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No. 16.)
TWO COPPER-PLATE GRANTS FROM INDORE.
287
asy=āsmābhiḥ kṣitah and idānim for idānim. Besides, Visarga is omitted after bhunjata in 1. 6, and wrongly inserted after krishāpayatas=cha in 1. 7. The influence of Prāksit' may be traced in the use of the word Santaka. The inscription is written throughout in prose.
As regards orthography we have to notice
(1) The doubling of d in dh before y (cf. pad-ānuddhyato in l. 1). (2) The doubling of u and y after r (cf. sarvvān=evo in l. 2, and sarvvairzīvo in 1. 7;
also Aryya in 1. 4; but we have a-chandr-ārka in ll. 4-5). (3) Omitting of a Visargn and doubling of the following consonant instead. (Thus we
have an irregular formation in asmābhikkyitah in 11. 5-6, but a regular one in
tulyadibhis-samanumantauyam in 1. 7. (4) The substitution of dental for lingual ņ, in brahmanasya (1.3) and tānijaka
The characters belong to the southern class of alphabets and approximate most closely to the Sāñchi Stone Inscription of Chandragupta II (Fleet's No. 5). A detailed comparison of the two inscriptions shows that all the common letters in them, except t, th, P, m, I and medial 1, perfectly resemble each other.
Two forms of t are used in the Säñchi inscription; one forined in the ugnal way, the two lower limbs branching off from a central vertical stroke (cf. t in bhāvit-ēndriyāya, l. 1), and the other, the precursor of the later forms, sach as are used, for example, in the Valabhi inscriptions and the inscription of Dahrasēna (Ep. Ind., Vol. X, pp. 51 ff., pl.), where the vertical stroke, instead of having a central position, is on a line with the lower limb on the right, and the left lower limb branches off from this (cf. t in jivita and apyāyita in 1. 3, patāka in 1. 4). The present inscription offers only the t of the latter class and in a more advanced form. The th is also a little different from that of the Sañchi inscription.
The p and l of the present inscription present analogous forms, though a little earlier than those used in the Säñchi inscription, while its m is distinctly earlier than that of the latter. The long medial i is formed in the Sanchi inscription by adding a small hook-like sign within the circle which is used to denote short medial i. In the present inscription long medial i is expressed by a loop formed by the left end of the circular curve used to denote the short medial i.
A comparison with the Valabal inscriptions also shows that the present inscription is considerably earlier than the earliest from Valabhi (Ep. Ind., Vol. XI, p. 106, pl.), which is dated in the Gupta Samvat 206. Thus the letters l, m, j, v, b, h, ch, d and conjunct r are distinctly earlier than those of the latter. On paleographical grounds, therefore, the present inscription must be referred to the period of the Sañchi insoription.
The characters include, in line 8, forms of the namerical symbols for 60, 7 and 5. . The inscription refers itself to the reign of Mahārāja Sri-Svāmidāsa. It is quite clear, both from the title Maharaja and from the epithet parama-bhatjāraka-pad-anuddhyāto, that Syamidāsa was not an iudependent sovereign, but merely a feudatory chief. The inscription is dated in the year 67 without reference to any specific era. As we have seen above, it must be referred, on paleographic grounds, to the period of the Sañchi inscription of Chandragupta II, which is dated in the year 93 of the Gupta Era. The year 67 of the present inscription should therefore, be also referred to the same era.
A possible alternative would be to explain the date as & regnal year. This does not, howlever, appear to be probable; for, in the first place, a reiga of 67 years is a very unusual onu, and secondly, the word varsha standing by itself at the end is never, go far as I know, used in inscriptions to denote a regnal year.
