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No. 18.]
MOUNT ABU VIMALA TEMPLE INSCRIPTION.
frequently occur are the Vikrama years 1245 (22 times) and 1378 (25 times). Of the inscriptions at Tejaḥpâla's temple 77 are dated, and here the earliest dates are of the Vikrama year 1267 (about A.D. 1230), the very year in which the temple was founded, while the latest date (in No. 1748) is one of the [Vikrama] year 1911 (about A.D. 1854); no less than 47 inscriptions are dated between the Vikrama years 1287 and 1297, and 9 between 1346 and 1389. Of the 30 inscriptions at the temple of Achalêsvara 22 are dated. Here the earliest inscription appears to be one (No. 1950), unfortunately almost entirely effaced, of the [Vikrama] year 1186 (about A.D. 1129), and another (No. 1941) seems to contain a date in the [Vikrama] year 1191. What I consider to be certain is, that No. 1951 of Mr. Cousens' List is dated in the [Vikrama] year 1207 (about A.D. 1150), in the reign of the [Paramara] Mahamandaléśvara Yasodhavaladeva (a fendatory of the Chaulakya Kumarapala, an inscription of whom is dated in the same year). Two other inscriptions (Nos. 1945 and 1946) are dated in the [Vikrama] years 122[5] and 122[8], the rest in 1377 and later years. Regarding the 13 remaining inscriptions, it will suffice to say that the Guhila inscription mentioned above (No. 1953 of the List) is dated in the [Vikrama] year 1342, and that the dates which occur in others are of later years.
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Of the inscriptions at the temple of Nêminâtha, the two largest and most important, together with 30 shorter ones, have been edited from Mr. Cousens' materials by Prof. Lüders, above, Vol. VIII. p. 200 ff. I now give the text of an inscription of the [Vikrama] year 1378, which is at the temple of Rishabha, and the chief point of interest in which is the statement that that temple was founded in the Vikrama year 1088 (about A.D. 1031) by a certain Vimala, who had been appointed dandapati at Arbuda by [the Chaulukya] Bhimadeva [I].
Before I proceed to describe the inscription, I may state that the date here given for the foundation of the temple is known to us also from other sources. In Ind. Ant. Vol. XI. p. 243, the late Dr. Klatt gave an extract from a Pattávali of the Kharatara-gachchha, according to which the minister Vimala, who belonged to the Pôravada (Prågvâța) family, and who broke the parasols of thirteen Sultans and established the town of Chandravati, caused a temple of Rishabhadêva to be built on the mountain Arbuda - a temple which even now is known by the name Vimala-vasahi,' and which, it is added, was consecrated by Vardhamânasûri in the year 1088. The same story, with the same date, is more fully given in the extracts in Prof. Weber's Catalogue of the Berlin MSS., Vol. II. pp. 1036 and 1037, where. we are moreover told that, to obtain from the Brahmans the ground on which he intended to build the temple, Vimala had to cover it with gold coins, and that he expended 18 crores and 53 lacs (185,300,000) in the building of the temple. And the date also occurs in an interesting extract from Jinaprabhasûri's Tirthakalpa, in Prof. Peterson's Fourth Report, p. 92 f. There, again, the Vikrama year 1088 is given for the foundation of the Vimala-vasati, and 1288 for that of the Luniga-vasati,3 and it is also stated that, when the two temples had been demolished or damaged (bhagna) by the Mlêchchhas, they were repaired in the Saka year 1243 (ie. the Vikrama year 1378), the first by Lalla, the son of Mahanasimha, and the other by Pithaḍa, the son of the merchant Chanḍasimha. We shall see below that our inscription actually records the restoration, in 1378, of Vimala's temple by Lalla (Laliga), the son of Mahanasimha, and
1 No. 129 of my Northern List.
3 So far as I can see, there is something wrong in the verses 39 and 40, as given by Prof. Peterson, but regarding the date of the construction of the Vimala-vasati there can be no doubt.
* According to the extracts, the stradhara, who built the Ldniga-vasati, was Sobhanadeva, who is mentioned in the same way (as prásádakdraka-sútradhara) in Mêrutunga's Prabandhachintamani, p. 259. This builder's name actually occurs in No. 1674 of Mr. Cousens' List, an inscription of the Vikrama year 1288.- Jinaprabhasûri's account of the mountain Arbuda, from which the extracts are taken, seems to be based on inscriptions and to be quite trustworthy.
