Epigraphia Indica Vol 07

Author(s): E Hultzsch
Publisher: Archaeological Survey of India

Page 46

No. 6.]
CAMBAY PLATES OF GOVINDA IV.
positive evidence, looking quite the other way, furnished by the copper-plate inscriptions, and to render the first line of verse 22 void of all meaning,
The last line of verse 22 tells us that Govinda IV. was known as SAhasanks in oonsequence of his unparalleled heroic deeds. Verse 23 states that, although he had the appellation Prabhůtavarsha, he was styled Suvarnavarshe, because he rained down showers of gold and made the whole world golden. This means that Govinda IV. had previously the usual epithet Prabhůta varsha, but that, on account of his profuse munificence, he earned for himself the additional biruda of Surarpavarsha. And deservedly was he styled Suvarnavarsba. It has been mentioned above, in the summary of the contents of the formal part of the inscription, that Govinda IV. weighed himself against gold, bestowed upon the Brahmans no less than six hundred grants, together with three lacs of suratnas, and granted, for repairing temples and feeding and clothing ascetics, eight hundred villages, four lacs of suvarnas and thirty-two lacs of drammas. Such exuberant liberality no other prince of the Rashtrakůta dynasty ever displayed, so far as their records inform us.
Little that is historically important can be gleaned from the remaining verses (24-31). Some historical fact, however, is undoubtedly contained in verse 28, wherein the Ganga and Yamuna are represented as doing service at Govinda IV.'s palace. The exact sense of this can be determined by the consideration of two other epigraphic references to the same fact. The Baroda charter of the Gujarat Rashtrakůta prince Karka asserts that Govinda III., "after taking away simultaneously from his enemies (the rivers) Ganga and Yamuna, charming through their waves, attained to the best and highest rank, by means of the display of the actual signs (of those rivers)." This clearly means that Govinda III. wrested the territory interveving between the Ganges and the Jumna from a prince belonging to some northern dynasty, and assumed their signs as a part of his insignia. The same fact is mentioned in a Nerûr grant, wherein the early Chalukya prince Vijayaditya is represented as fighting before his own father with the hostile kings of Northern India, and securing for his father Vinayaditya the signs of the Ganga and Yamuna among other insignia of paramount sovereignty. When, therefore, the Ganga and Yamuna are mentioned as doing service in the palace of Govinda IV., & similar thing is intended, vit either that, after an expedition of conquest against Northern India, he added the signs of these rivers to his insignia, or that he inherited these signs from some one of his predecessors, perhaps his own father Indra III., who, as we have seen above, overran Northern India.
There now remains to be noticed the preamble of the proge passages, preceding the formal part of the inscription. These set forth the various appellations by which Govinda IV. Was known. The topic of the appellations of the Rashtrakața princes has already been handled in
1 Ind. Ant. Vol. XII. p. 169, text lines 22 and 38. Here Dr. Fleet perceives a distinct allusion to some conquest over the Chalukyss, whether Western or Eastern, and further propounds the theory that the Rashtra katss wrested these signs from the Chalukyas, and the Chalukyas from the Early Guptas (loc. cit. pp. 167 and 248 ; Dyn. Kan. Distr. p. 338, note 7). In my humble opinion, the word cha in the second line of the verse, wherein Govinda III.'s assumption of the signs of the Ganga and the Yamuna is mentioned, clearly indicates that be first conquered the regions round about the Ganges and the Jumns and then adopted the signs of these rivers as part of his insignia. Dr. Fleet himself recognises this fact (loc. cit. p. 167). If so, I cannot understand how Govinda III. wrested these signs from the Chalukyas, whether Western or Eastern, who were ruling in the Dekkan, far away froin the Ganges and the Jumna. Again, I fail to understand how the Cbalukya, towards the end of the seventh century, wrested these signs from the Early Guptas, whose power was extinct by the middle of the sixth century A.D. The view which I have put forth here is, that an expedition of conquest in the regions round about the Ganges and the Jumns entitled both Govinda III. and Vijayaditya to add the signs of these rivers to their insignia. The same may also be said in regard to Govinda IV., but, as we do not know for certain that he ever invaded Northern India, and as we do know that his father Indrs III, overran it, it is equally reasonable to suppose that Govinda IV. perhaps inherited these signs from his father. - Ind. Ant. Vol. IX. p. 181, text lines 20-32.
2