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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
www.kobatirth.org
Acharya Shri Kailassagarsuri Gyanmandir
नन सूचन इस ग्रन्थ के अभ्यास का कार्य पूर्ण होते ही नियत
समयावधि में शीघ्र वापस करने की कृपा करें. जिससे अन्य वाचकगण इसका उपयोग कर सकें.
PREFACE The preparation of a critical edition of fourteen old Brāhmi inscriptions and one table of Brāhmi alphabet in the Udayagiri and Khaņdagiri caves, such as has been attempted in the present volume, is an undertaking, which could not be faced without a feeling of diffidence. So far as I am concerned, it had never been in my contemplation to undertake this difficult work before the task of teaching the Hāthi-Gumphā inscription of Khāravela was thrust upon me by the Boards of Higher Studies in Pāli and Ancient Indian History and Culture in the session 1924-25, during the absence on leave of the colleague in charge of the subject. I proceeded, however, with the task, examining the facsimiles of this bafilling epigraph, reading and discussing its text and interpretation, week after week, in a class of pupils, all of whom readily cooperated with me, and yet the prospect of solving its riddles was far from being bright. After many fruitless attempts I took it up in all earnestness in 1927, devoting myself wholly to it during the Poojah holidays with the firm determination to come to a definite solution. It was only towards the middle of October that the faded lines of the document appeared to me in a somewhat clear light.
I was aware that since Mr. Stirling published the first notice of this inscription in 1827 in a volume of the Asiatic Researches, James Prinsep, General Cunningham and Rājendra Lāla Mitra grappled with it without even succeeding in ascertaining the name of King Khāravela, in whose name it stood. The study of it obtained, no doubt, a right direction and received a fresh impetus when Dr. Bhagawanlal Indraji
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