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188
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
[VOL. XII,
No. 22.-MOTUPALLI PILLAR-INSCRIPTION OF GANAPATIDEVA; A. D. 1244-45.
BY PROFESSOR E. HULTZSCH, PH.D.; HALLE (SAALE).
This inscription is engraved on four sides of a pillar of the mandapa in front of the Virabhadrasvamin temple at Motupalli in the Bapatla taluka of the Guntar district.1 I edit it from a set of excellent inked estampages received from Rao Sahib H. Krishna Sastri, who has already noticed the inscription in his Annual Report on Epigraphy for 1909-10, p. 106 f.
With the exception of a few syllables near the edges of the pillar (e.g. in 11. 169-171), the inscription is well preserved. The alphabet is Telugu. The characters are on the whole well formed, but there are some letters (e.g. the dentals, linguals, r, l, and v) which it is not quite easy to distinguish from each other without paying regard to the context. The lingual is used twice in the word parkila (11. 89 f., 102). Of peculiar spellings may be mentioned klupta for klripta (11. 85, 149) and yavvana for yauvana (1. 13).
The languages are Sanskrit (11. 1-152,166-173) and Telugu (11. 152-166). The Sanskrit portion consists mostly of verses, which are 29 in number (11. 2-134, 166-173). The remainder of the inscription is in prose. Of rare Sanskrit words the following deserve to be noted:-antaripa, 'an island' (line 136 f.); amaliman, 'purity' (verse 17); aśviya, 'a number of horses' (v. 20); anandathu, joy' (v. 1); amredana, 'repetition' (v. 4); aśvamedha aśvamedhika (v. 12); uparinkh, to spread' (v. 27); ushmala, 'glowing' (v. 13); kan, 'to glitter' (v. 16); kalamba, 'an arrow' (v. 12); kridayita, 'sporting' (v. 4); ganda, a hero' (v. 18); the same gandaśaila, a boulder' (v. 26); guñja, 'a kettle-drum' (v. 23); ghrini, 'a ray' (v. 27); damara, tumultuous, terrible' (v. 20), Tridasaparivridha Indra (v. 13); Padmavasa Lakshmi (v. 5); parimoṭana, 'cracking' (v. 18); Maghavanmani Indranila (v. 27); rangat, 'rolling' (v. 3) ; lambapaṭaha, 'a kind of drum' (vv. 12, 25); Lopamudradayita Agastya (v. 15); Srivatsavakshas-Vishnu (v. 8).
The Motapalli pillar-inscription is an edict of the (Kakatiya) Maharaja Ganapatidēva (1. 135 f.). It opens with an invocation of Svayambhudeva. From the Prataparudriya we know that Siva under the name Svayambhudeva was the family-deity (kula-devata) of the Kakatiya dynasty. Verses 1-4 of the inscription invoke Gapesa, Sarasvati, the digit of the moon on Siva's head, and the Boar-incarnation of Vishnu, respectively. Verses 5-15 contain a mythical and legendary genealogy of the Kakatiya kings. Verse 5 introduces Vishnu, from the lotus. en whose navel sprang Brahma. From the Creator's eye the Sun was produced (v. 6), and from the latter Manu (v. 7). In this family (vis. the surya-vamia), was born Ikshvaku (v. 8), in his family Mandhatri (v. 9), and in his family Sagara (v. 10), whose sons were burnt by Kapila, but attained salvation through the austerities of Bhagiratha (v. 11). In this family was born Raghu (v. 12), and in his family Dasaratha, who, being mounted on India
1 Cf. Mr. Sewell's Lists of Antiquities, Vol. I, p. 88.
2 Professor Zachariae kindly informs me that the same participle occurs in two (unidentified) quotations of the commentary on the Mankhakota :-rangad-bhangash sa Gangam (verse 115) and rangat-samanga-ruchih (verse 126).
Ind. Ant., Vol. XXI, p. 199; and see now K. P. Trivedi's edition, p. 185.
