken or torn or worn-out belonging to the temple of that same god, and for the angabhôga and the rangabhôga and the perpetual oblation of the god, and for the purificatory ceremony of the month Chaitra and the festival of spring and the other occasions, and for the giving of food; and thus he preserved religion. May it be well! Om !
(L. 91)-Those who preserve these acts of religion shall obtain the reward of fashioning in gold the horns and hoofs of a thousand tawny-coloured cows at the sacred Våranasi or Prayaga or Kurukshetra or Arghyatirtha or Sriparvata or any other holy sites, and giving them to Brahmans versed in the four Jédas at such meritorious times as an eclipse of the sun, an eclipse of the moon, & vyatipáta, a passage of the sun from one sign of the zodiac to the next, etc.; those who destroy these acts of religion shall incur the sin of slaying those same cows and Brahmans at the Ganges or Våranasi or Kurukshatra or any other sacred sites ! And, to shew
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