North Indian Inscriptions

PART A

in stone has been produced’, but all these renderings are unsatisfactory. In my opinion the term upaṁno is used here in the same meaning as in language of the Buddhist Pāli Canon. Innumerable times it is stated in the Vinaya that such and such object was saṁghassa uppanno ; cf. e.g. Cullav., V, 23, 1 f.: saṁghassa makasavījanī uppannā hoti; chamaravījanī uppannā hoti ; saṁghassa chhattaṁ uppannaṁ hoti. The words are generally translated ‘a mosquito fan, or a chamara fan, or a sun-shade, had come into the possession of the Saṁgha’. This is quite true, but it is only by donation that the Saṁgha acquired these things, and so uppanna seems to have assumed the meaning of ‘presented’, which would suit admirably well also in our inscription .

   From the inscription A 3 (mentioning Dhanabhūti’s son, prince Vādhapāla) it results that Dhanabhūti ─to his grandfather the title ‘king’ is given in our inscription─ was a king himself^[1]. Cunningham found the name Dhanabhūti as that of a donor again in an inscription from Mathurā (List No. 125), and tried to link this donor to king Dhanabhūti of our Bhārhut inscriptions. The revision of the inscription List No. 125 given here as a supplement shows that his assumption is an ill-founded one.

SUPPLEMENT : MATHURĀ INSCRIPTION OF DHANABHŪTI
List No. 125 ; PLATE I

   Fragmentary inscription on a railing pillar from Mathurā. According to Cunningham the inscription was cut on a corner pillar with sockets for rails on two adjacent faces, and sculptures on the other two faces. Afterwards another railing was attached, and fresh holes of a much larger size were then cut in the face bearing the inscription. Cunningham, moreover, states that the pillar was in the Aligarh Institute, but when Mr. Ramaprasad Chand visited the Institute in September 1921, he was unable to trace the stone.^[2] So our knowledge of the inscription is restricted to the reading and the facsimile which Cunningham published first Arch. Surv. Rep., Vol. III (1873), p. 36, No. 21, and Plate XVI, and again Stūpa of Bhārhut (1879), p. 130, and Plate LIII. The facsimile in the Stūpa of Bhārhut is less trustworthy, being evidently altered, not from the stone itself, but in accordance with preconceived ideas about the reading of the text. From this revised facsimile Senart edited the whole inscription in ‘Inscriptions de Piyadasi’, Vol. II (1886), p. 476, note 1=Ind. Ant., Vol. XXI (1829), p. 246, note 62 (English translation), and the second part only in F.As. Ser. VIII, Vol. XV (1890, p. 119 f.

TEXT :

1 ka[p].^[3] …………………..
2 bhuti[sa]^[4] ……………..ts.^[5]
3 putrasa………………...sa6

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^[1] Cf. the discussion on the date of our Bhārhut inscriptions above p. XXX.
^[2] ASI. Ann. Rep., 1922-23, p. 166.
^[3] The second akshara may have been ha, but it can hardly have been la as assumed by Senart. After kap. about six aksharas are completely destroyed. As regards the restoration of this and the next two lines see the remarks below.
^[4]Of sa only a minute particle is preserved, but the reading is certain. Between bhūtisa and ts. about four aksharas are missing.
^[5] In the first facsimile the sign is only tsa, in the revised facsimile it has been changed to tsā, but certainly only because Cunningham thought that Vātsiputrasa was the original reading.
^[6] Before sa the facsimile shows a sign which Cunningham transcribed by la, but in this he cannot be right, as la never shows a slanting bottom line as the letter in the facsimile. Considering that Cunningham was unable to decipher the last but one letter in the second line, it is very probable that the corresponding letter in the third line also was defaced and that the sign given in the facsimile is imaginary.