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PART B
TRANSLATION:
In the northern quarter the three (classes of ) Savaganisisas (Sarvagānṛiśaṁsas ?)
[B 24-26 refer to one and the same sculpture.]
I am unable to offer a translation that would satisfy myself. All interpretations of the
inscription published hitherto are based on the reading ta instead of ga in the line 2. Hoernle
and Hultzsch transcribe the text uttaraṁ disa tini savatani sisāni. Hoernle rendered it ;[1] to
the northern (or upper) side (are) three heads turned towards each other’, while Hultzsch’s
tentative translation runs: ‘in the northern direction, [three covered] heads’. Hultzsch
understood savatami as Sk. saṁvṛitāni, Hoernle traced it back to an adjective saṁvartāni, unknown elsewhere, but both translations are equally unsatisfactory as no three heads are seen
in the sculpture, neither ‘turned towards each other’ nor ‘covered’. Hoernle’s attempt to
refer the inscription to the relief in the lower panel is of course only a makeshift that need
not be discussed. Barua and Sinha divide savatanisisāni into savata-nisisāni and boldly equating savatanisisa with Sk. sarvatraniśrita or sarvātmaniśrita translate the inscription: ‘on the northern
side─three classes of all pervading (Rūpabrahmas)’, which, apart from other reasons,
cannot be accepted as nisisa cannot possibly represent niśrita. Probably, as remarked already
above, the true reading is utaraṁ disa tini savaganisisā, and as tiṁni is used in the Prakrits with
nouns of all three genders and Sk. abhiśaṁsati, āśaṁsati becomes abhisiṁsati, āsiṁsati in Pāli,
we any perhaps translate the inscription into Sk. uttarasyāṁ diśi trayaḥ sarvag ānṛiśaṁsāḥ[1],
‘in the northern quarter the three (classes of ) Sarvagānṛśaṁsas’, i.e. of the gods whose kindness extends to all beings. However I am ready to admit that this explanation of the name
can by no means be called certain. But although the meaning of the name remains doubtful, we shall see later on that the three Savaganisisas correspond to the gods of the eleven lower
Rūpabrahmalokas of the later cosmographical system; see the remarks on No. B 26.
B 26 (742); PLATES XVIII, XXXVII
ON the railing below the middle panel of the outer face of the same pillar as No. A 62,
now in the Indian Museum, Calcutta (P 29). The inscription is engraved on the second and
third posts from the right. Edited by Cunningham, StBh. (1879), p. 134, No. 31, and
Pl. XIV and LIV; Hoernle, IA. Vol. X (1881), p. 257, No. 13, and Pl.; Hultzsch,
ɀDMG. Vol. XL (1886), p. 65, No. 49, and Pl.; IA. Vol. XXI (1892), p. 231, No. 49;
Barua-Sinha, BI. (1926), p. 45 ff., No. 145; Barua, Barh. Vol. II (1934), p. 8 f., and
Vol. III (1937), p. 1 ff. and Pl. XXXVIII (33); Lüders, Bhārh. (1941), 53 ff.
TEXT:
1 dakhinaṁ disa chha Kā-
2 māvacharasahasani
TRANSLATION:
In the southern quarter the six thousand Kāmāvacharas.
[B 24-26 refer to one and the same sculpture.]
The inscription, which was strangely misunderstood by Hoernle, was correctly translated by Hultzsch. In the later classification of the gods the Kāmāvacharas are identical
with the gods of the six Devalokas as opposed to the twenty Brahmalokas.
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Bharh. p. 53 Lüders translates sarvagānṛśaṃsyāḥ.
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