Indian Antiquary Vol 16

Author(s): John Faithfull Fleet, Richard Carnac Temple
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 54

THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[JANUARY, 1887.
and his son Samkaradêva; but there is the import- Eras, the Tables in which, with those in Mr. ant difference that, in their time, the person who Cowaajee Patell's Chronology, give, in convenient visited Népal was only a Brahman incarnation of forms, all the data that are ordinarily required. Sankaracharya ;' whereas, in the case of Visha- Instances, however, constantly occur, in which déva and his son, the visitor was the reformer the results arrived at from the Tables do not himself in person.
exactly agree with the details, recorded in inscripAccording to Dr. Bhagwanlal Indraji's inter- tions &c., that are the subject of computation. pretation and arrangement of the dates of the This is especially the case with dates from Southkings of Nepal, Vrishadeva reigned about ern India; my own experience being that, in a A.D. 260, and thus belonged to a period which very large proportion of these, the results do not would make it impossible that the statement agree. But the case is frequently the same with about Sankaracharya could be correct.
dates from Northern India. And, from the inBut the real date of Vrishaddva, as estab- stances of both classes that I have looked into, it lished by my own rectification of the early chrono- seems plain, that,- however absolute may be the logy of Nepal, was about A.D. 630 to 655; rules adopted in the Tables for arriving at the with, of course, the possibility, since the nearest initial days of Hindu years, which give the basis recorded date belongs to the time of his great- of all the detailed calculations, and however corgrandson Månadêva, that he really came some rect may be the published results on this point, ten or twenty years earlier.
yet the subsidiary rules and Tables, for working This result approaches so closely to the period out intermediate daye, must not be followed in arrived at, on estraneous and inferential grounds, too hard and fast a manner, but are always liable by Mr. Telang, that it is to be hoped that he will to modification and adjustment, sometimes on look again through the facts on which his con- account of retrenched and repeated lunar tithis; clusions were based, and will consider whether his sometimes in consequence of the practice of deductions do not admit of the slight modifications coupling a lunar tithi, when it commences after that would bring them into accordance with the sunrise and does not end in the same day, with statement of the Nepal Vamidvali. Like other the name of the following week-day, instead of native records, the Vamédvali is, for the most part, with the name of that with which the greater part extremely unreliable; it would, for instance, place of the tithi actually coincides ; and sometimes Vrishadova in B.C. 614. But, as shewn by Dr. because the theoretical arrangement of the Hindu Bhagwanlal Indraji, it has preserved, though luni-solar year, in twelve months, consisting of in a distorted form, at least one real historical alternately 30 and 29 solar days, in regular sucitem, in the statement that, in the time of Viśvadêva- cession, is not adhered to in actual practice, but varman, the predecessor of Amsuvarman, Vikra- varies irregularly from year to year. These are mAditya came to Nepål and established his era rather intricate matters, for which the Tables there; the real reference being to a conquest of do not provide, at any rate in a way that is the country by Harshavardhana of Kanauj, and convenient for use by those who are not experts. the partial introduction of his era as the result. And the result is that, except in respect of a date And there seems no particular reason for refusing that happens to be exactly normal in all its to accept its statement regarding the visit of surroundings, only a close approximation can be Sankaracharya as correct; supported, as it is, by obtained from the Tables. the fact that the name of Sankara appears for the It is easy enough, accepting the Rules and first time, among the Nepál kings, in the case of Tables as absolute in all their details, to assume Vrishadeva's son and successor. It is, at any rate, that the interpretation of an original passage sufficient, I think, to shew that Bankarachar. containing a date, is not correct; or, admitting ya's period is not later than that of Vrisha- that the interpretation is correct, to suggest dava
an error in the original record, and to adapt it
J. F. FLEET. to the results obtained from the Tables, by pro9th October 1886.
posing to alter the name of the week-day, or the
number of the tithi, and so on. But this method CALOULATIONS OF HINDU DATES. of procedure is hardly satisfactory. And my own The conversion of Hindu dates into English inclination, in cases of difference, is, to accept the equivalents has now been much facilitated by recorded details as at least primd facie correct, General Cunningham's useful Book of Indian and to use them as data for modifying and cor
• Wright'. History of Nepal, p. 152. • ante, Vol. XIII. p. 487.
ante, Yol. XIV. p. 850. • ante, Vol. XIII. p. 491f.