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No. 41]
RUSSELLKONDA PLATES OF NETTABHANJA
961
may not be so late as is usually believed. It seems probable that the epithet vandya applied in our record to the writer Dēvabhadra is not entirely unconnected with the origin of the cognomen Vandy-õpādhyāya which became regular among & class of Bengali Brāhmaṇas at a later date. The tradition that these cognomens are all derived from the names of certain villages appears to be doubtful.
It is difficult to connect Nēttabhañja who issued the charter under discussion with any of the four branches of the well-known Bhañja family of ancient Orissa, although in the family of the earlier Bhañjas of Khiñjalimandala we have actually a number of kings of the same name.' Our Nettabhañja seems to be earlier than even the earliest known members of the different branches of the Bhafija family. The draft of the charter under review is again remarkably different from any known record of the Bhañja family. Unlike the Bhañja inscriptions, our record does not offer any story about the origin of the royal family, nor does it refer to the places known to have been the headquarters of particular branches of the Bhanja dynasty. On the other hand, it describes king Nēttabhañja as a scion of the family of Drumarāja and as representing the hundredth generation of an ancient royal family. It would thus appear that besides the king's name ending in the word bhanja, our record has little to connect king Nettabhanja with the Bhatja 'family, several branches of which flourished at a later date in Orissa. It may, however, be pointed out that, although the meaning of the Prakritic name Nettabhanja cannot be definitely determined, it was fairly popular in ancient Orissa as some of the Bhañja rulers are known to have assumed the same name. Whether the Bhañjas of Khiñjalimandala, among whom we find several Nēttabhañjas, claimed any sort of relation with the earlier king named Nēttabhañja who issued the Russellkonda plates can hardly be determined in the present state of our knowedge. The rise of Nettabhañja of our record, whose dominions included parts of the Ganjam District, seems to have synchronised with the decline of the Sailodbhava dynasty of Köngöda about the eastern part of the same district. It is possible to suggest that the family of Drumarāja originally enjoyed a feudatory status.
The palaeography and style of the record under review suggest that its issuer was no other than that of the Baudh plates edited rather carelessly in the Journal of the Bilar and Orissa Research Society, Vol. XVII, pp. 104 ff. This charter was issued by king Nētta bhaõjs when he was staying at Navângulakapattana (i.e., modern Angul) in the fifteenth year of his reign. The correct reading of the concluding part of the inscription (lines 53-56) is : Svayariv ajalá pradatts ājñā sri- Nannéna pralekhitam(tam) ukirnna[m] Vädduräkena(na) bāsaman tāmra-pattakam=iti (1) Samvat 10 5 Kartti kalvadi 10 3. This identification would show that the dominions of Nēttabhañja included parts of the Cuttack-Dhenkanal areas in the north-east. It is interesting to note that, in the tenth century A.C., the earlier Bhañjas of Khiñjalimandala ruled over the same region between the Ganjam and Baudh-Keonjhar areas of Orissa
Värädda, whence the charter under discussion was issued, seems to be the same as modern Bāradā or Bårudā seven miles from Russelkonda and two miles from Kulädagarh which was the capital of the Bhañja ruling family to which the poet Upendrabhañja belonged and is probably to be identified with Kolada-kataka capital of the later Bhañjas of Khiñjali. I have not been able to identify the other geographical names mentioned in the inscription, viz., Chandütungam and Kämvērāla.
TEXT [Metres: verse 1 Varsasthavila ; verses 2, 3 Anushtubh ; verse 4 Puskpitāgrā.)
1 See Bhandarkar, List, p. 379.
From the original plates kindly lont by Sriyukta Chintamani Aobkrys, Vice-Chancellor of the Utkal Univer sity, Cuttack.
