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No. 34.]
MAREDAPALLI GRANT OF SRI-RANGARAYA II.
327
dynasty who lived during the days of its decline, will be useful in so far at least as they will enable us to determine with tolerable certainty the extent of their dominions and the seats of their government, if not also their relations with their quondam viceroys in distant provinces.
Tarning to the grant itself, it may be observed that the tops of the first, second, fourth, and sixth pages of the impressions are marked by the Telugu numerals 1, 2, 3 and 4. There also appear faint traces of the numeral 5 at the top of the eighth page. This seems to indicate that the grant was originally incised on five plates of which the first and the last were engraved only on the inner, and the intervening three on both sides. Judging from the impressions, the plates can be said to have been in good preservation. They measure 99' x 74" and seem to have had raised rims and a ring passing through the centre of their top.
The alphabet is Nandināgari. The following are some of the orthographical peculiarities and errors - (1) the doubling of y, t, and d after 7 in-turyyo (11. 9 and 13) ; -sauryyēna (1.25); -märttih
(1. 46) ; -kirtti- (1. 61); bharttui (1. 87); and -särddülamarddanah (1. 117);
(2) the doubling of when followed by rin nivasannrajati (1. 81);
(3) the dropping of the visarga before sibilants in -saptamasripati- (1. 11) and svahkāmini
svatanu- (1. 18);
(4) the use of the anusvāra instead of class nasals in narendrah (1. 11); Tatapinnama
(1. 13); haran (1. 14); niranjanāni (1. 34); -bhavainchitah (1. 65); and -mandalika- (11. 102 and 105);
(5) the use of instead of si in dinndgan (1. 58);
(6) the use of instead of I due, perhaps, to vernacular influence in lalita (1. 5).;
-chaļikshma- (1. 10); surabhiļāsugan (1. 21) and -mi(ma)raļa- (1. 55); and lastly,
(7) the use of the symbol for dh to denote th (11. 57 and 58). The words chawrast
(1. 90), samula (1.94), dhatta (1. 107) and ditāpatta, which occur in the Viļāpaka grant!, are also found here.
The inscription opens with obeisance to the god Ganadhipati and consists of eighty-three Sanskrit verses. It closes with the word Sri-Virupaksha in old Kanarese characters. The first three verses invoke respectively the gods Siva, Vishộa and Gaņēša in the manner of the British Museum Plates of Sadasivariya. The following eighteen verses carry the genealogy of the dynasty, partly mythical and partly historical, down to Tiru malarāya's reign and have their exact parallel in verses 3-20 of the Kondyäta grant of Veikata 1.3 Verses 22-29 describe king Tirumalarāya but record no historical facts. With verse 30 begins the description of the donor Sri-Rangaraya II, son of king Tirumala and Vengalamba. In verse 42 he is said to have belonged to the Atrēya-gotra.
1 Ep. Ind., Vol. IV, p. 270.
Ibid. p. 12.
Ind. ant., Vol. XIII, p. 129.
• Identical with these are the verses 24-27, 29, 30 and 82 of the Tumkur Plates of Tirumalaraya (800 Ep. Cars., Vol. XII, PP. 2-3).
