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The Indian Analyst
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North Indian Inscriptions |
THE GUPTA INSCRIPTIONS seat (of office) (?) of the Agrahārika,1 the Saulkika,2 and the Gaulmika3 . . . . . . . . . . . . and others who subsist on our favour. (Lines 31-33) “I have been requested by . . . . . . varman, by my father’s father, . . . . . . . . . by the Bhaṭṭa Guhilasvamin, . . . . . . . . . . . . belonging to Bhadrāyā. . . . . . . . . . .â No. 42 : PLATE XLII NĀLANDĀ CLAY SEAL OF BUDHAGUPTA This seal bearing an inscription of Budhagupta was exhumed like those of Vainyagupta, Narasiṁhagupta and Kumāragupta III from Monastery site No. 1 at Nālandā, Patna District, Bihar. It has remained unnoticed, except for a brief reference to its find by Hirananda Sastri in the Ep. Ind., Vol. XXI, p. 77, post script, and is published here for the first time.4 This seal also was originally a clay impression which was burnt eventually into a terracotta in the circumstances mentioned on page 355 below.
The seal is fragmentary, its proper right half being broken off. The extreme measurements
of the extant fragment are, as nearly as possible, 4-1/8” high by 1-¾" wide. It has an obvious
affinity with the other Gupta seals from Nālandā, being oval in shape, pointed at the top and
the bottom, and its edge being marked by a border line which is distinct at the bottom. Like
them, again, its upper field is occupied by a figure of Garuḍa executed in comparatively higher
relief. The proper left half of Garuḍa together with his face which is slightly defaced, is all
that is preserved now. It, however, differs from the other Nālandā seals in regard to the representation of the wing of Garuḍa which is appreciably longer here. To the proper left of
Garuḍa is seen a small disc which may represent the sun. If so, the arrangement of the emblems
of the sun and crescent respectively to the right and left of the figure is inverted on this seal.
In all other details the figure is similar to the device occurring on the above-mentioned seals.
The Garuḍa is, as usual, represented as standing on a base composed of two parallel lines,
below which runs a prose inscription in eight lines. Unfortunately the proper right half of the
inscribed portion has been destroyed, resulting in the disappearance of a little more than
half the writing in the beginning of each line. Again, whatever remains of the inscription is,
on the whole, in a bad state of preservation. The five upper lines are executed in a relatively
bolder relief than the lower ones, the irregularity being perhaps due to an uneven pressure in
the act of stamping. Lines 1-3 are more of less well-preserved. Lines 4 and 5 are somewhat
defaced and blurred; nevertheless they are not illegible. Lines 6-7 are too worn out and oblitreated to be properly deciphered. The last line can be read with certainty. The characters,
on the whole, resemble those of the Nālandā seals of Kumāragupta III but differ from them
in certain respects. The most notable difference is the occurrence here of m, characteristic of
the southern variety. The letter h exhibits two forms; the first occurs only once in Mahārāja line 1, and, though slightly broader, approximates to the same sign on the Nālandā seals of
Kumāragupta III, while the second, as in dauhitrasya, line 2 and -gṛihītō, line 3 looks like a
precursor to the later acute-angled type seen in such records as the Bōdhgayā inscription of
Mahānāman and the Lākhāmaṇḍal praśasti. The only other sign worth noticing is the medial
u in -gupta, line 8, which consists of a curve at the bottom turning to the right and ending in 1 Agrahārika is an official title, denoting probably ‘an officer in special charge of an agrahāra’.
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