North Indian Inscriptions

RECORDS OF THE SOMAVAMSI KINGS OF KATAK.

The Sômavaṁśi Kings of Kaṭak.

The Somavamsi Kings of Katak.
Sivagupta.
Janamejaya-Maha-Bhavagupta I.
Yayati-
maha-Sivagupta.
Bhimaratha-
Maha-Bhavagupta II.

......And as to the first of them, the facts are these. A. names, in the formal part of the record, a paramount king named Śivagupta, and his successor Mahâ-Bhavagupta (I.) who made the grant ; it is dated in the sixth year of a paramount king named Janamêjaya ; and it ends with a verse in praise of this latter king, who, like Mahâ-Bhavagupta (I.), is attributed to the Lunar Race. E. opens by mentioning in verse a king named Janamêjaya, and his son Yayâti ; then, in the formal part of the record, it names a paramount king named Mahâ-Bhavagupta (I.), and his successor Mahâ-Śivagupta who made the grant ; and it is dated in the ninth year of Yayâti, to whose name there are here attached the paramount titles, just as in the case of Mahâ-Śivagupta, and who, like Mahâ-Śivagupta, is here described as belonging to the family of the Moon, and as being the lord of the three Kaliṅgas. And F., after mentioning in the opening verses three kings named Janamêjaya, Yayâti, and Bhimaratha, names, in the formal part of the record, the paramount king Mahâ-Śivagupta, and his successor Mahâ-Bhavagupta (II.) who made the grant ; and it is dated in the third year of Bhîmaratha, to whose name there are here attached just the same paramount titles which are attached to the name of Mahâ-Bhavagupta (II.), and who, just like Mahâ-Bhavagupta (II.) in this record and Mahâ- Śivagupta in E., is here described as belonging to the family of the Moon, and as being the lord of the three Kaliṅgas. It is true that the fact is not specifically stated.

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But it is self-evident that we have the names of four kings, Śivagupta, Mahâ-Bhavagupta I., Mahâ-Śivagupta, and Mahâ-Bhavagupta II., each the father of his successor, and that Janamêjaya, Yayâti, and Bhîmaratha were simply fanciful names of the second, third and fourth of them. They were paramount kings of the Kôsala country ; for, the charters issued in the thirty-first year of Mahâ-Bhavagupta I. style him Kôsal-êndra or “lord of Kôsala” and convey village in different divisions of the Kôsala territory,─ Mahâ-Śivagupta’s charter conveys a village in, plainly, Dakshiṇa-Kôsalâ or Southern Kôsala,─ and the charter of Mahâ-Bhavagupta II. conveys a village in yet another division of Kôsala : and, unless one of their titles, tri-Kaliṅg-âdhipati, was simply a meaningless attribute, they were also paramount kings of the territory that was known as the three Kaliṅgas, and which included evidently Kaṭak or ‘Cuttack,’ and probably the whole of Orissa. Their capital seems to have been Kaṭak, which is mentioned by name in A., B., C., and D., as the place from which those charters were issued : E. and F., however, were issued from other towns named Vinîtapura and Yayâtinagara, both, like Kaṭak, on the Mahânadî ; these place have not been identified;¹ but it appears possible that the names are fanciful names for Kaṭak itself. And they claimed to
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......¹ Regarding the point that Yayâtinagara cannot be the modern Jâjpur, see page 355 below.