Epigraphia Indica Vol 25

Author(s): Sten Konow, F W Thomas
Publisher: Archaeological Survey of India

Page 12

EPIGRAPHIA INDICA.
VOLUME XXV.
No. 1.-REWAH PLATES OF THE TIME OF TRAILOKYAMALLADEVA: [KALACHURI] YEAR 963.
BY N. P. CHAKRAVARTI, M.A., PH.D., OOTACAMUND.
This set of two copper-plates was found in 1929 at Dhureti, a village about 7 miles from the Rewah town, by a cultivator while ploughing his field, and is now preserved in the Treasury at Rewah. During my visit to Rewah early in 1936, I came to know of this find and later in the same year the Political Minister of the State very kindly sent me the plates for examination and taking impressions. The record has already been noticed by me in the Annual Report, Archaeological Survey of India, 1935-36, pp. 90-91 and I am now editing it in the Epigraphia Indica with the kind permission of the Rewah Darbar.
The plates measure 158"x10" each and are strung together by means of a ring, passing through a hole pierced about the middle of each plate. They are inscribed on one side only, the obverse of the first and the reverse of the second plate being left blank. They have highly raised rims which have protected the writing beautifully. There is a seal attached to the ring, bearing at the top the figure of Gaja-Lakshmi in relief, rather crudely executed. Below the figure is a legend in one line which reads Srimat-Trailõkyamalla. When the plates were received by me the ring was found already cut but there can be no doubt that both the ring and the seal belong to the plates under discussion. The seal measures 63" x41" and the plates including the ring and the seal weigh 419 tolas.
Each plate has 11 lines of writing, the letters being approximately" in height. The en graver appears to have left too much margin between the lines in the second plate and had to engrave the last two lines in slightly smaller characters so that the record could be completed in this face of the plate. The engraving was done rather carelessly. Some of the letters are ill formed and while syllables have been dropped in many places, only in two cases the missing letters have been supplied at the top of the line concerned. The characters are Nagari, the language being Sanskrit. The whole record with the exception of three verses in 11. 1-5 is in prose. Several mistakes in grammar and syntax show that though the record was composed by two Pandits, neither of them was a proficient scholar in Sanskrit. The script does not call for any special remarks but attention may be drawn to the following minor points. The anusvāra has sometimes been represented by a circle above the syllable to which it belongs, e.g., simha (1. 8), Srichamda (1. 9), pamḍita (1. 11), etc., and sometimes it has been written in an ornamental way, e.g., om (1. 1), mamti, mamḍalaka (1. 8), samdhi (1. 8), etc. In writing & sometimes a cross bar has been used joining the two limbs of the letter thus making it look like 8, cf. Sivaya (1. 1), saranyaḥ (1. 4), éri-Malayasimha (1. 8), Saiv-achary (1. 11), etc. Due to shabbiness in writing it is sometimes hard to distinguish between and ch. For the same reason pra in pravarddhamana and tha in Jyeshtha (1. 7, look like vra and va respectively. As