________________
No. 29.]
FOUR BHANJA COPPER-PLATE GRANTS.
son as Satru or enemy, unless bhañja were to be an integral part of it, which would make him
4
the vanquisher of an enemy'. Similarly fila is a rock, but with bhanja added, it makes its wearer the breaker of rocks'. Rana is battle, but a king is no battle; he is Ranabhañja, the ⚫ conqueror in battle'. Dis are the 4 or 10 quarters. Obviously the king cannot be dis, but it is a great compliment to him to be called Digbhanja, the 'victor of all the quarters'. There is only one name in that line which appears to be self-sufficient without the bhañja and that is Vidyadharabhañja found in two plates (F and J) where in each case the last letter ra is absent which, however, is supplied by the seal attached to the charter F. By the way I may here note that the king had the title of Amoghakalaśa', which was conjectarally read by Dr. Kielhorn as Dharmmakalasa, owing to an over-engraving in the part where the epithet occurred. It was natural for him to read it as such, on the analogy of Kalayanakalasa attached to the name of Netribhañja, especially as the last letter looked like double m, which was apparently meant for gh. Dr. Kielhorn has clearly shown that plates F are palimpsests, but what is most curious is that the alterations are most prominent in the names of the donor, his title and his ministers. Plates J show that the Prime Minister was Bhatta Kesavadeva, who presented the charter to the queen for affixing the royal seal, and that the composer of the charter was Stambha, the Minister for peace and war, in whose office it appears that such records used to be prepared. In plates F the offices are reversed, whereby Kesava becomes Minister for peace and war, while Stambha becomes the Mantri. The alterations were so carelessly made that Khambha (the popular form of Stambha) continued to be shown as Minister for peace and war and, as such the writer of the charter. This led Dr. Kielhorn to suppose that Stambha and Khambha were different names, occupying the offices of Mantri and Sandhi-vigrahika respectively, while Kesava was put down as a messenger, in view of the fact that no messenger was mentioned in the record.
287
My view of the matter is that the record F was originally prepared during the reign of a short-lived king, the immediate successor of Silabhañja II, but it could not be issued before his death. At this stage Vidyadhara, the younger brother of the deceased, was installed, not without a coup d'état, which brought the Minister for peace and war to prominence causing the supersession of the Prime Minister Kosava by Stambha for the time being. The accession of Vidyadhara to the throne must have been an occasion for munificent gifts and apparently the charter F was issued in hot haste, with necessary corrections, though not very carefully carried out as
1 Our record J which has no signs of being tampered with at all reads as follows at the end :खाञ्छितं श्रचिकलिङ महादेव्या (4) मंत्रिया श्रौमहकेशवदेवेन । (ठ) बालिकचा चिकन लिखितं सांधिविग्रहिक श्री
सम्प्रेम । चरकीचाच सालीकुमारचन्द्रेण ।।
I think the original record was exactly like this, except perhaps that at (a) the word fad and at (6) d or some such equivalents were omitted. Ia tampering with the record the first alteration to have been made was the insertion of the family name of Stambhsdēva as Tējadika, which took the place of pravěsitam at (a) leaving no room for the word mantrina to precede his proper name, which was next inserted in the place of Kesavadēvēna. The official designation mantrinä had therefore to follow instead of preceding his name against the usual practice. Thus the word mantrină had to be put in the place of the unknown word at (6). This necessitated the insertion of his part of the duty (that is, presenting the record to the queen for affixing the royal seal) further on, again against the usual practice, and the word af had therefore to go in the place of rife. There remained now Kesava's name to be inserted and it was apparently put in the place occupied by if which was as usual followed by fafed fufauft, which was left intact, the duty and the office of the displaced minister thus being joined with his name in this manner. What was omitted to be done was the elision of which created an almost meaningless colophon as follows:
लाकितं श्रौमहादेव्या तेजडिकेन श्रौमहसम्भदेव मंदिष्या प्रवेशितं केशवेन लिखितं संधिविग्रहिक खम्भन उरको चाच सालीकुमारचन्द्रेन ॥
[The expression Tejadika might be connected with the Telugu and Kanarese Teji meaning a horse. The title may have been derived from the fact of Stambha or his ancestors having been originally Keepers of royal horses.-Ed.]
