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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA eulogy is all about the Early Gaṅgas, and the donor, Mahārāja Indravarman, is said to be the establisher of the spotless Gaṅga family, the years may be taken to be of the Gaṅga era till such time as the contrary is proved. The date of the inscription is given in words as Śatē triṁśaty-adhikē and then in numerical symbols as saṁvatsarāḥ 100 30 3. The last number ‘three’ is represented by three horizontal strokes one over the other, but between the symbols representing 30 and 3 another horizontal stroke, though shorter in size, is also noticeable. After the date in numerical symbols comes the term Śrāvaṇa-māsa. It is possible to interpret the year as 133 if the numerical symbols are taken into account. Then the expression Śatē triṁśaty-adhikē should be changed to Śate trayas-triṁśatyadhikē. The omission of trayas before triṁśat may be, as suggested by Dr. B. Ch. Chhabra, a case of haplography due to the carelessness of the engraver. Notwithstanding the investigations of a host scholars, the latest of them being Prof. Mirashi, the starting point of the Gaṅga era is still a riddle awaiting a satisfactory solution. Dr. Fleet[1] who tried to arrange the Gaṅga genealogy and fix the starting point of the era by basing his arguments on the synchronism afforded by the Gōdāvarī grant of Pṛithivīmūla, gave it up as the identification of Indrabhaṭṭāraka with Indrabhaṭṭāraka of the Chālukya dynasty did not stand scrutiny. On the other hand, Mr. G. Ramadas[2] basing on the astronomical details supplied by the grants themselves fixed 349 A. C. as the initial year of the Gaṅga Era ; but this was questioned by Mr. R. Subbarao[3] who, following the line of argument of Fleet, identified Indrabhaṭṭāraka of the Gōdāvarī grant of Pṛithivīmūla with Indrabhaṭṭārakavarman of the Vishṇukuṇḍin family and fixed the date of commencement of the Gaṅga era to be some time between 492 and 496 A.C.
This was disputed by Mr. Somasekhara Sarma[4], as the chronology of the Vishṇukuṇḍins itself has not been satisfactorily fixed, and as there was no agreement among scholars in the arrangement of the pedigrees furnished by the copper plate records of the rulers of the Vishṇukuṇḍin family. After an exhaustive discussion with the help of astronomical details supplied by the grants Mr. Somasekhara Sarma surmised that the Pūrṇimānta system of reckoning was followed during the rule of the early Gaṅgas and that the “Epoch of the Gaṅga Era began in the Śaka year 426-7 or 504-5 A.C. between June and January of that year”. Prof. Mirashi of Nagpur, after detailed examination of the Gaṅga dates showed that the “Gaṅga Era commenced on amānta Chaitra śu. di. 1 in the Śaka year 420 (the 14th March A.D. 498).[5] In his note on the Ponnuturu plates of Gaṅga Sāmantavarman[6] he also suggested that though the Pūrṅimānta scheme has been used in two of the earlier grants of the Gaṅga Era, the Amānta scheme has been adopted in later grants. If the surmise that the discrepancy in the numerical symbols employed in the present record is a scribal error and the suggested correction be accepted, then the grant was made in the year 133. It should be taken as the current year. The grant is said to have been made on the occasion of a solar eclipse on the new moon day of Śrāvaṇa. Calcluating from the starting point fixed by Prof. Mirashi, i.e., Śaka 420 plus 132 expired years of the era, we get Ś. 552 (630 A. C.) as the date of the grant. According to Swamikannu Pillai’s Indian Ephemeris, on the 13th of August of that year there was a solar eclipse ; but this was in the month of Bhādrapada. The village Tōṭavāṭaka is said to have been situated in the Krōshṭukavartanī vishaya. Krōshṭukavartanī appears in many of the early Gaṅga plates as the name of a territorial division and has been identified with the area round about the Narasannapeta taluk in the Srikakulam _________________________________________________
[1] Ind. Ant., Vol. XVI, pp. 131 ff.
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