North Indian Inscriptions

NALLUR GRANT OF HARIHARA II.

TRANSLATION.

......“Hail ! During the victorious and prosperous reign of the glorious and powerful emperor, the lord of the eastern, southern and western oceans, the glorious king of great kings and supreme lord of kings, the glorious Vîra-Harihara-Mahârâya,― while the glorious Mallaṇa-Oḍ[e]yar, residing at Honnâvura, was ruling the kingdom of Haive,― in the Kshaya saṁvatsara, which corresponded to the Śaka year one thousand three hundred and nine, (when) Jupiter (was standing) in Leo, on Thursday, the fifth (tithi) of the dark (fortnight) of (the month of) Pushya.”

......Gold and copper coins, apparently issued during the reign of Harihara II., still exist. In his paper on the Coins of the Kings of Vijayanagara,¹ Dr. Hultzsch describes a half-pagoda and a copper coin. A second copper coin is described in his paper on South-Indian Copper Coins.² On all of them the legend reads Pratâpa-Harihara.

......Of the birudas of the king mentioned in lines 38 to 50 of the subjoined inscription, the most important are :― Karṇâṭaka-lakshmî-karṇ-âvataṁsa, Śârdûla-mada-bhañjana, Vêdabhâshya-prakâśaka and Vaidîka-mârga-sthâpan-âchârya. The first shows that he was ruling over the Karṅâṭa country, and the second that he professed to have conquered the Chôḷas, who had the tiger for their emblem. The biruda Vêdabhâshya-prakâśaka clearly refers to the commentaries on the Vêdas, which were published under the king’s authority by Sâyaṇâchârya. This celebrated Vêdic scholar professes to have been the minister of Saṁgama II. and of Harihara II.³ The biruda Vaidika-mârga-sthâpan-âchârya of the inscription corresponds to Vaidika-mârga-pravartaka, which is attributed to Harihara (II.) in the colophon of Sâyaṇa’s commentary on the Śatapathabrâhmaṇa.⁴ In his Oxford Catalogue Professor Aufrecht describes a manuscript of the Tarkabhâshâ-prakâśikâ. From its colophon we learn that the work was composed by a certain Chinnabhaṭṭa, who was the son of Vishṇudêvârâdhya, the younger brother of Sarvajña, and a dependant of Harihara-Mahârâja.⁵ Professor Aufrecht tells us elsewhere that Sâyaṇa’s teacher was Vishṇu-Sarvajña.⁶ This Sarvajna was very probably identical with the elder brother of Chinnabhaṭṭa, and the Harihara-Mahârâja of the colophon of the Tarkabhâshâ-prakâśikâ with Harihara II. Some of the details furnished by Mâdhava’s and Sâyaṇa’s works⁷ regarding their relations and contemporaries are corroborated by a mutilated Grantha inscription of the Aruḷâḷa-Perumâḷ temple at Conjeevaram,⁸ which, with the permission of Dr. Hultzsch, I subjoin,⁹ as far as it can be made out :―

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......¹ Ind. Ant. Vol. XX. p. 302.
......² ibid. Vol. XXI. p. 321.
......³ See ante, p. 23.
......⁴ The passage alluded to runs as follows :―
Professor Weber’s Berlin Catalogue, Vol. II. p. 73.
......⁵ The colophon referred to runs as follows :― Professor Aufrecht’s Oxford Catalogue, p. 244, a.
......⁶ Catalogue Catalogorum, s.v.
......⁷ ante, p. 23.
......⁸ Dr. Hultzsch’s Annual Report for 1892-93, p. 14, No. 50 of 1893.
......⁹ From an inked estampage received from the Editor.
......¹⁰ Read:.