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INDIAN INSURIPTIONS AND THE KAVYA
composed in on old Prakrit very much nearer to Pâli, still the results that may follow from its examination would of course be equally applicable to Sanskrit Poetry; as there exists no separating barrier between Prakrit and Sanskrit kavyas. As far as the information provided by the Alamkara-sastra goes, both Sanskrit and Prakrit compositions are regarded as branches of a common stem and are both bound by the same laws. Accordingly we find that all the known Prakrit kavyas are composed in obedience to the same canons as are written in Sanskrit. They present the same varieties of style and the same alamkaras, and it happens not seldom that one and the same author uses both Prakrit and Sanskrit. Even the author of our inscription must have known Sanskrit and been expert in Sanskrit kávya also, because he appears to be guilty of some Sanskriticisms. The compound Vijhachhavanta° (1. 2) appears to be but a transliteration of the Sanskrit Vindhyarkshavat, since the Greek form odeytos shews that the Prakrit name of the Rikshavat began with u. Another apparently Sanskrit sanidhi is found in Kesavajuna (1. 8), where the rule of the Prakrit demands Kesavajuna, i. e., Kesavajjuna. So also the form pitupatiyo (1. 11) occurring in a writing of such a late date, must be looked upon as only an archaic imitation of pitṛipatnyoh. As far as I know this is the only instance of a genitive in the dual number, which has been entirely lost even in older Prakrit literature. It is even possible that the inscription might have been at first composed in Sanskrit and then translated or transliterated, as the Prakrit, which resembled Pâli, was then, as even in much later times, the official language in southern India.65 Whatever may be the case, so much is certain that the author was acquainted with the Sanskrit language as well as the Sanskrit literature.
AUGUST, 1913]
231
His work is a gadyam kávyam like the Girnâr inscription discussed above and belongs to the class of prasastis. After the date given in quite an official manner, there follows the description of the king of kings Gotamiputa Sâtakani written in a high poetic style, which together with the shorter praise of his mother Gotami Balasiri and of the cave prepared by her, in all, covers eight lines and a half, and altogether makes a gigantic sentence. Then there come at the end two short sentences which say that the Queen gave away the cave to the Bhadrayaniya monks and that her grandson Pulamâyi assigned the village Pisachipad raka for the preservation of the sculpture and pictures. In these concluding sentences, the language is quite business-like; but even there we find some figures on a small scale made use of. In the first of these, the mother is described by means of three epithets giving rise to alliteration, mahadevi maharajamata maharajapatamaki, in the second the king is spoken of not by name but as mahadeviya ajjak dya serakamo piyakamo na[tá Sakaladakhind]pathesaro, the grandson ever willing to serve and please the Queen the grandmother, the lord of the whole of the Deccan.' Thus even here the author does not forget his profession altogether.
As for the first and the main part of the prasasti, its style entirely resembles that of the Girnâr prasasti in that long compounds are used to bring out ojas or the force of language. These run on almost exclusively from 1. 2 to 1. 6; then in 1. 7, the almost breathless reader is favored with a resting pause, in as much as only short words are used. In the last line and a half of the description of the king, the poet again takes a new leaf and uses towards the end the longest compound which contains sixteen words with forty-three letters (paranagarula ityddi). The Anuprasa is more liberally made use of, as is the case with the Girnâr prasasti. Thus we have in 1. 2 asika-asaka, in 1. 3 °pavatapatisa, divasakara hara° °kamalavimala," in the last parts of the compounds in 1. 3 sdsanasa, vadanasa vahanasa, °dasanasa, and many more similar expressions. In one point, however, the Nâsik inscription differs from the Girnâr prasasti. While the latter disdains the use of the conventional similes of court poets, these are found in our prasasti in a very large number and sometimes very striking too. Just the very first epithet of the king Himavata-Meru-Mudara-pavata-sama-sarasa whose essence resembles that of the mountains Himavat, Meru, and Mandara, is conceived quite in the kavya style. Thus the author shows that the comparisons of the king with these mountains so favourite in later times were in vogue even in his day. What he, in reality, means by the phrase in question is that Satakani was possessed of
65 See on this my remarks on the Prakrit Pallava Land-Grant in the Epigraphia Indica, p. 4 f.
