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EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
(VOL. XXIII.
vāranān (1. 41). The letter A in conjuncta fich and nichh is placed after ch and chh and is not connected with it (cf., e.g., läfichhana in l. 8, and pañchabhih in l. 13). The anusvāra is denoted by a circle after the consonant, and very often a virāma is added underneath.
There are several superfluous signs of interpunctuation in the grant (cf. 11. 47, 61, 62), the most glaring instance being that in line 2, where the sign is used between two words of the same compound, dakshinya and satya.
As regards orthography, the class nasal is used before surds, the only exception being samkhyāṁ (1. 33). The letter v is used throughout for b. Consonants are doubled after r, except in varsha (1..16), and paursha (1.53), but cf. varshshāni in 11. 26-27. In doubling bh, the form bhbh is used instead of bbh. In one case alone, t seems to be doubled before r (puttrah, 1. 51), though it is doubtful whether the letter really denotes ttra. There are several cases of interchange of sibilants. Thus s is used for & in samit-āri (1. 24), mahisaḥ (1. 26), and for sh in Asādha (1. 50); $ is used for sin salila (1. 3), afinë (1. 42), and sh for s in shutah (1. 12). As in the other platest of Vajrahasta, we have prakshyālita (1. 3) instead of prakshālita, and samujvala (11. 8, 25) instead of sam ujjvala. It is difficult to distinguish between medial i and d.
The language of the inscription is Sanskrit. It contains twelve verses, the remainder being in prose.
The inscription is one of king Vajrahasta (III, or, according to another reckoning, V) of the Gänga dynasty, the son of Kāmărņava and Vinayamahādēvi. Six other copper-plate grants of this king are known, of which four have been edited and published in well-known journals'. Of the remaining two, the Triplicane Grant, dated in the Saka year 982, is noticed in the Annual Report on South Indian Epigraphy, 1924-25 (p. 7, No. 5) with a summary of its contents. The remaining one, the Boddapādu Grant, is described by Prof. Subba Rao', but no reference is given. It was published in the Telugu Journal Bharati (Vo) II, No. 5). In the following remarks I shall confine myself to the four published copper-plate grants of the king known to me.
The introductory portion of the present grant, which covers the first forty-two lines and six letters of the forty-third line, is an exact repetition of what we find in the other four platest. It contains, in addition to the opening stereotyped panegyrical passage, the genealogical account of the family, to which we shall refer later.
The next portion beginning with Kalinga-nagarāt in l. 43, and ending with viditam-astu bhavatām in l. 46, also ooours in the first three grants mentioned in footnote 1, with this difference, that whereas in the present grant, and the Madras Museum plates, the name of the king is written as Srimad- Anantavarmmā Vajrahasta-devah, it is simply "Srimad-Vajrahastadevah " in the other two.
The remaining portion, which actually records the grant, is, of course, different, though the ugual legal phrases, which occur in 11. 47-49, are common to all. Thus, with the exception of the name of the village in 1. 47, the first forty-nine lines of the present inscription contain nothing new. It must be noted, however, that the present grant contains, comparatively speaking, fewer mistakes than the others.
(a) The Nadagim plates, year 979 Saka (above, Vol. IV, p. 183); (b) The Madras Museum plates, year 984 Saka (above, Vol. IX, p. 94); (c) The Chicacole plates, year 971 Saka (J. A. H. R. 8., Vol. VIII, p. 171) and (d) Narasapatam platos, year 967 Saks (above, Vol. XI, p. 147).
* J. A. H. R. 8., Vol. VI, pp. 203-205.
. This has been noticed also in the Annual Report on South Indian Epigraphy for 1925-26 (No. 1 of Appendix A). But by mistake the name of the dynasty is given as Eastern Chalukya instead of Eastern Ganga.
• A few minor changes are introduced in Narasa patam plates. Hence I do not give any translation of the text, for which cf. above, Vol. IV, pp. 102-93 and Vol. XI Pp. 162
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