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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
(VOL. VIII.
The inscription contains the two first acts of a hitherto unknown natiká, i.e. a drama of four acts, entitled Pårijatamañjari or Vijayasri (1. 4). This drama had been composed by the king's preceptor (rajaguru) Madana, whose family hailed from Gauda (Bengal), and who was a descendant of Gangadhara (1. 3 f.). It was acted for the first time at the spring-festival in the city of Dhårå (1. 3)— the modern Dhår.
The opening verse (1) contains the following statement :
“On this pair of blank slabs is being written with difficulty the power to be absorbed by the ear- of the virtues of Bhoja himself, who has become incarnate in the form of Arjuna."
Of the two slabs here mentioned, only the first is now available. The second must have borne the two remaining acts of the nafika.
The last verse (76) on the preserved slab runs thus:
“This panegyric (prasasti) was engraved by the artist (tilpin) Rámadóva, the son of the excellent sculptor (rúpakara) Sihaka."
Here the inscription is called a panegyric. Hence it is very probable that it was composed and engraved in the lifetime of the prince whom it celebrates. This was Arjuna (v.1) or Arjunavarman (1.7 and v. 19), king of Dhårå (1. 9 and v. 6). He belonged to the Paramara family (1. 13) and was a descendant of the emperor (sarvabhauma) Bhojadeva (1.7). The poet represents him as the equal of his ancestor Bhojadeva (v. 6), and even as an incarnation of Bhoja (v.1). In verse 3, Bhojadeva himself is compared to the god Krishṇa and to the epic hero Arjuna :
« Victorious is Krishna ; like Krishna, Arjana; (and) like Arjuna, the glorious king Bhôjadêva, who was able to defeat (his enemies) by leaping arrows;' who afforded protection to the whole earth ; who assumed the radh&6 which distressed his enemies) by wounds from roaring, terrible arrows;S (and who) had his desires speedily fulfilled for a long time at the festive defeat of Gang@ya."
The last few words of this verse imply that king Bhôjadêva defeated a prince named Gangeya, just as the epic hero Arjuna killed Bhishma, whose metronymio was Gångêya. As the well-known Paramára king Bhôjadêva of Dhårå was reigning in the first half of the eleventh century, his enemy Gångêya must be identical with the Kalachuri king Gångeya of Tripuri, whose reign fell into the same period.
Arjunavarman, the hero of the drama, is in one place (v. 10) styled the son of king Subhata.' This enables us to identify him with the Paramára king Arjunavarman, who was the son of Subhatavarman, and whose copper-plate grants are dated in A.D. 1211, 1213 and 1215. The same three grants prove that the new drama was composed in the reign of this
* See the definitions in the Dakardpakam, III. Verse 40, and in the Sahityadarpana, Nirnaya-Sågara Press edition, p. 345, where the Ratnaralt und Viddhaldlabhanjikd are quoted as examples. Others are the Priyadarfikd, Karnasundarf, Kamalinikalahansa and Vrishabhánuja. The prototype of all of them is Kalidasa's Malavikdge nimitran, which has however fire scts and is therefore styled andakam.
• On the formation of Gangddhardyani (without oriddhi of the first rowel) see Pâqini, IV. 1,160.
• Vasantotsava, v. 8 and 1. 27. As this festival takes place on the first tithi of the dark fortnight of the pernimanta Chaitra (Ind. Ant. Vol. XXVI. p. 187), it is also called Chaitrotsava (v. 9), Madhitaava (l. 15) and Chaitraparsan (1. 3).
• The word bdna, an arrow,' may refer also to the Bina king.
"A particular attitude in shooting (standing with the feet a span apart)."- Monier-Williams.
• In the case of Kțishṇa we have to translate :-"who was able to defeat the leaping (deanon) Baņs; who afforded protection to all the cows (by lifting up the mountain Govardhana); who made Radha distressed by being smitten with manifest love." In the case of Arjuus, Radha is the foster-mother of his opponent Karna. 1 Ep. Ind. Vol. I. p. 232 f.
Ibid. Vol. II. p. 302. Prof. Kielhorn's Northern List, Nos. 106, 197 and 198,
