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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA TRANSLATION Hail ! Paramēśvara-Pallavāditya, a devoted worshipper of Mahēśvara, meditating on the feet of the Supreme Master, the Lord Arhat. He who is named Badirāju, son of the village chief in the family of the Bādirājulu, divided off a field of three puṭṭis of millet by the royal measure and gave it as the village-chief’s hereditary land. He who preserves this (assignment) will have the reward of performing the horse sacrifice often. He who destroys it will ever have the sin of destroying the Śrīparvvata. Written by Pallavāchārya, son of Vāchcho . . lāḷa. The inscription is ordinarily supposed to have been engraved in the name of a small Pallava chief Bādirāju and the expression Paramēśvara is held to be an epithet. Paramēśvara was a title assumed by Pulakēśin II after his repulse of Harsha and was used by the Western and Eastern Chalukyas after him. The Rāshṭrakūṭas used it, but not regularly. The Bāṇas claim descent from the door-keeper of Paramēśvara and do not use the title for themselves. The Gaṅgas do not use the title. And the Chōḷas at a later period avoid it. It is therefore unlikely that a small chief of Pallava descent would use it, particularly as the earlier Pallavas used the word only as a personal name and the later Pallava kings were recognised as paramount long enough to make it unlikely that any members of the clan would assume it as a title. Nandivarman Pallavamalla in the Kāśākuḍi plates[1] (c. 730 A. C.) calls himself paramēśvara and in line 136 the word is used in paramēśvara-mahākōshṭakāriṇā by the king’s high-treasurer. If paramēśvara is not a biruda, it must be a name. There is only one name that deserves consideration ─that of the Pallava king Paramēśvara I (660 to 680 A. C.). There are the following definite reasons for making this attribution.
(1) The characters belong to the seventh and eighth centuries. They are later than the sixth century as k and r are no longer open. They are not later than the ninth century as they possess an earlier form of l. (2) The inflection -ṇḍu (modern Telugu -ḍu and -ṇḍu) in the Addanki inscription is represented, here as -nru. The modern Telugu āḷḷu ‘ a millet ’ is represented, not as āḍlu as in the Addanki record, but as ārlu. These forms are closer to the Tamil type, but are not Tamil. The freer use of r is a sign of age. (3) Paramēśvara I frequently calls himself in Tamil inscriptions Īchchuvaraparuma and Paramēchchu[va]ra[2] and in Sanskrit Paramēśvaravarmā[3] with only a simple biruda, if any. Pallavāditya is one of the birudas of Narasiṁha II, Paramēśvara’s son[4] and Mahēśvara is a contemporary name of Śiva, although I cannot find the term paramamāhēśvara until the ninth century in an Eastern Chalukyan grant.[5] Paramēśvara, unlike many other kings, often does not use śrī before his name.[6] (4) The vocabulary and structure of sentences are not less archaic than those of the Addanki inscription. The language of the inscription is of special interest. It has been previously noticed,[7] that there are several unusual words and forms. Mūnru (l. 10) ‘ three ’ may be compared with Tamil mūnru and is certainly the oldest form known of the numeral substantive three. Paḷḷeyāri _________________________
[1] S. I. I., Vol. II, p. 350. l. 71. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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