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THE GUPTA INSCRIPTIONS
2 Vikram-āvakraya-krītā dāsya-nyagbhūta-[pā]rtthiv[ā] [ﺍ*] U - - m=anu1 saṁraktā
dharmma – UU – U - 2[ ||*] 2
3 Tasya rājādhirāj-arshēr =achin[t*]yō – U - [rmma]ṇah3 [ﺍ*] anvaya-prāpta-
sāchivyō vyā - - - 4[n*]dh[i*]-v[i*]grah[ē] [ ||*] 3
4 Kautsaś=Śāba iti khyātō Vīrasēnaḥ kul-ākhyayā [ﺍ*] śabd-ārttha-nyāya-lōkajñah-
=kavih=Pāṭaliputrakaḥ [ ||*] 4
5 Kṛitsna-pṛithvī-jay-ārtthēna rājñ=aiv=ēha sah=āgataḥ [|*] bhaktyā bhagavataś=Śambhōr=gguhām =ētām =akāraya [t] [ ||*] [5]
TRANSLATION
(Line 1) Luck !
(Verse 1) That inner light, which shines like the sun, (which is difficult to find among
men) on earth, which pervades (the heart of the learned) and which is wonderful, has the
appellation of Chandragupta (II). 5
(Verse 2) (The earth), which is bought by the purchase-money of (his) prowess,6 (and)
in which the princes have become humbled with slavery, is attached with reference (to him),
(being protected with) righteousness (and good policy).
(Verses 3 and 4) He, who has attained to the position of minister, through hereditary
descent, of that saint-like over-king of king7 of inconceivable (but magnanimous) action,
and has been entrusted with the Office of Peace and War, is Vīrasēna, of the Kutsa gōtra,
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1 Fleet reads this as māna, but it seems more like m=anu0. May be restored to [pṛithvī ya*]m=anusaṁraktā.
2 May perhaps be filled up with [-sannaya-pālitā].
3 Bühler restores it to ō(jjvala)-or ō(ddhata)-(ka)rmmaṇaḥ. Better to restore it to ō(dāra)-(ka)rmmaṇaḥ.
4 Fleet restores it to vyāpṛita-sandhivigrahaḥ, which makes no sense and which, as Bühler says, “introduces a
metrical mistake.” He, therefore, proposes Jacobi’s restoration: vyāpṛitaḥ sāndhivigrahaḥ. The part of the rock after
the last letter ha is well preserved, and if there had been a visarga, it surely would have been preserved. Besides,
what is required here is a word denoting an office and used in the locative. Again, the second letter of vyā is com-
pletely gone, and what is preserved of the intermediate one is more like sṛi than like pṛi. Perhaps this line is to be
restored to [vyāsṛishṭas=sāndhivigrahē].
5 As Fleet says, “there seems to intended a play on the words ‘sun’ and ‘moon’, the latter of which (Chandra)
forms part of the king’s name.” By “inner light” we have to understand, I suppose, “the light of knowledge.”
6 The word used for “prowess” is vikrama, and the word arka has already been used in the preceding verse. They
together make Vikramārka which is equivalent to Vikramāditya, a title which is frequently coupled with the name
of Chandragupta II on his coins. It is not impossible that the two components of his title have been explained each
in one verse.
7 It is worthy of note that Chandragupta is here called ṛishi. It shows that he was not a mere ruler, but that
there was something of the speculative or spiritual in him. This agrees with the fact that he has been called antar-
jyōtir in the very first verse. As regards rājādhirāja, it was a title of paramount sovereignty, occurring, as was
pointed out by Fleet, in its Prākṛit form i.e., rajadhiraja, on some coins of Maues, Gondophares, etc. (Gardner and
Poole, Coins of the Greek and Scythic Kings of Bactria and India, pp. 68 ff. and pp. 103, 109-110). The same, however,
has been read as Rajatiraja by Whitehead in his Catalogue of Coins in the Panjab Museum, Lahore, pp. 98 ff. and pp. 146
ff.). Rajatiraja is obviously identical with Rājātirāja occurring in the sense of paramount sovereign but coupled also
with Mahārāja in some inscriptions of the earlier Great Kushāṇas (Lüders, A List of Brāhmī Inscriptions, Nos. 56,
60, 62, 72, etc.). By the early Gupta period, these conjoint titles seem to have been supplanted by the single Mahā-
rājādhirāja, except in No. 6 above, where, as pointed out before, the name of Chandragupta is coupled with the two
titles: Mahārāja and Rājādhirāja, exactly like Mahārāja Rājātirāja of the Kushāṇa king. But this is obviously due to the fact that the record was put up at Mathura where the influence of the Kusha?a chancellory still persisted From the Gupta period onwards Rajadhirāja occurs only in metrical passages, where it was incovenient or impossible to introduce the prefix mahā; thus, in addition to the present passage, in line 6 of the Mandasōr inscription
of Yaśōdharman and Vishṇuvardhana (CII., Vol. III, 1888, No. 35) and in the derivative rājādhirājya, in line 24
of the Junāgaḍh rock inscription of Skandagupta, No. 28 below, in line 2 of which we also have, again for metrical
reasons, another variety of the title, namely Rājarājādhiraja.
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