|
The Indian Analyst
|
|
South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA
45 na [tanayaḥ][1] Kuṇḍa-bhōginā(naḥ |) līñchhita[2] Jayasi[ṁhē]na utkīrṇṇa[3] Chchhē[ḍ]ḍi[4]-[bhō]-
B.─Chaṇḍēśwar Plates of Mānabhīta Dharmarāja, Regnal year 18 This set of inscribed copper plates was discovered in 1936 from an old well in the village of Chaṇḍēśwar under the Tangi Police Station in the Puri District, Orissa. It originally consisted of three plates ; but the first plate, apparently containing inscription on one side only, in missing. Consequently the record is fragmentary. The ring, on which the plates were strung and to which the royal seal must have been affixed, is also lost. The two plates of the set, now extant, have the usual hole (½ inch in diameter) for the ring to pass through. They measure 6 inches by 3½ inches and together weigh 35¼ tolas. The plates have writing on both obverse and reverse. There are altogether 41 line of writing on the four sides (11+12+12+6).
The palaeography, orthography and style of the inscription do not call for any remark as they resemble those of the other published records of the Śailōdbhava king Mānabhīta Dharmarāja (circa 695-730 A.D.) who issued the present charter. But attention may be drawn in this connection to an interesting fact not so far noticed by scholars. We have seen how some of the epigraphs of Sainyabhīta Mādhavavarman II Śrīnivāsa were written in the normal East Indian alphabet of the seventh century and how some of them exhibit a slightly modified script prevalent in the same age in the southern areas of Orissa. The charters of Mānabhīta Dharmarāja can be similarly divided into two groups. While the Banpur plates[7] and Nivina grant[8] are written in the former alphabet, the Puri plates[9], the Kondedda grant[10] and the present charter are written in the latter script. Indeed it is interesting to note that the Puri, Kondedda and Chaṇḍēśwar records representing the second group of the charters of Mānabhīta Dharmarāja were all engraved by the same person who was rather careless in the performance of his work. The palaeography of the inscription under study is characterised by the imperfect formation of some signs (cf. many cases of the medial u), the same letter often written in different shapes (cf. n in yēn=āº in line 1 and d-aṅganānām in line 2), different letters (e.g. p and m in ºpāditō in line 30 and kamala in line 34 respectively) often made almost undistinguishable from one another, use of several varieties of a sign like medial ā or u, etc. Another feature of paleographical interest is that the date of the grant, viz. the regnal year 18, is written as 10 0 8. This shows that the practices of writing numbers in symbols and figures were both prevalent in Orissa side by side in the age of the record. The twofold mistake in the present case is that ten was written by the symbol for 10 and a zero, instead of one and a zero, and that the zero was retained in spite of 8 occupying the place of the unit.[11] _________________________________________________
[1] Read sutēna. The intended reading may be lēkhit=Ōpēndrasiṁhaś=cha tanayaḥ as in the Puri, Buguda and
Cuttack (Orissa) Museum plates.
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
