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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
[VOL. XVII.
No. 12. THE KEDARPUR PLATE OF SRI-CHANDRA-DEVA.
BY NALINI KANTA BHATTASALI, M.A., CURATOR, DACCA MUSEUM.
In the October number of the Dacca Review, for 1912, Mr. J. T. Rankin, I.C.S., published a note given him by the late lamented scholar Babu Gangamohan Laskar, M.A., on a copperplate inscription of Sri-Chandra-Deva found at Idilpur in the Faridpur District of Bengal. This note for the first time established the fact that a Buddhist line of kings with the suffix "Chandra" at the end of their names had ruled in East Bengal with Vikramapura as their capital about the 10th or 11th century of the Christian Era and votaries of antiquarian studies in Bengal have been busy thenceforth, discussing the position of the Chandra kings of Vikramapura in the chronology of their country. The discovery of a second copper-plate of SriChandra-Deva at Rampal in the Munshiganj sub-division of the Dacca District in April, 1913, by Prof. Radha-Govinda Basak, M.A., ga e a further impetus to the discussion. Prof. Basak published this plate first in the Sravanu and Bhadra number of the vernacular magazine Sahitya for 1320 B.S. and finally in the Epigraphia Indica, above, Vol. XII, page 136.
The present plate is the third of Sri-Chandra-Deva. It was found in April, 1919, in excavating earth from a ditch at Kedarpur in the Madaripur sub-division of the Faridpur District of Bengal. It was preserved in the custody of the second teacher of the Kedarpur Middle English School. I came to know of the find from a friend and it has been obtained for the Dacca Museum by the Hon'ble Mr. T. Emerson, C.I.E., I.C.S., through the kind efforts of Mr. J. N. Roy, I.C.S., Magistrate of Faridpur, and Mr. N. Sen, Sub-Divisional Officer of Mādāripur.
The plate measures 8" x 7", and is therefore slightly smaller than the plate published by Mr. Basak, which measures 94" x 8". The Royal Seal of the Chandras is attached to the middle of the top of the plate. It displays the Wheel of the Law with two couchant deer on the two sides, symbolical of the first "Turning of the Wheel of the Law" at the Deer Park,-the present Sarnath near Benares. It is noteworthy that the Palas of Bengal who preceded the Chandras, and who were Buddhists as well, had similar devices on their seals. The name of Sri SriChandra-Deva[b] is written in relief below the Wheel in the present seal.
The plate is incomplete and appears to be no grant at all, but only a plate kept ready, with the stereotyped portion of the grant inscribed in the office of issue, to be filled in with the necessary remaining portions as occasion arose. The plate is full of engraver's mistakes of a serious nature. It may be noted that Kadarpur, where this plate was found, contains the ruins of a royal settlement surrounded by a broad ditch as well as a big silted up tank, commonly associated with the memory of Kedar Ray, one of the famous twelve chieftains who ruled Bengal before the country was completely dominated by the Mughals. Kedar Räy had his capital at Sripur, which, from the description of Ralph Fitch, appears to have been a flourishing town in 1585; and the reasonableness of having a second capital, only a few miles off, is not very apparent. Of course a thousand and one contingencies might have taken the present plate to Kedarpur, where it has now been found, but the find of this unfinished plate also makes it possible that the ruins at Kedarpur may be those of the Chandras who preceded Kedar Ray by no less than five hundred years.
The plate is inscribed on one side only and there is a vacant space of about two inches at the bottom. The inscription contains 18 lines of writing. The letters are 24 to 30 inch in height and are in most places well inscribed. Mistakes of engraver or scribe are, however,
