THE GUPTA INSCRIPTIONS
daughter’s son of the Lichchhavi,1 son’s son of the prosperous Ghaṭōtkacha, the Mahārāja2
and the son of the son’s son of the prosperous Gupta, the Mahārāja. Whose
(Verse 9) fame, ever ascending higher and higher masses, and travelling by many paths,
(namely) by liberality, prowess of arm, sobriety and utterance of scriptural texts, purifies the
three worlds, like the white water of the (holy river) Gaṅgā, dashing forth rapidly when liberated from the confinement in the inner hollow of the matted hair of Pasupati, (which rises up in
ever higher and higher masses and flows through many paths).3
(Lines 31-32) And may this poetic composition (kāvya) of Harishēṇa, the servant of the
very same venerable Bhaṭṭāraka,4 whose mind has been enlightened through the favour of
dwelling near (him), who is the Sāndhivigrahika, Kumārāmātya (and) Mahādaṇḍanāyaka, (and
who is) a native of Khādyaṭapāka,5 and son of the Mahādaṇḍanāyaka Dhruvabhūti, lead to
the welfare and happiness of all beings!
(Lines 33) and (it) was executed by the Mahādaṇḍanāyaka Tilabhaṭṭaka6 who meditates
on the feet of the Paramabhaṭṭāraka.
No. 2 : PLATE II
ĒRAṆ STONE INSCRIPTION OF SAMUDRAGUPTA
This inscription was first brought to notice by Alexander Cunningham in 1880, in the
Archaeological Survey of India Reports, Vol. X, p. 89, from which it seems that discovered it in
1874-75 or 1876-77, when, as Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India, he
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both the terms rājñī and Mahādēvī used in conjunction with the name of the wife of a paramount sovereign, compare, e.g., Paramabhaṭṭārikā-rājñī-Mahādēvī-Kōṇadēvī of the Mandar Hill rock inscription of Ādityasēna (CII.,
Vol. III, 1888, p. 212). In the later part of the Gupta period, however, Mahādēvī was applied even to the wives
of Mahārājas, e.g., throughout the Kārītalāī grant of Jayanātha (Ibid., p. 118).
1 Note the spelling of the tribal name here; it is Li-chchhi-vi. Elsewhere, e.g., in line 3 of the Bhitarī pillar
inscription of the Skandagupta (No. 31 below), it is, Li-chchhi-vi, where the vowel in the second syllable is i instead
of a.
2 From the Gupta periods onwards Mahārāja was applied only to feudatories, not to paramount sovereigns.
See above, Introduction, p.2.
3 Bühler translates this stanza as follows: “And the glory of this (ruler), which rises up in layers one above
the other, through his generosity, his bravery of the arm, his self-control, and his perfection in the science of letters
and which follows more than one path, purifies the three worlds, like the white waters of the Gaṅgā, which rises
up in ever higher floods, follows more than one path, and dashes forth rapidly, freed as it is from the imprisonment
in the inner hollow of the braid of hair of Paśupati.” (Ind. Ant., Vol. XLII, p. 173).
4 Fleet renders it by “the slave of these same feet of the Bhaṭṭāraka” and Bühler by “the slave of the feet of
this same lord” (Ind. Ant., Vol. XLII, p. 172). Both these scholars seem to have forgotten that the plural of pāda is often added to proper names or titles in token of respect. In such cases pāda cannot be translated by “the feet
(of).” If the latter sense had been intended, we should have had, not bhaṭṭāraka-pādānāṁ but bhaṭṭāraka-pādayōḥ. In
the very next line, Tilabhaṭṭaka, who was entrusted with the engraving of the record, speaks of the king as Paramabhaṭṭāraka which is practically equailent to Bhaṭṭāraka-pādāḥ of Harishēna. But who is intended by Bhaṭṭāraka-pādāḥ? Fleet thinks that he was not Samudragupta but his son and successor Chandragupta II. But the word
ēva in ēshām=ēva which immediately precedes Bhaṭṭāraka-pādānāṁ clearly shows that it must denote the king who
has been the subject of the panegyric up till the inditing of the colophon by Harishēṇa. This king, of course, is
Samudragupta, as Bühler also understood him to be. Fleet has correctly pointed out that whereas mere Bhaṭṭāraka has been applied to fudatory Mahārājas, Paramabhaṭṭāraka is coupled with Mahārājādhirāja in the Gupta
epoch.
5 [See above, page 215 note 3, according to which the meaning would be ‘the head of the superintendents of
the royal kitchen.’–Ed.].
6 [Can this name Tilabhaṭṭaka be an error for Tilakabhaṭṭa?–Ed.].
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