________________
206
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
[Vol. XIX.
TRANSLATION.
In the year 359, on the first (day) of Asvayuja, this Jewel (ratna)(a) has been installed(6) by the lay-hearer Potaka, together with his companions, the Odiliyakas, (who are) the song of Sida. (May) this gift, endowed with merits, (c) belong to all living creatures.
NOTES.
(a) I.e., Buddha who is one of the Tri-ratna : Buddha, Dharma and Sangha. In the Saddharmapundarika, however, the term ratna denotes a Bodhisattva (Sacred Books of the East, vol. XXI, p.66). The word ratnagriha which occurs in a Mathurā inscription of Dhanabhūti (Lüders, List of Brāhmi Inscriptions No. 125), and two Sāñchi inscriptions (Fleet's Gupta Inscriptions, p. 32 and p. 261), probably means the sanctuary containing the Buddha's image. (6) Prasthapita ; cf. prethavatiye in another Kharðshthi inscription (Thomas, JRAS., 1916, p. 283). (c) dhamaüte=dharma-yukta as Dr. Thomas suggests.
No. 33.
RAWAL SPURIOUS INSCRIPTION OF THE YEAR 40.
BY STEN KONow. At the village of Rawal near Mathura an inscribed stone has been dug out of a mound. The stone is now in the Mathurā Museum,
The information which has been supplied by the Honorary Curator is to the effect that there is nothing suspicious about the find. The stone is stated to be, to all appearances, old.
To judge from the photographs and estampages, the stone is square, about 4" high, 11}" long and 6" broad. It is inscribed with four lines in Kharoshthi of a very peculiar type, one line on the front edge of the upper surface, and three lines on the vertical face of the front. The inscribed portion measures about 4" by 8", and the size of individual letters varies between " and 11".
When the impressions reached me, I was hardly able to recognize a single akshara, and I was for some time in doubt whether I had before me a Kharoshthi inscription or a record in some
unknown' script. It was only when I chanced to think of the Shakardarra inscription of the year 40 that I realized that the Rawal record is nothing else than a clumsy copy of the former, evidently executed by a person who cannot have had but a very imperfect idea of the contents of his original. The only way of editing 'the Rawal inscription is, therefore, to compare it, line by line, with the Shakardarra record, and to show how far the writer has been able to reproduce his draft.
The various attempts at reading the Shakardarra inscription have been registered by Mr. N. G. Majumdar, the last editor of the record, in his valuable List of Kharosthi Inscriptions, and I need not repeat what he has said.
L. 1 does not present any serious difficulty. It runs : sam 20 20 Progharadasa masasa divas., where we can only be in doubt whether the last word should be restored as divase or as divasami. The edge is broken, and there seems to have been room for a mi after the mutilated & at the end. We may note the shape which the letter da has in this inscription. It looks like ta.
It will be seen that the initial sam rises above the line. The copyist has exaggerated this feature and, besides, separated the akshart in an upper and a lower part. The ensuing numeral figures have come out fairly well.
1 J. & P. A. 8. B., XX, 1924, p. 20.
