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No. 23.SIRRAMBAKKAM INSCRIPTION OF PARAMESVARAVARMAN, YEAR 1
(1 Plate) P. B. DESAT, DHARWAR
This inscription was found at Sirrambākkam alias Tenkärapai, a village in the Tiruvallur Taluk, Chingleput District, Madras State. It was copied by a member of the office of the Government Epigraphist for India in the course of the epigraphical survey of the Taluk in 1947-48. It is registered as No. 83 of Appendix B and noticed at page 1 of the Annual Report on Indian Epigraphy for that year. I edit the record here for the first time with the kind permission of the Government Epigraphist for India.
The epigraph is engraved on a slab of stone used as a step at the entrance of the Chelliamman temple in the above village. The slab is almost square in dimensions measuring about 29 inches long and 28.5 inches broad. In the central part of the stone is carved a floral design consisting of melon-shaped petals arrayed within the space formed by two concentric circles. The diajneter of the inner circle is about 8 inches and that of the outer one 15,5 inches. The space inside the inner circle is left blank. The margin on the four sides of this design contains the writing. The insoription is made up of six lines, two of which are incised in the upper space, followed by two more in the right. Next comes one line at the bottom and another towards the left. The record is partly damaged and a few letters in lines 3 to 5 are obliterated. As the inscription speaks of the erection of a temple, it seems likely that this inscribed slab was originally fixed into a wall of that temple.
With the exception of the four letters of the Grantha alphabet, viz., s, m, h and in the first line, the characters are archaic Tamil of the unornamental variety and belong to the 7th century.. They may be compared with those employed in the cave inscription at Vallam and some of the labels on the rocks near Pūñjēri. Among the individual letters may be noted the initiala in line 5 and cursive y in line 6.
The language is Tamil. We may note the honorific plural varummar of Sanskrit varman in line 1. The vowel-ending plural form Somāsiyāru in the compound Sämāsiyāru-marumagan is also noteworthy. Two similar forms are met with in the Vallan cave inscription, namely, Mayendirappõllaresaru-adiyān in line 3 and Vayandappiriaresaru-magan in line 4. The full import of the expression Tunan-gilavar in line 2 is not known. The word kilavar, which, however, forms part of it, may stand for chiefs' or 'hoadmen.' The expression tadumā in line 6 is difficult to explain.
The inscription refers itself to the first regnal year of Mahārāja Paramēśvaravarman, Considering the palaeography of the epigraph and the historical facts known about the Pallavas of Kāñchi, who had risen to power at this time and were wielding authority in the region represented by the present record, we are justified in identifying this Mahārāja Paramēsvaravarman with the Pallava ruler Paramēśvara I (circa 670-700 A. D.). The date of our epigraph would thus be about 670 A.D.
1 SII, Vol. II, No. 72 and Plate X. ' Ibid., Vol. XII, No. 23 A and Plate II.
8 The expression Kulaittu from talai is used adjectively in the sense of 'first'. The same usage may also be notod in the familiar phrase talaittu kufandai meaning first child'. For epigraphic usage of the word talai meanin first,' we may note the expression Ani-tlalai-ppiraiyal in the Takkolam inscription (above, Vol. XIX, p. 87).
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