South Indian Inscriptions

EPIGRAPHIA INDICA

The date of the document is given in lines 1-2 as Samata 56 Muyasira-vadā 4 vāra Vīhapaï, i.e. Saṁvat 56 Mārgaśira-vadi 4 vārē Bṛihaspatau. The date is thus Thursday, Mārgaśira-badi 4, year 56. It is of course not impossible to regard the year 56 in the date of the charter under discussion as the regnal year of its issuer ; but the internal evidence of the record, as will be shown below, would suggest that the year should better be referred to the Chālukya-Vikrama Saṁvat, the first year of which corresponds to Śaka (current) 999=1076-77 A. D.^[1] In that case the date of our record, viz. Chālukya-Vikrama Saṁvat (current) 56, Amānta-Mārgaśīrsha-badi 4, Thursday would correspond to Thursday, the 20th November, 1130 A. D.

The charter was issued from Vāgharākōṭṭa by Rāṇaka Parachakraśalya who was the son of Dhaṁsaka (possibly Sanskrit Dhvaṁsaka) and grandson of Mahāmaṇḍalēśvara Mahāmāṇḍalika Rāṇaka Chamaravigraha. The issuer of the charter and his grandfather have been endowed with feudatory titles only. The name of the issuer’s father goes without any royal epithet possibly because he predeceased his father and Parachakraśalya directly succeeded his grandfather.

The charter records the grant of a village called Salēḍāgrāma in favour of a Brāhmaṇa named Bṛihaspati who belonged to the Vatsa gōtra and the pañch-ārshēya pravara and was the son of Āgasti and grandson of Chaïkara. It is interesting to note that the donee’s grandfather is represented as belonging to the Kavaṇḍīlla gōtra. Kavaṇḍīlla seems to be a mistake for Kauṇḍilya or Kauṇḍinya and the donee of the charter under review may have actually been a dvyāmushyāyaṇa. The Vatsa gōtra has five pravaras (viz. Bhārgava, Chyavana, Āpnuvat, Aurva and Jāmadagnya), while the Kauṇḍilya or Kauṇḍinya gōtra has three pravaras, viz. Āṅgirasa, Bārhaspatya and Bhāradvāja. The donee’s pañch-ārshēya pravara seems to refer to the Vatsa gōtra. A Brāhmaṇa named Priyaka seems to be mentioned in the document as a witness while Mahāpātra Gōvindasāi was the dūtaka or executor of the grant. The plates appear to have been engraved by two persons named Dhōllajā and Gābhuruja.

There is a group of epithets seemingly applied to the name of Chamaravigraha, although, considering the corrupt language of the document, they may be actually meant for Parachakraśalya who issued the charter. The first of these epithets is parama-māhēśvara which shows that the rulers in question were devotees of Śiva in spite of the fact that the charter under discussion bears the Vaishṇava emblem of Garuḍa which, as will be shown below, was probably borrowed from their ancestors. The second epithet, viz. samadhigat-āśēsha-pañcha-mahāśabd-āvalī-vandita, points to the feudatory status of the rulers, also indicated by their titles, Rāṇaka, etc. The other epithets, which are of outstanding importance, are (1) kanaka-ḍamaru-trivalī-rav-ōttrāsit-ārāti-chakra, (2) Rāshṭrakūṭ-āmala-kula-tilaka, (3) Llātalōra-vinirggata, (4) śvēta-chchhatra,(5) pīta-chāmara, (6) Garuḍa-darpaṇa-dhvaja and (7) ashṭādaśa-ghaṭṭa-gōndram-ādhipati. These epithets show that Rāṇaka Parachakraśalya claimed to have belonged to the Rāshṭrakūṭa royal family and that his family hailed from the Kannaḍa area although he was ruling in the Sambalpur region of Orissa far away from the original home of his forefathers.

The word rāshṭrakūṭa, as an official designation probably meaning ‘ the head of a rāshṭra (a small division of a kingdom) ’ (cf. grāma-kūṭa meaning ‘ the head of a village ’), is often found in the copperplate charters of certain rulers, generally of Kannaḍa origin, in the usual list of officials and others, to whom the royal order concerning a gift was issued.^[2] In ancient and medieval India, such official designations are known to have very often become stereotyped as family names. Out of hundreds of such cases, a few, viz. Dēsāi (Sanskrit Dēśādhipati or ºkṛita), Mahāpatra, Niyōgin, Rājagura, Sēnāpati, Majumdār (from Mazmuadār), Mīrbahar, etc., may be quoted hare by way of illustration. It is also well known that Pēshwā was originally the official designation of a minister of the Marāṭhā rulers of Śivājī’s house, but that is gradually became stereotyped as a family name

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^[1] Bombay Gazetteer, Vol. I, part ii, p. 446
^[2] Above, Vol. XXIII, p. 169 ; Vol. XXV, p. 30, etc.