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Reprinted from the Bulletin of the Deccan College', Vol. XIV, No. 3, Dec. 1952
ON THE PRAKRIT AND SANSKRIT NAMES OF
THE NASIK CAVE-HILL
By
M. A. MEHENDALE
The name of the hill in which the Buddhist caves at Nasik are excavated appears in some of the Prakrit inscriptions in these caves as tiruṇhu (5 times)1 or tiramphu (once). The same hill is styled as trirami in two of the inscriptions" written in mixed dialect in some of these caves. The names occur either singly as tiranhu and triraimi, or in composition as tiranhu-pa(v)vata and triraśmi-parvata. That both tiranhu and trirami refer to the Nasik cave-hill is made clear by such references as follows: (this) cave caused to be made on the summit of the mountain Tiranhu and given as a gift to the community of monks; this cave, with a caitya building and cisterns inside it, caused to be made on the mountain Tiramnhu and given to the community of monks in the four quarters; the building of (this) caitya caused to be completed on the mountain Tiranhu"; this cave and these cisterns caused to be made on the Triraśmi hills."
The above references further suggest that the two names refer to the identical hill, and in this respect all scholars are agreed. The difficulty only arises in linguistically equating these two names, as the Pkt. tiranhu cannot be regularly derived from Skt. trirami. The difficulty of deriving ph<ém has been already pointed out by Dr. KATRE, to which may further be added the difficulty in deriving the end vowel ui (ranhu < rasmi).
Bhagvanlal INDRAJI, one of the early scholars dealing with the Nasik inscriptions, makes no attempt to solve these difficulties. His only observations are--- "The name Trirazmi or Triple Beam of Light is difficult to explain. It may refer to the three solitary hills of which the cave hill is the most easternly, or it may have been given to the cave hill because of its perfectly pyramidal or fire-tongued shape."
1. For the various editions of the inscriptions where this word occurs, see LÜDERS, List of the Brahmi Inscriptions, EI 10. Appendix, Nos. 1123 (twice), 1124, 1126, and 1141. 2. See LÜDERS, List No. 1140.
3. See LÜDERS, List Nos. 1131, 1137.
4. El 8. 60f.
6. EI 8. 91f.
Jain Education International
5.
7.
8. Tiranhu, Teranhu(ka) And Trirasmi, Indian Linguistics, 14. 143-145. 1954.
9. The Bombay Gaz. 16. 633. Earlier on p. 541, he observes, About five miles to the south of Násik the Trimbak-Anjaneri range ends in three isolated hills six to eleven hundred feet above the plain...... The three hills are bare steep and pointed. The cave hill, besides being the highest, has the most sharply cut and shapely outlines. From Násik or from Govardhan six miles up the Godavari, its form is so perfect a pyramid as to suggest that its pyramid or triple fire-tongue shape was the origin of the name Trirasmi (Pk. Tiranhu) or Triple Sunbeam, by which it is known in seven of the cave inscriptions."
Madhu Vidya/246
EI 8. 90f.
EI 8. 78f.
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