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The Indian Analyst
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North Indian Inscriptions |
SRAVANA-BELGOLA EPITAPH OF MALLISHENA. Among Professor Kielhorn’s contributions are ‘various readings’ from a manuscript copy of the present inscription. This copy was made from a palm-leaf MS. at Madras for Professor Bühler, by whom it was presented to the India Office Library.1 After the publication of Mr. Rice’s Inscriptions at Śravaṇa-Beḷgoḷa, Professor Kielhorn recognised at once that the Madras MS. contains a copy of the Mallishêṇa epitaph, an proposed a number of improvements in Mr. Rice’s text on the basis of Professor Bühler’s copy.2 It appears from Professor Kielhorn’s ‘various readings’ either that the Madras MS. was copied from the pillar while the latter was still in a state of more perfect preservation than at present, or that the MS. was based on an independent duplicate of the Mallishêṇa epitaph. ......The alphabet of the inscription is Kanarese. The upper and lower portions of some letters of the first and last lines, respectively, on each face of the pillar are drawn out into ornamental flourishes. The language is Sanskṛit, verse and prose ; only the two last lines are in the Kanarese language. The only orthographical peculiarities which deserve to be noted, are that dh and bh, when doubled, are sometimes written as dhdh and bhbh, and that rṇṇa is written as rṇna.3 The object for which the inscription was composed, and the pillar containing it set up, is to perpetuate the memory of the Jaina preceptor Mallishêṇa-Maladhâridêva (verse 64), who committed religious suicide by sallêkhanâ (line 211) or samâdhi (l. 212), i.e. by prolonged fasting,— which, in his case, lasted three days,— at Śvêtasarôvara (v. 72) or Dhavalasarasatîrtha (v. 70), i.e. at Śravaṇa-Beḷgoḷa.4 The date of his death was the day of Svâti, Sunday, the third day of the dark fortnight of Phâlguna of the (expired) Śâka year 1050, which corresponded to the cyclic year Kîlaka (v. 72). According to Professor Kielhorn’s calculation,5 the European equivalent of this date is Sunday, the 10th March, A.D. 1129. The date of the inscription itself is not stated ; but the record cannot have been composed more than a generation after Mallishêṇa’s death, because the composer, Mallinâtha, was a lay-disciple of the deceased preceptor (l. 222).
......The account of Mallishêṇa’s suicide is preceded by a sort of historical sketch of the Śravaṇa-Beḷgoḷa branch of the Digambara sect of the Jainas. It is not a connected and complete account, and cannot even be proved to be in strictly chronological order. The names of some selected Digambara preceptors are mentioned with much stale and extravagant praise, but not without valuable allusions to contemporary persons and incidents. ......1. The list naturally opens with Vardhamâna of the Nâtha race, the founder of the Jaina religion (v. 1). ......2. Of the three Kêvalins6 the inscription mentions only Gautamasvâmin, surnamed Indrabhûti (v. 2). ......3. The Śrutakêvalins (v. 3). ......4. Bhadrabâhu, whose disciple was 5. Chandragupta (v. 4) ; and 6. Kauṇḍakunda7 (v. 5). In two other Śravaṇa-Beḷgoḷa inscriptions (Nos. 40 and 108 of Mr. Rice’s volume), these
three named are mentioned in the same order, and Bhadrabâhu whose pupil was Chandragupta,
is called the last of the Śrutakêvalins.8 ......1 Zeitschrift D. M. G. Vol. XLII. p. 552, No. 308.
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