Epigraphia Indica Vol 30

Author(s): Hirananda Shastri
Publisher: Archaeological Survey of India

Page 50

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कोवा (गांधीनगर) पि ३८०००० No. 6] MUSUNIKA GRANT OF DEVENDRAVARMAN III; GANGA YEAR 306 Adityavishnusarman, the son of Nārāyaṇabhaṭṭa, who belonged to the Bharadvaja gotra, and, at the time of the grant, was residing at Nagara. A third part of the village was given to his brother Bhanusarman. The grant was written by the Mahasändhivigrahika Sarvachandra and was engraved on the plates by the Akshasalin Khandimalla.
The date of the grant does not admit of calculation in the absence of such details as the month, fortnight, week-day or nakshatra; but the mention of the solar eclipse in line 17 gives some basis for verification. The grant does not, of course, state in which lunar month the eclipse occurred, nor does it explicitly connect the Ganga year 306 with it. Supposing that it occurred in that year, we get some data which we can verify. I have shown elsewhere,' from an examination of all available Ganga dates which contain any verifiable details, that the Ganga era commenced on Chaitra su. di. 1 in the Saka year 420 (the 14th March 498 A.C.). According to this epoch, the current Ganga year 306 corresponds to the Saka year 725. In this year there was a solar eclipse in the month of amanta Vaisakha, on the 25th April 803 A.C. There was no eclipse in the Saka year 726 corresponding to the expired Ganga year 306. This is, therefore, one of the few dates of the Ganga era which cite a current year.
The introductory part of the present grant contains merely conventional praise. In fact the prasasti of the Ganga rulers had become stereotyped long before and was being repeated in connection with the name of each successive Ganga king, sometimes with the addition or omission of a laudatory expression here and there which contained no historical information. It is not, therefore, possible to identify any early Ganga king on the basis of the introductory prasasti in his grant. The year 306 of the Ganga era in which the present grant was recorded shows, however, that Devendravarman who made it was the third king of that name, who was the son of Rajendravarman I.
Besides the present grant we have the following four records of the reign of Devendravarman III: (1) the undated Bangalore plates recording the grant of the village Sidhata in the vishaya (territorial division) of Varahavartani on the occasion of an ayana-sankranti; (2) the undated Chicacole plates registering the gift of the village Virințika in the Pushkariņi-vishaya; (3) The Indian Museum plates dated Gn. 308, mentioning the gift of the village Purujvana in the territorial division of Bakudravakōna on the occasion of a solar eclipse in Magha; and (4) the Tekkali plates dated Gn. 310, recording the grant of the village Niyinō in the territorial division of [Ru]pavartani. All these grants were issued from Kalinganagara. The introductory parts of all of them are identical except for the addition or deletion of an expression containing conventional praise.
In the present grant Rajendravarman I feceives the imperial title Mahārājädhirāja while his son, the reigning king Devendravarman III, is mentioned with the lower one of Mahārāja. This does not, however, indicate that the Ganga kingdom became smaller in the reign of the latter or that he owed allegiance to some other power. The drafters of the grants of this king do not appear to have been very careful in the use of these titles; for we find that in the Chicacole plates Rājendravarman is called Mahārāja, and Devendravarman, Mahäräjädhirāja. Again, in the Tekkali
1 Above, Vol. XXVI, pp. 326 ff.; Vol. XXVII, p. 192; Vol. XXVIII, pp. 171 ff.
Ep. Carn., Vol. IX, Bn. 140.
JAHRS, Vol. VIII, pp. 185 ff.
Above, Vol. XXIII, pp. 73 ff. For the reading of the date, see ibid., Vol. XXVI, p. 329. Above, Vol. XVIII, pp. 311 ff.
In the present grant the expression sita-kumuda-kund-Endv-avadata-dig-deba-vinirgata-yabah which occurs in the Tekkali plates (above, Vol. XVIII p. 312) has been omitted. Similarly the expression dhvast-arati-kulachalo which occurs in the present as well as the Tekkali grant finds no place in the Indian Museum plates. Again, the epithet parama-mähësvara is not mentioned in the present grant in the description of Devendravarman as it is in the Indian Museum plates.