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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
[VOL. XXIII.
text. The uneven surface of the reverse side, showing a number of fissures, must have made the engraver's task somewhat difficult. In several instances he has been obliged to leave blank space in the middle of a line and re-engrave a letter er letters, as in the last line, after the blank space. The plate is cracked at the upper left corner and some slices appear to have been cut away from here, as also from the lower left corner. As a result of the damage, which happened probably when the plate was being dug out, several letters are lost from the commencement of lines 1-3 and 14-15.
The characters belong to the Eastern variety of the. Gupta alphabet ', representing a further stage of development as compared to those of the copper-plates of Bengal dating from the 5th century A.D. Palæographically, it resembles the Faridpur plates of Dharmaditya and Gopachandra' which are referable to the 6th century. As pointed out below, the approximate age of the plate can be determined also from its internal evidence. As regards the forms of individual letters, noteworthy are m, y, sh and 8, and the conjuncts fich, tm, lp and Im. The letter y shows a curl on the left with opening on the outer side. This particular form of the letter has been found by Hoernle also in the Bower Manuscript,' and it appears in the Faridpur plates, the Gunaighar plate of Vainyagupta (A.D. 507)' and in the latest one (A.D. 543-44) of the Dämödarpur plates. The letter h has the lower portion of its curve shaped like a hook. turned to the right. It differs from the h occurring in the Baigrām, Pähäppur and Damodarpur' plates in which the curve is much shorter and is turned to the left. Attention may also be drawn to the use of the peculiar medial o, consisting of the 2-stroke on top of consonant and the hook-like a-stroke added to its stem below. The record contains examples of the final t and m and the numeral signs for 3, 7, 8 and 20.
The language of the inscription is Sanskrit. With the exception of two verses in Arya metre at the beginning and eight other verses relating to land grant, the document is composed in prose throughout. The superfluous addition of the suffix ka in datlaka (1. 12) is a well-known feature of the records of the Gupta period. The word vārakrita, in asmad-vārakritaih (1. 12), which probably refers to a class of officers, is of lexical importance. As regards orthography, mention may be made of the doubling of a consonant either preceding & subscript r or following a superscript r, the use of the dental nasal in tansa (1. 17), and of the same nasal instead of m, once in danbha (1. 1). The sign for b occurs only in a single instance in brāhmanasya (1. 16), but everywhere else in the record the sign for v has been employed for 6. This orthographical distinction between b and v, as is well known, gradually became obsolete after the Gupta period.
1 Ind. Ant., Vol. XXXIX, 1910, pp. 193 f. * Introduction to the Bower Manuscript (Reprint, Bombay 1914), p. 46. • Indian Historical Quarterly, Vol. VI, 1930, pp. 45 ff.
Above, Vol. XV, pp. 141 ff. and Vol. XVII, p. 193. . Indian Historical Quarterly, Vol. XXI, pp. 78 ff. . Above, Vol. XX, pp. 59 ff. * Above, Vol. XV, pp. 113 ff.
• The primary meaning of vara is a person's turn or proper place', and várakrita would mean one appointed in turn or one appointed in a place'. In the Ghugrahati plate of Samacharadeva certain persons are said to have been appointed kulavara (karaşika-Nayanaga-Kēšav-adin kalavarau prakalpya) in connection with the land granted. Also in a Faridpur plate of the time of Gopachandra we have Vishayadhikaranen-adhikaranakajiankulavåran-prakalpya, i.e., having appointed, through the Vishayadhikarana, kulawaras who are acquainted with administrative affairs'. The word kulandra has been taken by Pargiter to mean a referee' or 'an arbitra (Ind. Ant., 1910, p. 205, n. 49; in the above passage I read juan for juana of Pargiter). Evidently the word vorabnia is used in a similar sense in the present record. In line 12, this class of officers are supposed to carry out the appor. tionment of the price of the land at the Vithi.
