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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA A.D. 794 speaks of him as Vallabharâja, “ the Vallabha king,” or, possibly, “ the king of the Vallabhas.”[1] This designation however,─ as also the simpler designation Vallabha,─ was, not a special biruda, but an appellation of general application. The two appellations were not restricted to the Râshṭrakûṭa family ; and the name Vallabha does not always denote a Râshṭrakûṭa even in the Râshṭrakûṭa records.[2] And the fuller one of them, Vallabharâja, is of interest in connection with the Râshṭrakûṭas of Mâlkhêḍ chiefly because, through its Prâkṛit forms, it explains the name, “ the Balharâs,” by which the contemporaneous Arab travelers and geographers of the ninth and tenth centuries A.D. used to speak of those kings.[3] The Kaḍaba grant, which purports to have been issued in A.D. 813, would set up for Dantidurga the biruda of Vairamêgha,[4] by which appellation alone it mentions him ; but we cannot admit this as established, until we obtain some authentic confirmation of it from a record the nature of which is unquestionable. Dantidurga was succeeded by his paternal uncle Kṛishṇa I. The Paiṭhaṇ grant of A.D. 794 introduces him as Kṛishṇarâja, and then present two verses which establish for him the birudas of Śubhatuṅga and Akâlavarsha.[5] Another verse in the same record might perhaps be taken as practically speaking of him as Śrîvallabha : but the appellation is there divided into two words, śriyô vallsbhaḥ,[6] which is at least a very exceptional manner of putting forward any formal epithet, title, or biruda ; with that passage we have to compare the descriptions, similarly in verse, of Jagattuṅga II. as vallabhô vîra-Lakshmyâḥ in the Nausârî
one of the Pâla records tells us that “ Gôpâla was the husband of Fortune as well as the lord of the Earth,” or, more literally, that “ Gôpâla was a lord (pati) of the Earth who was the fellow-wife (sapatnî) of Fortune ” (Ind. Ant. Vol. XXI. p. 257, and note 55). And the Chôḷa records constantly utilise the idea : thus an inscription of the twenty-ninth year of Râjakêsarivarma-Râjâdhirâja says that, “ while the goddess of the Earth was beaming under his fringed white parasol, the king wedded the goddess of Fortune ” (South-Ind. Inscrs. Vol. III. p. 55) ; an inscription of the second year of Râjakêsarivarma-Râjamahêndra says, from the opposite point of view, that “ while the goddess of Fortune was resplendent, he wedded the great goddess of Earth, in order that she might abide joyfully under the shade of single parasol ” (ibid. p. 114) ; an inscription of the fourth year of Parakêsarivarma-Râjêndradêva says that, “ while the goddess of Fortune and the great goddess of the Earth became his great queens, the king raised on high his brilliant white parasol ” (ibid. p. 61) ; and an inscription of the twelfth year of Parakêsarivarma-Râjêndrachôḷa I., expanding the idea by introducing Victory as another so-called wife, and referring also to his actual wedded wife, speaks of “ his long life, in which the great goddess of the Earth, the goddess of Victory in battle, and the beautiful and matchless goddess of Fortune, who had become his great queens, gave him pleasure while his own illustrious queen was prospering ” (id. Vol. I. p. 99). It may be added that we have a still more figurative expansion of the general idea, by the suggestion of a city as a wife of a king, in the verse in the Aihoḷe inscription of A.D. 634-35 which says that Pulakêśin I., who was Śrîvallabha or favourite (in this passage, more exactly, husband) of Fortune, became also the bridegroom of the town Vâtâpipurî (page 8 above, verse 7) : so, also, a country is put forward, in the same way, in the description of the earliest Śilâhâra princes of the Northern Koṅkaṇ as “ favourite of the Koṅkaṇ ” and “ favourite of the whole Koṅkaṇ ” (Ind. Ant. Vol. XIII. p. 134, text line 3, p. 135, line 2, p. 136, line 1-2 ; and, in another direction, we find Learning indicated, by the use of the word vallabha, as a wife of wise men (see page 187 below, note 10).─ Both in the biruda Pṛithivîvallabha and in the epithet śrîpṛithivîvallabha, the Sanskṛit records use, indifferently, either pṛithvî or pṛithivî, while the Kanarese records often present the corruptions pṛithuvî, pṛithuvî, pṛithuvî, and pṛithuvî. No distinction seems to be involved. And, while giving in the present study, in each individual case, the form that is actually used, it seems desirable, for the sake of uniformity in indexing, etc., to adopt for general purposes the form pṛithivî, which, though it is strictly only a substitute for pṛithvî, is decidedly the more familiar word of the two and also seems to be more common term. ____________________________________ | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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