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204
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
[VOL. VII.
miniature, in the centre of the later cursive letter, of the principal part of the old square character, to which attention has already been drawn on page 199 above, in the remarks on the Mantrawadi inscription of A.D. 865; and the same feature is recognisable, though not so pointedly, in alamkritan, line 1, kavsleyan, line 21, and kavileyu, line 22. There seem to be three abnormal vowel-marks in this record : the stroke projecting downwards from the bottom of the k of ganiká, near the end of line 8, appears to be intended to supply the d, which was omitted in its proper place on the top line of the writing; in the superscript i of Srimad, near the beginning of line 16, the long vowel appears to be marked by a curve on the right, instead of the left in the usual manner; and in Srimad, line 18, it appears that, i having been written instead of i, an upward stroke to the right was added, on revision, by way of marking the vowel as long:- As regards the language, we have ordinary Sanskrit verses in lines 1 to 6: and the remainder of the record is in Kanarese, of the archaic style, in prose. As far as the words Annigereyal=ire, in line 19, this record follows the same draft on which there was based the corresponding part of the Nilgund inscription. But this record does not seem to have included the verse Jayati bhuvanakiranan, etc., which we have in the beginning of the Nilgund inscription; and it presents a few various readings, of which, however, only Saufan, instead of Gaudan, in line 4, is of any particular interest. Like the Nilgund inscription, this record presents, in line 8, the word prátirajya, employed in the sense of pratirája, 'a hostile king,' or rather, perhaps, 'a collection of hostile kings.' In Bárandsivado, line 21, we have a curions substitute for the usual locative Baranásiyol, with which we have to compare the locative Varanasivadul in an inscription at Balagámi,' and Baranasivada, in the place of the usual genitive Baranasiya, in an inscription at Pattadakal ; these forms suggest, of course, the existence and occasional use of a base Barandsiva (with such variants as Baranasiva and Varanasiva), for which, however, it is difficult to account.-In respect of orthography, the only points to be noted are (1) the use of ri for pi in the word srishti, line 10, just as in lines 12 and 33 of the Nilgund record, and again in vriddhi, line 15; and (2) the occurrence of lanchanan, instead of lafchhanan, in line 13, just as in line 16 of the Nilgund record.
This inscription is another record of the reign of the Rashtrakūta king Amoghavarsha I.; and it is distinctly dated in such a way as to shew that he commenced to reign in A.D. 814 or 815. It mentions, like the Nilgand inscription, an officer of his, named Dêvannayya, who, residing at Annigero, was governing the Belvola three-hundred district. And, devoted to the same end with the Nilgund inscription, it records that Dévaņpayya assigned the tax on clarified butter to the two-handred Mahajanas. of Srivůra - doubtless in order to make the proceeds of the tax available for expenditure by them on communal purposes, instead of being credited to the state revenues.
The record is dated at the time of an eclipse of the gun on Sunday the new-moon day of the (amanta) month Jyaishtha of the Vyaya samvatsara, Saka-Sanvat 788 (expired), in the fiftysecond year of the reign of Amoghavarsha I. And the corresponding English date is Sunday, 16th June, A.D. 866, when there was a total eclipse of the sun, visible in India, at 9 hrs. 4 min. after mean sunrise.7
The date presented in this record fixes, as I have pointed out before now, the commencement of the reign of Amoghavarsha I. in A.D. 814 or 815, in the following manner. The record places the new-moon day of the amanta month Jyaishtha, on which day the assignment
See page 206 below, note 2.
Ind. Ant. Vol. XIX. p. 145, text line 18. • Ind. Ant. Vol. X. p. 167, No. 105, text line 6. See the next paragraph but one.
Regarding the use of this form of the name, instead of Anpigere with the lingual , see Vol. VI. above, p. 100, note 2. • See Vol. VI. above, p. 107, note 4.
T See Vol. VI. above, p. 102, note 8. In Ind. Ant. Vol. XII. p. 316 a, and more fully and clearly in my Dynastiar of the Kanaron Districts, in the Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, Vol. I. Part IL, P. 401, note 2 .