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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
[VOL. VI.
Amôghavarshadêva, Atisayadhavala, and Atiśayadhavalanarendradeva, is enough to show that all these endings, also, were not integral and essential parts of the birudas, and are to be disregarded for all general purposes. In editing records, it may be convenient to retain the ending indra, rather than to translate it by rendering, for instance, Lakshmivallabhendra by "Lakshmivallabha, the chief of Lakshmivallabhas or of favourites of Fortune." But the other two will be better treated by translation,-narendra being rendered by " king," and narendradeva by "his majesty the king."
We have next to note that the most distinctive and leading birudas of the Rashtrakatas were those ending in varsha. Not only are they found most frequently in the stone records, and often without any other appellation accompanying them, but also, in the formal preambles of the prose passages of the copper-plate charters of the kings of the main line, it is always the biruda ending in varsha that is used, - and without any other appellation,- to denote the predecessor, and the biruda ending in varsha of the reigning king is always presented with such others of his appellations as are put forward; and, in the corresponding passages of the copper-plate charters of the feudatory princes of the Gujarat branch, the biruda ending in varsha is always prefixed to the proper name of the prince. We may find, hereafter, an exception to this rule about the designation of the predecessor in the copper-plate charters of the main line, when we obtain any such record of Amoghavarsha I. ; for, the Kaņheri stone inscription of A.D. 851 describes him as meditating on the feet, not of Prabhatavarshadêva, but of Jagattungadêva, and, as we shall see further on, there are other indications that Govinda III. was best known as Jagattunge after his death, though, as we shall also see, in his lifetime he was best known as Prabhůtavarsha. But, after the Såmångad grant of A.D. 754, all the copperplate records of the main line that we know at present, conform, with such variations as have been indicated above in the actual selection (without omitting the biruda ending in varsha) and order of the appellations of the reigning king, to the practice of the Paithan grant of Govinda III., which describes him as Prithvivallabha, Prabhůtavarsha, his majesty the king Srivallabha, meditating on the feet of Dhâråvarshadêva ;) and the Atakûr stone inscription uses only the biruda Amôghavarshadêva to denote the predecessor of Krishna III. And another special feature of the birudas ending in varsha is that we cannot trace back the conception of them to any predecessors of the Rashtrakūtas of Malkhôd, nor even to the first Gujarat branch of the Rashtrakațas which was represented by Karkaraja II. son of Govindaråja in A.D. 757, nor to the early Rashtrakūtas of Central India whose existence is disclosed by the grants of Abhimanyu and Yuddhasara-Nandaraja. They were plainly first devised by the Råshtrakůtas of Malkhôd. The fashion seems to have been set by Akalavarsha-Krishna I., 88 we have no biruda ending in varsha for his predecessor Dantidurga. And it seems likely that each subsequent member of the family was invested with a varsha-appellation at the time when he was selected for the succession and was formally appointed as Yuvaraja.
Other special R&shtrakūta birudas were those ending in avalóka and tunga. Of the former, we have two instances in the Malkhêd line, namely, Khadgávalóka in the case of Dantidurga, and Raņávalóka in the case of Stambha, son of Dhruva ;' and we find two instances
1 Pages 108, 104, above, text lines 8, 17, 19, 20, 21, 22.
Ind. Ant. Vol. XIII. p. 134, No. 15, text line 2. Above, Vol. III. p. 108, text lines 43, 44.
Page 53 above, text line 2. But, when once they had been started by the Rashtraktas of Malkhed, the fashion was followed, probably as the result of intermarriages, in other families also; for instance, we have the Kalachuri king KeyůravarshaYavarAja I., at some time about A.D. 926 (see Prof. Kielborn's List of the Inscriptions of Northern India, Vol. V. above, Appendix, p. 61, No. 429), and the Paramara king Amoghavarsha-Vakpatirája, with the date of A.D. 974 (ibid. p. 8, No. 46), and Karivarshu-Sabilladdva, a king of Chanpak-(Chamba) (ibid. p. 81, No. 593), and the Paramára chieftain Dhårdvarsha, with the date of A.D. 1209 (ibid. p. 28, No. 193). See Dyn. Kan. Distrs. p. 386.
See pages 195, 197, below.
