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174 EPIGRAPHIA INDICA
(VOL. XXVIII not hard to find. According to some scholars the Gāngas of Kalinga hailed from Karņāțaka where the Saka era was in vogue. As Kielhorn has shown, the months of the Saka era were generally amanta and very rarely pūrņimanta. Besides, the prevailing custom in Karnātaka in the early centuries of the Christian era seems to have been to use the amanta scheme. Very few early inscriptions from Karnataka contain any data necessary for the verification of the dates mentioned in them, but there is one record which affords & clue. The Sangöļi platest of Harivarman record a grant made on the occasion of the Vishuva on the new-moon day of Asvina. The mention of Vishava or Tulā-sankranti in the dark fortnight of Asvina shows that the month was amânta. Harivarman flourished in A. D. 526 or 545. So the Sangoli plates belong to about the same period as the commencement of the Gänga ora and may be taken to indicate the custom of reckoning of lupar months prevailing in Karnāțaka. If the Gängas originally hailed from Karnataka, they may have commenced their era on amānta Chaitra su. di. 1. The custom prevailing in Kalinga may have been to use the pūrnimānta scheme as it certainly was in the neighbouring country of Dakshiņa Kösala. The Gängas following this custom seem to have dated some of their early records according to the purnimānta scheme. Later on, however, they adopted the amänta scheme with which they were familiar in their home province. Hence we find that in all later records of the Ganga era, the months are reckoned according to the amänta scheme.
No. 30–INTWA CLAY SEALING
(1 Plate)
B. CH. CHHABRA, OOTACAMUND The ancient site of Intwā is situated on a hill, in the midst of a thick jungle, about three miles from the famous rock at Jūnāgadh in Saurāshtra, that contains inscriptions of Asoka, Rudradāman and Skandagupta. The name Intwā owes its origin to the fact that the site has since long been yielding bricks (ints) in abundance. "
During the winter of 1949, the Government of Saurashtra had a small-scale excavation conducted here under the direction and supervision of Mr. G. V. Acharya, once the Curator of tho Archæological Section of the Prince of Wales Museum of Western India, Bombay. He has laid bare remains of a couple of Buddhist monasteries. One finds that their pavements, walls, drains and platforms were all made of bricks of extra large size. In plan, they closely resemble those exposed at Taxila. Further diggings at Intwă must yield inany more antiquities.
Mr. Acharya has collected an assortment of relics from this site in the shape of tiles, terracotta, pottery, beads and the like, but no inscription. The only inscribed object found there is a baked clay sealing. It is now housed in the local museum at Jūnāgadh along with the other Intwā antiquities.
In November 1950, I happened to visit Jūnāgadh in the course of my official tour that side. I then had an opportunity of examining the sealing in question. Similar clay sealings have been
Above, Vol. XIV, pp. 163 f.
. See, e.g., the date of the Lõdhiä plates of Maha-Sivagupta Bālārjuna, Journal of the Kalinga Historical Research Society, Vol. II, p. 121. The tithi Karttika-paurnamast is again expressed as Kartika dina 30, which shows that the month was pūrnimänta. Above, Vol. XXVII, p. 326, text line 32.
In the same way the Early Chalukyns of Badami continued to use the so-called Kalachuri-Chēdi era, which was previously current in Maharashtra, for some years after they conquered the country from the Kalachuris, but later on they gradually introduced there the Saka era with which they had been familiar in their home province; A. B.O.R.I., Vol. XXVIT p. 13.
