North Indian Inscriptions

PATTADAKAL INSCRIPTION OF KIRTIVARMAN II.

of the god Śiva, under the name of Vijayêśvara. This temple is now known by the name of Saṁgamêśvara ; but there is no question as to its identity : there are two short inscriptions on structural parts of it, which give the name of the god as Vijayêśvara (Ind. Ant. Vol. X. p. 170) ; and the same name remained in use at any rate till A.D. 1162 (Jour. Bo. Br. R. As. Soc. Vol. XI. p. 273). It then mentions Vijayâditya’s son, Vikramâditya II., whom it describes as having bruised the town of Kâñchî ;¹ and it tells us that his Mahâdêvî or queen-consort, Lôkamahâdêvî, who belonged to the race of the Haihayas, i.e. the Kalachuris, erected a great stone temple of the god Śiva, under the name of Lôkêśvara. This temple, again, still exists, but is now known by the name of Virûpâksha ; the identity is established by records on structural parts of it, which give its name as Lôkêśvara, and speak of it as the temple of Lôkamahâdêvî (Ind. Ant. Vol. X. pp. 165, 167, and Vol. XI. p. 124) : it stands on the south-east of the temple of Vijayêśvara-(Saṁgamêśvara). The record then mentions a Râjñî, or queen, of Vikramâditya II., named Trailôkyamahâdêvî, who was the uterine younger sister of Lôkamahâdêvî, and was the mother of Vikramâditya’s son and successor, Kîrtivarman II. ; and it tells us that she erected a great stone temple of Śiva under the name of Trailôkyêśvara. This temple, which must have stood somewhere on the north-east of the temple of Lôkêśvara-(Virûpâksha), is not now in existence, I think.² The inscription then proceeds to record that the pillar itself, stamped with the mark of the triśûla, or trident, which is the weapon of Śiva, was set up, in the middle of these three shrines, by a sculptor named Śubhadêva, for an Âchârya named Jñânaśiva, who had come from the Mṛigathaṇikâhâra vishaya on the north bank of the Ganges ; and it concludes by recording certain grants.

......As regards the date, the inscription refers itself to the reign of Kîrtivarman II., by speaking of him with the paramount titles. And further, though it does not quote the year of the Śaka era or the regnal year, it gives details which enable us to place it exactly. The grants were made, or one of them was made, on the occasion of a total eclipse of the sun, on the new-moon tithi of the month Śrâvaṇa ; and the English date is the 25th June, A.D. 754 : on this day, which corresponds to the new-moon day of the first pûrṇimânta Śrâvaṇa of Śaka-Saṁvat 677 current, there was a total eclipse of the sun, which was visible right across India.³

......Immediately below the above duplicate inscription, the pillar is square. Here, on the south face, there are remains of five or more lines, of about twenty letters each, in the same local characters, and, on the east face, remains of eight lines of about twenty letters each, in Nâgarî characters, of the same type : these two records, again, are duplicates ; but all that can be made out is that the inscription registers a grant of land, purchased with gadyâṇakas of gold, by the son of a Bhaṭṭa named Pulivarman, and that it probably speaks of Paṭṭadakal by its ancient name of Kisuvoḷal or Kisuvolal. And on the west face there are remains of eleven or twelve lines, of about twenty letters each, in the same local characters : but, the north face being apparently quite blank, this record was not duplicated in Nâgarî ; and it is so much damaged that nothing intelligible can be made out, except that, in the fifth line, Bâdâmi is perhaps mentioned as Vâtâpî.
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......¹ The word used is vimardana, which may mean either ‘bruising’ or ‘destroying.’ But the Wokkalêri grant says that, though he entered Kâñchî, he did not destroy it (avinâśya praviśya ; Ind. Ant. Vol. VIII. p. 28, and South-Ind. Inscrs. Vol. I. p. 146).
......² Unless, perhaps, it is the temple, partly of Northern and partly of Drâviḍian style, which Dr. Burgess (loc. cit. p. 33) describes as standing close on the north side of the temple of Vijayêśvara-(Saṁgamêśvara). But, then, its position does not give the triangle that is required in connection with the description of the erection of the pillar (see the Text, and page 5 below, note 10).
......³ In this year, Śrâvaṇa was intercalary.— For the eclipse see von Oppolzer’s Canon der Finsternisse, pp. 188, 189, and Plate 94.— For Kîrtivarman II, we have a later date, in A.D. 757, in the eleventh year of his reign (Ind. Ant. Vol. VIII. p. 28). The eclipse that I mention above, answers all possible requirements ; and there is no other eclipse that does so, for at least twenty years on either side of it.