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The Indian Analyst
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North Indian Inscriptions |
THE GUPTA INSCRIPTIONS of the day of the month or fortnight. It is an inscription of solar worship; and the object of it is to record a perpetual endowment, by a Brāhmaṇa named Dēvavishṇu, for the purpose of maintaining a lamp in a temple of the Sun at Indrapura or Indrāpurā i.e., the modern Indōr. This mention of the place, under its ancient name, connects the record satisfactorily with the locality in which the plate was found. The temple was built by the two merchants of Indrapura, Achalavarman and Bhṛikuṇṭhasiṁha, Kshatriya or Khatri1 by caste and the amount of the endowment was invested at Indrapura in a guild of oil-men of which Jīvanta was the head (pravara). The guild was to make a uniform and perpetual supply of oil for lamp, whrever it was stationed, whether at Indrapura or at some other town whither it might emigrate. TEXT2 [Metres: verse 1 Śārdūlavikrīḍita and verse 2 Indravajrā] 1 Siddham [|| *] Yaṁ vipra vidhivat=prabhuddha-manasō dhyān-aika-tānā3-stuvaḥ4
yasy=āntaṁ tridaś-āsurā na vividur=nn=ōrdhvaṁ na tirya- 1 It is worthy of note that there was a tribe called Kshatriya or Kshattri which is mentioned both by foreign
writers and in Sanskrit literature. Thus Arrian, who has left us an account of Alexander’s invasion of India, informs
us that when this Macedonian emperor was encamped at the confluence of the Chēnāb and the Indus, he received
deputies and presents from Xathroi (Khathroi), an independent tribe of Indians (McCrindle’s Ancient India, its
invasion by Alexander the Great, p. 156). As has been pointed out by K. P. Jayaswal (Hindu Polity, pt. I, p. 60), the
same tribe appears to have been mentioned by Kauṭilya (XI. line 4) along with the Kāmbōjas and Surāshṭras as
the Saṁghas subsisting both upon agriculture and arms. They have apparently been referred to as Kshatriyas by
Ptolemy (Ind. Ant., Vol. XIII, p. 360). Similarly, they seem to have been referred to in the phrase Khatiya-
dapamāna-madanasa occurring in the Nasik cave praśasti of Gautamīputra Sātakarṇi (Ep. Ind., Vol. VIII, p. 60,
line 5). Again, they appear to be the Kshattri described in the Manusmṛiti (X, 12-13, 16, 19, 26 and 49) and the
Kshatriyas of later inscriptions, such, e.g., as the Lāḍṇū inscription (Ep. Ind., Vol. XII, pp. 23 ff.) of Sādhāraṇa
who and his ancestors are spoken of as Kshatriyas of the Kāśyapa gōtra or the six grants of the Gāhaḍavāla king
Jayachchandradēva of Kanauj (Ind. Ant., Vol. XVIII, pp. 136-42) which speak of one and the same grantee,
viȥ., Rājyavardhana, a Kshatriya and of the Vatsa gōtra. They doubtless represent the modern Khatrī caste which
pursues business and is spread over the Panjab, U.P., Rājaputānā, Central India, Gujarāt and even some parts
of Mahārāshṭra (R. E. Enthoven’s Tribes and Castes of Bombay, Vol. II, pp. 205 and ff.).
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