Jignasa Journal Of History Of Ideas And Culture Part 01

Author(s): Vibha Upadhyaya and Others
Publisher: University of Rajasthan

Page 236

198
/ Jijñāsā
Ancient Indian epigraphs may broadly be divided into two groups: (i) those incised on behalf of the private individuals, and (ii) those engraved on behalf of the ruling kings. The documents of the first group usually record donations in favour of religious establishments or installations of images for worship. In some cases they mention the king during whose reign the grant was made or the installation took place. Sometimes eulogistic compositions were also engraved on stone tablets or pillars to commemorate public works like the excavation of a tank or the construction of a temple by a private citizen or a group of people. Such works sometimes mention the ruler of the country and occasionally describe his achievements. Thus private records often provide valuable material for the reconstruction of the political history of the period. It should, however, be remembered that as these records were not "official', they were not always drafted with the same care with which "official' documents were composed. For example, a private citizen felt no hesitation in describing the Gupta emperor as a mere Mahārāja. The use of this title for Kumāragupta I in the Mankuwar Buddhist image inscription led Fleet to conjecture that "it may indicate an actual historical fact, the reduction of Kumāragupta, towards the close of his life, to feudal rank by Pushyamitras and the Hūņas, whose attacks on the Gupta power are so pointedly alluded to in the Bhitari inscription of Skandagupta." But a proper differentiation in the nature of private and official records makes such a conjecture totally unwarranted.
The earliest inscriptions of India are those of Asoka who calls them edicts on morality (dhammalipi). Inscriptions of the subsequent period are, from the point of view of their contents, of many types such as yūpa-śāsanas (engraved on sacrificial post), stambha-śāsanas (engraved on pillars, either architectural or commemorative), pratimā-sāsanas image inscriptions), rāja-śāsanas (royal edicts), dāna-śāsanas (donative records, royal or private or institutional or religious), kraya-śäsanas (sale deeds), vijaya-śāsanas (victory deeds), abhaya-śāsanas (edicts of protection), dharma-śāsanas (religious edicts), vīragals (hero-stones), satīstones (inscriptions recording cases of self-immolation by widowed wives) and so on. Scholars generally categorise all these types under two major headspraśastis or pūrvās and tāmra śāsanas. The epigraphs commemorating the particular achievements or kirti of a king were called praśastis or pūrvās. Kalhapa calls them pratishthä-śāsanas. But, in that case, the pure praśastis of the type of the Allahabad pillar inscription of Samudragupta and the undated Mandasor inscription of Yasodharman, which are entirely devoted to the recitation of the glory and conquests of the kings mentioned in them, will have to be differentiated from the praśastis composed on the occasion of the pratishthā ceremony of the temples, flagstaffs, and such other constructions. The tāmra-śāsanas, on the other hand, record the grants made in favour of learned Brāhmaṇas, religious institutions or deserving individuals and officials. Their importance was twofold : judicial and religious. Whenever two parties differed on the question of the ownership of a piece of land, the copper plates were presented in the law-courts. Therefore, they were prepared in strictly legal language. From the religious point of view also, complete performance of ritualistic formalities was deemed necessary. Hence, gradually more and more emphasis was laid on the strict observance of the rules laid down in the Dharmaśāstras regarding the composition of the copper plate grants. Broadly, their contents may be divided into three sections : preamble, notification and conclusion. The preamble generally comprises mangala or auspicious invocation, the place of issue, the name of the donor with his titles and ancestry, and the address in respect of the grant. The notification consists of the specification of the gift, the name of the donee, the occasion and purpose of the grant and the boundaries of the land gifted. Lastly, the conclusion contains an exhortation, the names of the