South Indian Inscriptions

EPIGRAPHIA INDICA

puḍhaviya laid down by Prakrit grammarians.^[1] In vasa-sahas-āyu-vadhiṇike we have the Māgadhī neuter nominative singular in e as in Asokan inscriptions.^[2] Finally, ya is used in the sense of cha in l.4.

The inscription refers itself to the reign of the king (Rājan), the illustrious Kumāravaradatta. The royal name bears resemblance to the name Vīrapurisadata which occurs in the Nāgārjunikoṇḍa inscrptions.^[3] The record contains to regnal dates, both expressed in season, fortnight and day as in other early epigraphs of the south.^[4] The object of the inscription is to record certain pious donations made by two ministers of the king.

The inscription opens with the auspicious word sidhaṁ, followed by a salutation to Bhagavat. It then record that at the Ṛishabhatīrtha of the Bhagavat, on the fifteenth day of the fourth fortnight of Hēmanta in the fifth (regnal) year of the king, the illustrious Kumāravaradatta, his Amātya Vāsishṭhīputra Bōdhadatta, who was the grandson of the Amātya Goḍachha and the son of the Amātya Mātṛijanapālita, made a gift of 1,000 cows to Brāhmaṇas ‘for the purpose of augmenting his life for a thousand years ’. He further made a second gift of 1,000 cows on the 10th day of the sixth fortnight of Grīshma in the sixth year, evidently of the same king’s reign. Besides being an Amātya of the king, Bōdhadatta held the offices of Daṇḍanāyaka and Balādhikṛita. Finally, the inscription records a third gift of a thousand cows which another Amātya of the king, Indradēva,^[5] who was also Daṇḍanāyaka, made to Brāhmaṇas probably in the same (sixth) regnal year.

Ṛishabhatirtha, where these donations were made, is plainly identical with the pool Damau Dahrā, beside which the present inscription is engraved. This tīrtha seems to have been very famous in ancient times ; for the Tīrthayātrāparvan, a subsection of the Āraṇyakaparvan of the Mahābhārata contains a verse which declares that a man, who fasts for three nights at Ṛishabhatīrtha in Kōśalā (i.e. Dakshiṇa-Kōsala or Chhattisgarh) obtains the religious merit of a Vājapēya sacrifice.^[6] In view of this it is not surprising that the Amātyas of the king Kumāravara datta chose this tīrtha for making their mahādānas of a thousand cows each.^[7]

It is not clear who is meant by Bhagavat to whom the Ṛishabhatīrtha was dedicated. In ll. 1-2 Dr. Bhandarkar read the words thera Gōḍachha, which suggested to R. B. Hiralal that Damau Dahrā, which is just a solitary place like Rūpnāth, was a likely place which a few Buddhist monks may have selected for their residence.^[8] The reading thera is however extremely doubtful. Moreover, Goḍachha, who held the office of an Amātya, was probably not a Buddhist monk. The description of the tīrtha in the Mahābhārata clearly shows that it was a Brahmanical, not Buddhist, tīrtha. The mention of Brāhmaṇas as recipients of the gifts suggests that Bhagavat does not denote the Buddha. The name of the king Kumāravaradatta (one who was born by the grace of Kārttikēya) and that of the Amātya Mātṛijanapālita (one who is protected by the Divine Mothers) indicate that boththe royal and ministerial families were worshippers of Śiva. The

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^[1]See Vararuchi, I, 13 and 20, and Hēmachandra, VIII, l. 216. The word occurs in the form pathaviya in l.3 of the Nāṇāghāṭ inscription of Nāganikā.
^[2]See aje bahuvidhe dhamma-charaṇe in Girnar Edict IV. Compare also dhamm-āyu-bala-vadhanike in Mayidavōlu plates ; above, Vol. VI, p. 84.
^[3] Above, Vol. XX, p. 16, etc. Similar names Kumāradatta and Kumārīdatta occur in the Kathāsarītsāgara. taraṅga 51, v. 123.
^[4] See e.g., above, Vol. I, p. 7, and Vol. VIII, pp. 59 f.
^[5] The name [I]dadēva occurs also in an inscription at Sāñchī. See Lüders, List of Brahmi Inscriptions, No. 419. Indradēva of the present inscription was the grandson of Dinika. His father’s name is lost
^[6] Cf. Ṛishabhaṁ tīrtham=āsādya Kōśalāyāṁ nar-ādhipa | Vāapēyam=avāpnōti tri-rātr-ōpōshitō naraḥ || Āra ṇyakaparvan (edited by Dr. V.S. Sukthankar), adhyāya 83, v. 10.
^[7] For the procedure of making this mahādāna, see Matsyapurāṇa, adhyāya 278.
^[8] See his Inscriptions in C. P. and Berar (second ed.), p. 180.