Epigraphia Indica Vol 34

Author(s): D C Sircar
Publisher: Archaeological Survey of India

Page 93

No. 11-FRAGMENTARY INSCRIPTIONS FROM CHITORGARH
(1 Plate) D. C. SIRCAR AND G. S. Gar, OOTACAMUND
(Received on 18.6.1959) The stone slab containing two fragmontary inscriptions published below was recently found while clearing debris in the fort area of Chitorgarh in the Udaipur Division of Rajasthan. It is now kept in the store-room of the office of an Overseer of the Western Circle of the Department of Archaeology, stationed at Chitorgarh.
The writing on the fragment of the slab consists of two inscriptions, called A and B in the following pages. The two records together cover an area 9 inches in height and 7 inches in breadth. Inscription B is engraved below A. The writing is broken away from the left, right and bottom sides of the stone. Thus only the central part of the lines of writing in the original records is preserved, though the concluding part of B is also completely broken away and lost. Inscription A consists of only 3 incomplete lines while B exhibits 8 such lines. The number of aksharas in each line of the extant part of the two epigraphs is between 16 and 21. The composition being in verse, it is easily seen that 12 and 14 aksharas are respectively broken away from the beginning of line 1 of A and B while 16 aksharas are lost at the end of the last line (i.e. line 3) of A. We have also to note that the same stanza in Vamastha seems to be continuing from line 2 to line 3 of A and that, if calculated on this basis, the number of lost syllables at the end of the second line and at the beginning of the next in the said record would be altogether 24.
The fact that the formation of the letters in the two inscriptions is different shows that two different persons were responsible for their reproduction on the stone. The space between two lines in both the inscriptions is about half an inch while that between the two records is about one inch. As, however, will be seen below, both the records appear to record the pious activities of the same person.
The characters of both the records belong to the Northern Alphabet of about the first hall of the 6th century A.D. The letters of B have been more boldly and deeply cut than those of A. The angular corners of the letters in B end in a protrusion (cf. the back of ch and d and the lower angles of p and v). The top serifs of letters are triangular in most cases in B but are straight horizontal strokes in A. The sign for medial i in A generally comes down to the bottom of the letters while it stops at their top in B. There is also some difference between the medial sign of i in A and B. Rhas a sort of an upward stroke added to the left of its bottom in A, while in B the hanging bottom line of this and some other letters and signs has a somewhat thick and triangular end. Barring these differences, the alphabets of the two records are similar to each other and they bear remarkable resemblance to the stone inscriptions of the Aulikara king Yabodharman Vishnuvardhana found at Mandasor, one of which is dated in the year 532 A.D. We may compare, for example, the letters n (without loop), k, ch, n, d, r and has found in the epigraphs under study and in the Mandasor inscriptions. It is particularly interesting to note that the alphabet of B is remarkably similar to that of the fragmentary (duplicate) Mandasor inscription of Yasodharman.
*CII, Vol. III, pp. 142-68 and Platou. • Ibid., Plate facing p. 150.