Epigraphia Indica Vol 08

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

Page 75

EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
(VOL. VIII.
now be added after attention has been invited to this point. Of course the unsatisfactory explanation of ranafirah = sênágra, having once been suggested, may have contributed to enlarge the use of the word. Anyhow I consider that here samarasirasi means no more than samaré or samaréshu.
Kelasapavatasikhara being perfectly certain, vimana ought not to be interpreted as an unspecified palace,' but as one of the heavenly mansions of the gods residing on Kailasa. The Prakrit Tiranhu must, notwithstanding its irregular form, be= Sanskrit Trirasmi. The meaning of rasand is partially identical with rasmi ; this circumstance may have favoured the transition, especially the substitution of n for m. Besides, local names are subject to dialectic accidents, of which it is often difficult to state the origin and fix the measure. Of Bhadávaniya the etymologically correct form is that which we shall find in the next epigraph, viz. Bhadâyaniya "(-ka). Regarding that sect, a subdivision of the Sthaviras, comp. Rhys Davids in J. R. As. Soc.,
N. S., 1891, p. 411 ff., and 1892, pp. 5-7. As to the relation between the three genitives at the end of line 10 of the text, I may refer to my remarks on K. 13 above.
Chitananimita is translated : 'to allow (this cave) to be taken care of' by Bühler, who reads chitand and takes it to mean chintana ; and : ' for painting the cave)' by Bhagvanlal, who reads chitana and derives the word from chitrayats. This etymology, which is recommended by the ~, seems to me to be the only acceptable one, although Bhagwanlal probably limits the meaning too closely. Chitray may as well be taken in the general sense of ornamentation, embellishment. Bühler seems to have been influenced by the comparison of lenasa pațisatharane which, in the next inscription, sums up the object of the present donation. To be sure, the two expressions cannot contradict each other, but nothing requires a priori that they should be exactly synonymous. Chintana has the very definite and abstract meaning of thought;' it is not easy to introduce it here without some violence. We shall see on the other hand that the explanation for the repairs of the cave,' proposed for pafisantharane in N. 3, is far from being certain.
The restoration mata , . .. Dakhina]pathisaro is as probable as the translation of pitupatiyo proposed by Bühler is inadmissible. Dharmasētu, in religious phraseology, especially that of inscriptions till a rather recent period (above, Vol. III. p. 343; Vol. IV. p. 207, etc.), denotes figuratively a foundation as a bridge, a dam of merit,' which enables its author to get over the ocean of samsára. The way in which the word is used in 11. 12-13 of the next inscription could lead us to fancy that it is here transformed into a proper name, attached to that cave which has been dug out by the king's grandmother. Such a name, however, would be very vague and little significant. I admit that dhamasetu must be taken in its ordinary meaning, as an apposition to lena either expressed or understood, to mean the pious foundation of the queen. I cannot account for the curious idea of Bhagwanlal, who sees in it the personal name of some manager of the cave.' As to pitupatiyo, he transcribes it by paitripitrikah. He evidently thought of the analogy of pitsipaitámaha; but the two are in no way identical. It might be admitted that they are equivalent, and that pitripitsi=
father and father's) father. The insuperable difficulty lies in the reading. The stone does not bear pitupitiyo or pitupetiyo, but pitupatiyo. The i-vowel after the second p is decidedly excluded by the tail of the r in the preceding line, and no trace of an e-vowel can be discovered. It is pitupatiyo and nothing else that has to be explaived. Patti in the Buddhist Pali, i.e. prapti, is a technical term denoting the application to another of the merit acquired by good works, by a gift, by a foundation (Childers, .v.). It is probably through the intermediate meaning a part, participation,' that the word has come to be used in that way. Thus pitupattiyo or Ottiko means who is applying to his father the merit of his donations. The king speaks of his father only because his father alone is dead, and he begins by alluding to his mother, proclaiming his donation to be inspired by his veneration towards her and his wish to share in her views. It is therefore just as if he had said, with an idiom more familiar to the language of inscriptions, pitaram udditya. From this case I am inclined to conclude, without