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The Indian Analyst
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North Indian Inscriptions |
SUPPLEMENTARY INSCRIPTIONS THIS inscription was first brought to noticed by M.B. Garde, the then Director of Archaeology in the former State of Gwālior, who announced its discovery in the Annual Report of the Archaeological Department, for Saṁvat 1986 (1929-30 A.C.), pp. 22 and 59-60 (No. 23). A number of errors appearing in this notice were subsequently corrected by D. C. Sircar, who edited the record in the Epigraphia Indica, Vol. XXXIII (1960), pp. 162 ff. and plate, in which he also gave a revised reading of the text. From the same plate the inscription is edited here. The inscription is incised on a pillar which is about 5.5 metres high above the ground, and stands on a hillock close to the northeastern end of the Jhālōnī tank, at Budhērā[3], in the Pichhōre parganā of the Shivpuri District of Madhya Pradesh. The pillar is roughly dressed and the portion on which the record is incised was not made smooth for the purpose. The letters too were not well formed, and they have also suffered very much from the weather ; some of them are lost altogether and some others are mutilated. Thus, the preservation of the inscription is far from satisfactory, and at times, we have to resort to imagination to decipher them. The inscription has seven lines of writing, occupying a space about 36 cms. in breadth and 23 cms. in height. The letters too are indifferently formed, as said above. In all these respects the record resembles the Baṅglā inscriptions edited above (Nos. 162-174). The individual aksharas are about two cms. in height.
The record is all in prose. As to the orthography, we notice scribal errors, e.g., in durgrē (for durgē), bhaṭṭārka (for bhaṭṭāraka), in ll. 2 and 3, respectively and in the proper names which are all given in the local language. The inscription refers itself to a ruler named the glorious Gaṇapati[4], whose dynasty or lineage is not mentioned, but from the Imperial titles used in it, he was undoubtedly the last of the Yajvapāla rulers whose known dates range between V. 1348 and 1357, or 1292 and 1300 A.C. The purpose of the inscription is to record the raising of the pillar on which the inscription was incised, to commemorate the memory of two persons who are described in it as hata (killed), apparently in a contest with some enemies who are not specified. The year, which is given only in figures and without the further particulars, is (Vikrama) 1351, Śaka 1216, regularly corresponding to 1294-95 A.C.
Beginning with the date, as mentioned above, the record, in its first half (ll. 1-3) refers to
the ruler Gaṇapati, endowed with royal titles, and says that his mahāpradhāna (Chief Minister)
Dēüva was in charge of administration i.e., his governor or viceroy, at Kirtidurga. This place
appears to be more likely the town of Chandērī in the Gunā District, rather than Dēogaḍh, as
[1] The first two letters in this line are repeated inadvertently, by the writer. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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