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No. 24-PATTALI GRANT OF YUVARAJA RAJENDRAVARMAN, GANGA YEAP 313
(1 Plate) D. C. SIRCAR, OOTACAMUND
This inscription was published by Mr. Manda Narasimham in the Telugu journal Bharat, June 1954, pp. 574 ff. In April 1956, it was purchased from Mr. Narasimham for the Epigraphical Gallery in the Office of the Government Epigraphist for India. Nothing is known to us about the findspot of the record and the story of its discovery. Mr. Narasimham's article in the Bharati does not disclose any fact in these respects. But there is little doubt that the plates were discovered somewhere in the Srikakulam District of Andhra Pradesh.
The inscription is written on three copper plates held together by a ring bearing the seal of the issuer of the charter. The plates are rectangular in shape and measure each 7 inches in length and 34 inches in height. They have slightly raised rims. There is a hole (about inch in diameter) in the left side of the plates for the ring to pass through. The diameter of the ring is about 4 inches while its thickness is about inch. The ends of the ring are soldered to the bottom of a thick circular seal about 1 inch in diameter. On the countersunk surface of the seal, which is considerably corroded, there are traces of the figure of a standing animal which is no doubt a bull that was the emblem of the Eastern Ganga kings. The three plates together weigh about 94 tolas and the ring and the seal about 38 tolas.
There are altogether 37 lines of writing in the inscription. But line 30 containing only three aksharas written between the beginning of lines 29 and 31 is not a continuous line, while the tot. line contains only one akshara followed by a danda. The inscription is incised on the inner side of the first plate and both the sides of the second and third plates. It has, however, to be notioed that, through oversight, the engraver originally began to incise the concluding part of the record (lines 34 ff.) on the outer side of the first plate instead of on the corresponding side of the third plate, which is its proper place. But the mistake was detected when only one line and a half had been engraved on the reverse of the first plate.
The characters belong to the later Kalinga script and resemble those of many early medievad inscriptions discovered in the Srikakulam region. The letter dh has the form of adh in some cases as noticed often in inscriptions in the later Kalinga alphabet. The language of the record is corrupt Sanskrit and it is written in prose with the exception of a few imprecatory and benediotory stanzas at the end. In point of orthography, the record resembles other epigraphs of the area and age in question. The grant was issued in the year 313 of the Garga era, which fell in the period between 809 and 811 A. D. The date is written both in words and in figures; but there are no other details of the date.
The charter was issued from Kalinganagara by Yuvarāja Rājöndravarman, desoribed as the son of Mahārājādhirāja Paramēsvara Parambhattāraka Anantavarman of the Eastern Ganga family. It records the grant firstly of the village of Păttali (elsewhere called Padali) situated in the territorial unit called Krishnamattamba, in favour of the goddess Kañchipotti-bhattärikā. in order to provide for her offerings, etc., by Yuvarāja Räjēndravarman himself and secondly of Kabasankira-grāma in Dāpupañchāli and Arali-grāma in Jämtotta-pañchāli in favour of the same deity by Rājēndravarman's mother Loka-mahādāvi. The primary object of the charter was to record the grant of Pattali-grāma since the order of the Yuvarāja was issued to the inhabitants of that village only. That Lūka-mahādēvi's grant of the villages of Kubasa kira and
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