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No. 38.]
GHATIYALA INSCRIPTIONS OF KAKKUKA.
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pillar is surmounted at the top by a quadruple image of Gapapati, facing the cardinal direotions. The next vorso informs us that the village of Rohinsakupaka (Ghatiya!A) had formerly become unsafe on account of the Abhiras (Ahirs), and had consequently not been a place of residence for good people. Verses 3 and 4 tell us that Kakkuka, the favourite son of Kakka, of the Pratihára race, constructed a market place decorated with variegated streeta, went to the houses of Brahmanas, Kshatriyas (praksita) and Vaibyas, and, promising them means of livelihood, established the mahájana, the big folk there. We thus fully understand what the Máta-ki-sdl epigraph and our inscription No. I mean by saying that Kakkuks established a haffa and mahájana at Rohimsaka or Rohimsak apa. Owing to its being infested by the Abhiras, whose predatory instincts even to the present day are not quito extinct, the place must have becomo desérted, but it was re-peopled by Kakkuka by induoing, men of the three principal castes to come and reside there, after he had defeated and ousted the Ahirs. The verse following expresses & wish for the permanence of the prosperity of the mahajana, and of the fame of Kakkuka. Then follows the date Samvat 818 Chaitra Sudi 2 which, though the farther details of it are not given, is, it will be seen, identical with that specified in our inscription No. I and the Mata-ki-sål epigraph. Next, we are informed that the inscription was written by a Maga, called Mátriravi, and was engraved by the goldsmith Krishnesvara, doubtless the same who incised the Jodhpur insoription of the Pratíhåra Bâuka. It is followed up by the name of the sutradhára or mason who probably dressed the stone and erected the column, but the name is lost.
The fact that Matsiravi is called a Maga is very interesting. On the original stone the letters ma and gå are quite distinct, and, though na is not so distinct, it is clear enough. No reasonable doubt nood, therefore, be entertained as to Matriravi being spoken of as a Maga. Maga is another name for the Sakadvipiya Brahmaņas, about whom the late Professor Weber wrote a very learned and exhaustive paper. Round about Jodhpur there is a class of Brahmaņas known as Sêvaks, most of whom are religious dependants of the Osval Sravaks. They call themselves såkadvipa BrAhmaņas, and know that their story is told in the Namagrantha of the Sürya-purana and also in the Bhavishya-purana. That the SAkadvipiyas were originally foreigners has been clearly shown by Professor Weber. But it is only our inscription that furnishes a specific date, vis. V. E. 918, when we can positively assert that Magas lived and were known by this very name in Rajputånå at least.
Inscription No. III is of two lines containing nothing but verse 5 of Inscription No. I. Inscription No. IV consists of four lines containing two verses. They possess the flavour of subhashitas, and have each one and the same last pada, saying that six things are dear to Kakkuka. What those six things are has been specified in the verses themselves.
No. I. .
TEXT: 1 at fatuat A: Il retenticaruta 2 afso nefty: [1*] vaa afunga OTT
: Thrga: creeret[*]; verTATHT: [*]
For some remarks on Ahirs, noe Journ. Bo. 4. Soc. Vol. XXI. pp. 480-433; for faller information still, soo my monograph contributed to the Bthnographical Survey of Bombay.
Prakriti, which is the meas payal in verse 20 of the Maid-bt-wl inscription, here doubtless signifies the Kshatriy clam, as it is distinguishod both from the dipra (Brahmia) and agib (Valbye) class. This is rather An unusual sons of the word, and so far I have not seen it used in this sense anywhere else. From the original stone. • Read *°
Bond fro:
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