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No. 28.]
SOME RASHTRAKUTA RECORDS.
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either it establishes sendhura (for which, however, I cannot find any other authority) as a corruption of sind húra, for sindhura, elephant,' or else, and more probably, it is a mistake for " sindura = sem duram," based on a habit which, Dr. Kittel has told me, the manuscripts have of not anfrequently presenting an aspirated instead of an unaspirated letter and vice versa. Beyond that, I can only say that Mr. Rice's Karndfakutabdánusasanam of Bhattákalankadêva (1890), p. 108, under the illustrations of sutra 160, does give sendura as the corruption of sindúra.
So far, no authority has been found for the assertion that sindhura, an elephant," becomes sindura. We have only obtained sindura, with the unspirated d but retaining the short u, as a corruption of that word, and sindhára, with the long but retaining the aspirated dh, as another form of it.
Bat, also, we have not found any conclusive authority for sendura or sendára a8 & corruption of sindára, red lead. We have only obtained, more or less certainly sendura with the short u, and doubtfully sêndhûra with the aspirated dh, and sendøra apparently deduced by inference from it. Turning, however, to other sources of information, we there obtain something quite definite. In a language closely allied to Kanarese, Mr. C. P. Brown's Telugu-English Dictionary (1852) does not give sindura, sendura, sendúra, or sendára. It does give sindhuramu, with the meaning of only 'an elephant,' and simdúramu, with the meanings of only' red lead, mininm,' and 'a sort of tree.' And, while it does mention simdharamu with the aspirated dh and the long ủ, it specifies it as an "error" for sindúramu. But, in a language of which the vocabulary is very much mixed up with that of the Kanarose of the southern districts of the Bombay Presidency, Molesworth and Candy's Marath-English Dictionary (1857), while not presenting sindhura, 'an elephant,' or sindura, does give sindore, with the meaning of only red lead, minium,' and gives sêmdůra (with the palatal f) as a popular form of it, and also sêmdůra (with the dental 8) with the indication that it is commonly written findúra. And Professor Piachel, in 8 119 of his Praksit Grammar (1900), Vol. I., Part 8, of the Grundriss der Indo-arischen Philologie und Altertumskunde, has given sendura, with the short e and the long ll, as the corruption of sindůra. On the other hand, the Paiyalachchhinamamala of Dhanapala, according to Dr. Bühler's edition (1879), does not seem to deal with sindara, but indicates, in verse 9, that sindhura, 'an elephant,' retains the tatsama-form sindhura, and does not present any corruption of that word.
It would thus seem that, among the Kanarese authorities, there has been some confusion between sindhura,' an elephant,' and sindúra, 'red lead, minium, vermilion,' which confusion, however, is in all probability confined to mistakes by copyists. But I cannot discover any authority of any kind for the assertion that sindhura, an elephant,' takes the form sindúra, or any indication that the word sindura has the meaning of an elephant. And there are no reasonable grounds for imputing any confusion between the two words to the writers of the ancient records. On the other hand, sendûra, sendûrs, and sendura are given as corruptions of sindůra by authorities of an unquestionable kind. We may, therefore, safely discard any idea that sindûralañchhana and sendūralañchhans can mean' an elephant crest.' And we may safely revert to my original rendering of it as the mark of vermilion, for which, however, there is now to be substituted, in more technical terms, the red-load crest.
The only point that remains, is, to determine exactly what we are to understand by a red-lead crost. Now, Monier-Williams' Sanskfit Dictionary, revised edition, gives sindøra. tilaka as meaning 'a mark on the forehead made with red lead." And, similarly, Dr. Kittel's
1 Also, we may remark, it gives sindúra-tilaka as meaning marked with red lead, an elephant,' and sindúra. tilakd as denoting 's woman whome forehead is marked with red lead and therefore whose husband is living).' And H. H. Wilson has mentioned particular use of the inddra-tilaka by women, in telling us that a widow, about to commit ottee, "in making preparations for ascending the funeral pile, used to mark her forehead with sind dra, and to deck herself sumptuously with all the symbols of radhand," or woman whose husband is still alive; see his Worka, Vol. II. p. 300.
