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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA MEHAR PLATE OF DAMODARADEVA ficance, the biruda of Dāmōdaradēva is Vaishṇavite in its form, and in this respect, it stands much nearer to the biruda, Arirāja-Danuja-mādhava, prefixed to the name of Daśarathadēva, identified by Dr. N.K. Bhattasali with Danujamādhava who flourished after the Sēna rule.1 Both Dāmōdaradēva and Daśarathadēva were Dēvānvayas and Sōma- or Chandra-vaṁśīya Kshatriyas, and both of them were worshippers of Vishṇu. These points of coincidence need an explanation. We may only ask ; do they not suggest that Daśarathadēva was a descendant of Dāmōdara, if not his immediate successor, and certainly the most powerful king of the Dēva family ? In the present plate, Dāmōdaradēva is called Gajapati only, while in the Ādāvāḍī plate Daśarathadēva is honoured with the epithet of Aśvapati-Gajapati-Narapati-rājatray-ādhipati. In the former, there is no epithet indicating the place of which Dāmōdara was the king ; while in the latter Daśaratha boldly claims to have obtained the kingdom of Gauḍa and issued the charter from Vikramapura, which he could not have done had he not succeeded the later Sēnas after their fall or extermination.
The Chittagong plate of Dāmōdara refers to a village called Kētāṅgapālā, which was bounded on the north by the Mṛitachchaḍā and had in its neighbourhood, if not actually within it, Bāghapōkhirā ‘Tiger’s Pond’. The village may be identified with the modern Kētaṅgyāpāḍā, forming a part the village of Hāshimpur, P. S. Paṭiyā, and bounded on the north by the Marāchharā-Pukhariyā which is still the name of a hamlet by the hillside, on the southern bank of the river Śaṅkha.2 In other words, the inscription relates to a village in the district of Chittagong, and not elsewhere. The present inscription places the village of Mēhāra in the khaṇḍala (subdivision) called Vāyisagrāma which in its turn was included in the Paralāyi vishaya of the Samataṭa maṇḍala lying within the Pauṇḍravarddhana bhukti. The Mēhāragrāma of the record being no other locality than the present village of Mehār, it is easy to determine that Dāmōdaradēva’s kingdom extended at least over the three districts of Tippera, Noakhali and Chittagong. Now the question arises whether the rule of Dāmōdara, or for the matter of that, of all the three kings of the Dēva family, was confined to the three districts of Chittagong division, or it was coextensive with not only the whole of the Samataṭa maṇḍala but also with the whole of the Pauṇḍravarddhana bhukti, as it was then known. Apart from being described as Gajapati in one plate and Sakala-bhūpati-chakravartin (the Lord of all the kings), in the other, there is no other indication whatever that Dāmōdara or any predecessor of his in his own line was a paramount sovereign. Nor does it appear that they were Sāmantas under the successors of Lakshmaṇasēna, who somehow maintained the position as Gauḍēśvara and paramount sovereign within the Pauṇḍravarddhana bhukti at least for seventeen years after the death of Lakshmaṇasēna. The length of the reign of Kēśava, the second son of Lakshmaṇasēna, is not as yet determined. But certain it is that the reign of Madhumathana-Madhusūdana at least was synchronous with that of the two later Sēna kings. Had Dāmōdara or any of his two predecessors succeeded in supplanting the Sēnas within the Pauṇḍravarddhana bhukti, he would have usurped forthwith all the high-sounding epithets including Gauḍēśvara, as was done subsequently by Daśarathadēva. But Dāmōdara passed as the Arirāja-Chāṇūra-Mādhava without the title Gauḍēśvara. It is in the Mehār plate of Dāmōdaradēva that Samaṭaṭa finds mention, perhaps, for the first time as a maṇḍala, within, of course, the Pauṇḍravarddhana bhukti, And this may have been a creation of Purushōttama’s family for distinguishing it from Vaṅga, apparently a maṇḍala under the rule of the later Sēnas within the same Pauṇḍravarddhana bhukti, which included in it Vikramapura and _______________________
[1] Inscriptions of Bengal, III, p. 182. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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