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No. 21.]
PURSHOTTAMPURI PLATES OF RAMACHANDRA: SAKA 1232.
199
No. 21.-PURSHOTTAMPURI PLATES OF RAMACHANDRA: SAKA 1232.
BY PROF. V. V. MIRASHI, M.A., NAGPUR.
These plates were brought to my notice by Mr. B. M. Bhusari, M.A., Professor of Marathi, in the Osmania College, Hyderabad (Deccan). At my request Dr. N. P. Chakravarti, Government Epigraphist, supplied me with excellent ink-impressions of them. The original plates were kindly procured by Mr. G. Yazdani, M.A., O.B.E., Director of Archeology, Hyderabad State, and their ink-impressions taken by the Superintendent for Epigraphy, Madras. I am indebted to Mr. Yazdani for permission to edit the plates in this Journal.
The copper-plates, which are three in number, were discovered in the possession of a Gōsavi at Purshottampuri on the southern bank of the Godavari, about 40 miles due west of Parbhani, in the Bhir District of H. E. H. the Nizam's Dominions. They are very massive, each measuring 1' 24" broad, 1' 8" high and " thick. Their total weight is 47-25 lbs. The ends of the plates are raised into rims for the protection of the writing. The first and third plates are inscribed on one side only and the second on both the sides. The plates have in the centre at the top a round hole 11" in diameter for the ring which must have originally held them together; but neither the ring nor the seal, which must have been connected with it, is now forthcoming. The writing is in a state of excellent preservation. There are 141 lines in all, of which thirty-four are written on each of the first two inscribed sides, thirty-eight on the second side of the second plate, while the last plate has thirty-five lines. The technical execution is very good, there being few mistakes of writing or engraving. In line 51 two redundant aksharas have been cancelled by incising two vertical strokes on the top.
The characters are Nagari. Except in a few cases they closely resemble the ordinary Nagari characters of the present time. The only peculiarities that call for notice are that the curve for the medial u is in some cases added to the side and not to the bottom of the vertical stroke, see Vishnu-, 1. 81 and -achyutam, l. 137; the medial diphthongs are in many cases denoted by prishthamātrās; the subscript member of the ligature gg like that of nn is denoted only by a horizontal stroke, see svarggam, 1. 136; n appears with a dot in one case and without it in another, see Sarngain 11. 2-3 and 30; the form of the rare jh in Vimjhadeva, 1. 105, is noteworthy; the letters and in approximate to their modern forms, see ramana-, 1. 2 and yajñair-, 1. 124; the letters t and n, th and dh as well as v and ch are in some places written alike; the left member of dh is fully developed except in ligatures like ddh; there was thus no possibility of confusion between dha and vā, still the horizontal line joining the vertical strokes of the former akshara is not discarded, see nidhanam, 1.2; finally, v and b are denoted by their proper signs except in vrahma-sv-, 1. 133.
The language is Sanskrit and the record is written partly in prose and partly in verse. There are 59 verses in all. Of the initial 18 verses which eulogize the reigning king Raniachandra and his ancestors, one completely and another partly occur in the earlier Paithan plates of the same king. It is again noteworthy that in the concluding portion, which contains benedictive and imprecatory verses, there is one verse which is only a hemistich, and another, which is an Anush
1 In their size and weight the present plates resemble the Paithan plates of the same king Ramachandra edited by Dr. Fleet, Ind. Ant., Vol. XIV, pp. 314 ff. Of the three plates here the first weighs 18 lbs., the second 14-25 lbs. and the third 15 lbs.
2 The aforementioned Paithan plates have a Garuda seal.
3 These are verses 4 and 13. The second half of the latter verse occurs as the first half of the corresponding verse in line 46 of the Paithan plates.
