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269
No. 43] TWO GRANTS OF VARMANS OF VANGA 20 तो पुण्य[काणी नियतं स्वर्गगामिनौ । षष्टिवर्षसहस्राणि स्वर्गे मोदति
भूमिदः । आक्षेप्ता चा21 नुमन्ता [च तान्येव नरके वसेत् । स्वदत्तां परदत्ताम्वा(तां वा) यो
हरेत वसुन्धरां(राम्) । स विष्ठायां क्रिमिभूत्वा पितृभि]22 स्सह [पच्यते । बहुभिर्वसुधा दत्ता राजभिस्सगरादिभिः । यस्य यस्य यदा
भूमिस्तस्य तस्य तदा फलं(लम्) ।] 23 इति कमलदलाम्वु(म्बु)विन्दुलोलां श्रियमनुचिन्त्य मनुष्यजीवितञ्च सकलमिद
मुदाहृतञ्च बु(बु)द्वा न] 24 हि पुरुषैः परकीर्तयो विलोप्याः ॥
B. Vajrayogini Plate of Sāmalavarman This is only a quarter of a whole plate. It was discovered in the village of Vajrayógini, P. S. Muinsiganj, District Dacca. Vajrayógini, in old days, must have been a part of the city of Vikramapura. It is unusually big in area, being a conglomeration of 28 hamlets, each with a separate name. Vajrayogini contains a.number of old temple sites, full of mouldering bricks. By the side of three large tanks in the village, there is a raised homestead site, still known as Nastika-panditer bhită, i.e. the atheist Pandit's homestead, which is fondly believed to have been the site of the homestead of the famous Buddhist scholar Dipankara. A large number of Buddhist and Brahmanical images including the famous silver image of Vishnu, now in the Indian Museum', were discovered in different parts of the village. An image of Tārā of the late Gupta or early Päla period and another inscribed image of the same deity of a later dates discovered in this village are now in the Dacca Museum.
Sõmpārā is a hamlet of Vajrayogini. There is an old tank in the hamlet from which several Buddhist images were recovered. The inscribed image of Tărā referred to above was one of them. On the southern side of the tank, there are mouldering ruins of an old temple, fragments of the basement walls of which are still standing. East of the ruins is a small tank by the side of the District Board road. This tank was reclaimed some years ago and the earth raised was thrown round the tank. The fragment of copper-plate under study was discovered by some boys on the north bank of this tank, about six inches below the surface of the soil. Priyanath Banerji, a teacher of the local High School, obtained the fragment from the boys and presented it to the Dacca Museum.
The fragment is thick and fairly heavy. It measures 54 by 43 inches. Therefore, the copperplate, when entire, must have measured approximately 111 by 9 inches. Both the obverse and the reverse of the fragment contain each 15 lines of writing.
The characters are Proto-Bengali of the 11th-12th century and closely resemble those of the Belāva plate of Bhöjavarman. As noted above, 7 shows distinct development from its form found in the plate of Srichandra and that of Harivarman edited above. The letters, which are
1 See my Iconography of Buddhist and Brahmanical Sculptures in the Dacca Museum, p. 84, Pl. XXIX.
See ibid., Intro. p. xxiv, and p. 56, Plate XX. ३ Ibid., P.57, PlatexXI. .
