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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA No. 40─TWO NAGA INSCRIPTIONS (1 Plate) D. C. SIRCAR, OOTACAMUND Recently I had an occasion to examine the impressions of two inscriptions relating to the worship of the Nāgas or serpents in ancient and medieval India. The first of these records is engraved on the pedestal of a Nāga image now preserved in the Lucknow Museum. The second epigraph is incised on a stone slab which was discovered at Biharsharif (Patna District, Bihar) or in its neighbourhood but is now exhibited in the Patna Museum. The Nāgas enjoy a prominent place in ancient Indian legends and folklore. There are literary references to numerous Nāgas, the most famous among them being Śēsha or Ananta, Vāsuki, Takshaka, Dhṛitarāshṭra, Ēlāpatra or Airāvata, Karkōṭa or Karkōṭaka, Kauravya, Śaṅkha, Maṇi and others. The cult of the Nāgas, allied to that of another class of semi-divine beings called Yaksha, was widely prevalent in ancient India.[1] The worship of snake-deities is popular in different parts of India even to this day.[2] In ancient times, there were many great centres of the Nāga cult in Northern India. The chronicles of Kashmir speak of the worship of several Nāgas in that land, the most important among them being Nīla who had his abode in the waters of the Vitastā and was regarded as the guardian deity of Kashmir.[3] An illustrious royal house of ancient Kashmir, represented by the celebrated Muktāpīḍa Lalitāditya (eighth century), claimed descent from the Nāga Karkōṭaka, who is also famous in the Mahābhārata episode of Nala, king of the Nishadhas probably living near the Pāriyātra (the Western Vindhyas and the Aravalli range).[4] The Nāga kings Ēlāpatra and Chakravāka are mentioned in certain old Barhut inscriptions[5] and were probably worshipped in pre-Christian times in the region in question. In Buddhist literature, Ēlāpatra is mentioned as the Nāga of Takshaśilā (in Gandhāra),[6] where the great serpent-sacrifice of the Kuru king Janamējaya is sometimes supposed to have taken place.[7] Numerous ancient Nāga images have been discovered at Mathurā and in its neighbourhood. An inscription[8] of the year 26 of the Kanishka era, corresponding to 104 A.D., records the installation of a Śilāpaṭṭa by some persons, described as ‘the sons of the actors of Mathurā, who are being praised as the Chāndaka brothers ’, at the sthāna of Bhagavat Dadhikarṇa, lord of the Nāgas. The existence of a temple of Dadhikarṇa-nāga at Mathurā during the age of the Kushāṇas is also indicated by another inscription[9] on a pillar base originally belonging to the Huvishka monastery of that place. It states that the object was the gift of Dēvila who was ‘ a servant of the shrine of Dadhikarṇa ’. Another Mathurā inscription[10] on a Nāga image, dated in the year 8 of Kanishka’s reign (78-101 A.D.),
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[1] See James Fergusson, Tree and Serpent Worship, 1873 ; J.Ph. Vogel, The Indian Serpent Lore, 1926 ; N. K.
Bhattasali, Iconography of the Buddhist and Brahmanical Sculptures in the Dacca Museum, pp. 212 ff. ; K. K. Gutpa
in Proc. I.H.C., 1939, pp. 223-29 (The Nāgas and the Nāga Cult in Ancient Indian History) ; etc. An inscription
at Gurzala and another at Macherla, both in the Andhra State, invoke the presence of the eight Nāgas, viz., Sēsha,
Vāsuki, Takshaka, Karkōṭa, Abja, Mahāmbuja, Śaṅkhadhara and Kulika, to decide the auspicious or inauspicious
nature of the grants recorded in the epigraphs. See ARSIE, 1910, p. 107.
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