________________
NOVEMBER, 1888.)
GHOSRAWA BUDDHIST INSCRIPTION.
309
son of Indragupta and his wife Rajj[@]ka, mentioned, when this inscription was comwas born in a noble Brâhmaņical family, at Na- posed. garahara (in the Jalalabad valley) in Uttard. Unfortunately, the inscription is not dated, patha (or Northern India). Anxious to follow and we therefore are left to determine its the teaching of Buddha, he went, after he had age approximately from the characters in which studied the Vedas and the Sastras, to the great it is written, and from the statement contained Kanishka vihara (in the neigabourhood of the in it, that Viradiva was patronised by a king modern Peshawar), where he became the disci- Dévapala. The test of the characters is, under ple of the teacher Sarvajñaśânti, and, as it any circumstances, a vague one; and although appears, formally embraced the Buddhist faith. there can be no doubt that the Dévapala He subsequently visited the diamond-throne at spoken of is the Pala king of that name, one Mahabodhi (or Bodh-Gaya), and from there of the more immediate successors of that Gopala went to a vihara, called Yasovarmapura, 'the of whom we have a short inscription at Nalantown of Yaśôvarman,' where he stayed for a long da, the chronology of the earlier rulers of the time, enjoying the patronage of the king Déva- Pala dynasty is still so doubtful that even a pala. Viradêva erected two chaityas on the seemingly valuable statement like the mention hill Indrabaila (or Giryêk, about 5 miles of one of their number, in the present instance, south-west of Ghosr&wA); and he was elected leads to no very satisfactory result. I thereby the sangha, or assembly of monks, probably fore can only repeat here, what has been stated
in succession to a monk named Satyabôdhi, to already by Captain Kittoe, that our inscription · preside over the monasteries at Nalanda (the was probably composed some time between modern Baragaon, about 9 miles west of Ghôs- the middle of the 9th and the middle of the râwâ). --It is hardly necessary to say that, with 10th centuries A.D. Judging merely from the the exception of Yalovarmapura, which by characters, the forms of which appear to me Sir A. Cunningham has been identified with the considerably earlier than those of an inscription town of Bihar, but which may be an older name of Mahipala, of which I have an impression of Ghðsråwå itself, all the places mentioned before me, I would assign it to the latter half of here are well known from the records of the the 9th century, while the latest researches by Chinese pilgrims. Nor need I point out what Dr. Hoernle, on the chronology of the Pala valuable proof is furnished by the above short dynasty would rather bring it down to about narrative, in support of the fact that Buddhism the middle of the 10th century. I do not think was still flourishing in the famous localities that the inscription can possibly be later.
TEXT.'
Om 1 Sriman'=asau jayati sat[t]va-hita-pravsitta-san-madas-idhigata-tat[t]va-nayő Munin
drah! kles-atmanam durita-nakra-durasad-antaḥ sansâ(msk)ra-sågara-samatta. 2 ran-aika-sêtuh 11 Asy-asmad-guravô va(ba)bhavar-ava(ha)lah sambhûya harttum
manaḥ ka lajja yadi kovalo na va(ba)lavin=asmi trilóka-prabhau ity
Alôchayat=e. 3 va MÂnasabhuva yo durato varjitah srimin=viśvam-seshnmwend-nyntad=V6(b)dhnu
Sa-vajrasanah | Astyl-Uttarapatha-vibhushann-bhůta-bhâmir-dos-ottamô Na4 garahare iti pratitah | tatra dvijâtir=udit-dita-vansa(msa) janma namn=Èndragapti.
iti râja-sakhô va(ba)bhůva || Rajj[]kaya dvija-varaḥ sa guņi gri. 5 hinya yuktô raraja kalaya [s]malaya ya th=ênduh lôkal pativrata-katha
paribhavanasu samkirttanam prathamam=eva karûti yasyah | Tabhyamraja6 yata entah sataram vivêki yô vâ(bâ)la dva kalitah parn-10ka-vu(buddhyil 1
sarsv-Ôpabhôga-subhayu-pi grihê viraktah (pravra Jiyara Sugata-Kasanam-abhyupé(pai)
See ante, Vol. XIV. p. 164. The Devapála of the From the impression. Expressed by a symbol. huge Gw Alior inscription, mentioned on p. 165 and Metro, Vasantatilaki. re-discovered at Serin (Siya liņi), is, in my opinion, not 1 80 Metre, Sardůlavikridita. the DAADA of the PAla dynasty, and his date, Vikramai 1 Metre. Vasantatilaka: and of the next four verses. Sathvat 1005 (not 1925) is therefore useless for the » This Ikshara, ya, was originally omitted, and is chronology of that dynasty.
engraved below the line.
