South Indian Inscriptions

EPIGRAPHIA INDICA

A.D. 940, the Karhâḍ grant of A.D. 959, and the Kardâ grant of A.D. 972.^[1] Among the stone records, a similar formal preamble is found in the Kaṇheri inscription of A.D 851, which duly describes Amôghavarshadêva I. as meditating on the feet of Jagattuṅgadêva-(Gôvinda III.) ;^[2] and, though a formal preamble was not used in the Âtakûr inscription of A.D. 949-50, still that record duly follows the same rule in describing Kṛishṇa III. as a very bee on the water-lilies that were the feet of Amôghavarshadêva-(Vaddiga).^[3] In the other prose records on stone, we find sometimes the ending dêva, and sometimes the plain biruda without any ending ; the instances on each side are about equal in number : we might expect to find the honorific ending used in all cases in which the biruda was used alone. Without the proper name ; but that was not done in, for instance, the Hattî-Mattûr inscription of the time of Kṛishṇa I., which employs for him no appellation except that of Akâlavarsha,^[4] and the Paṭṭadakal inscription of the time of Dhruva, which uses only the appellations Dhârâvarsha and Kalivallabha ;^[5] and, though these two happen to be private records, not requiring any official drafting or approval, some of the others are official records, and, accordingly, we cannot determine the existence of any custom in this matter, dependent on the nature of the record and its liability to official scrutiny. It seems evident, however, that the better general practice was to use the ending dêva with the birudas in prose. No instance has as yet been found, in which the word râja is used as the ending of a biruda, either in verse or in prose : other words meaning “ king ” occur in some of the verses ; for instance, Amôghavarsha-nṛipati, “ king Amôghavarsha,” in the Dêôlî grant of A.D. 940,^[6] and Jagattuṅga-nṛipa, “ king Jagattuṅga,” Amôghavarsha-nṛipati, and Amôghavarsha-nṛipa, in the Kardâ grant of A.D. 972 :^[7] but the more special word râja, used so pointedly with the Sanskṛit proper names, is not met with anywhere. Another ending used with a biruda in prose, is indra, which we have in Lakshmîvallabhêndra, in the Nîlgund inscription of A.D. 866 :^[8] an exceptional instance of its use with a proper name, in Kṛishṇarâjêndra, has been noted on page 184 above ; and another exceptional instance of it with a biruda is found in Nirupamêndra, in the case of the feudatory prince Dhârâvarsha-Dhruvarâja (the second of that name) of Gujarât, in a verse in the Baroda grant of A.D. 866 or 867 ;^[9] but it seems to have been, properly, restricted to the combination vallabhêndra, as an honorific form of vallabha.^[10]And other endings, used in prose, were narêndra, in, for instance, Śrîvallabhanarêndra, in the Tôrkhêḍê grant of A.D. 813,^[11] and narêndradêva, in, for instance, Śrîvallabhanarêndradêva, in the Paiṭhaṇ grant of A.D. 794.^[12] But the manner in which the Nîlgund inscription of A.D 866 speaks of Amôghavarsha I. as, indifferently, Amôghavarsha,

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^[1] The Sâmângaḍ grant does not mention any predecessor of Dantidurga ; because he was the first paramount Râshṭrakûṭa king. The Kanarese grant of A.D. 804, and the Tôrkhêḍê grant of A.D. 813, and the Kâpaḍwaṇaj grant of A.D. 909 or 910, do not include the formal preamble mentioning predecessors. The other copper-plate grants are records of the feudatory Gujarât branch of the family ; and in the records of that line it was not the custom to name the previous princes in the preambles of the prose passages.
^[2] Ind. Ant. Vol. XIII. p. 134, No. 15, text line 2.
^[3] Page 53 above, text line 2.
^[4] Page 161 above, text line 1.
^[5] Ind. Ant. Vol. XI. p. 125, text lines 1, 2.
^[6] Above, Vol. V. p. 194, text line 31.
^[7] Ind. Ant. Vol. XII. pp. 264, 265, text lines 12, 13, 24-25.
^[8] Page 104 above, text line 17, and see page 106, note 2 ; see also page 188 below.
^[9] Ind. Ant. Vol. XII. p. 184, text line 17 ; the appellation was there translated by “ king Nirupama” (p. 188, verse 37).
^[10] For the appellation Vallabhêndra, see page 189 below, page 190, note 1, page 191.─ The ending indra is met with once, in a Western Chalukya record (Ind. Ant. Vol. XIX. p. 17, text line 8), in the paramount epithet of which the customary form was simply śrîpṛithivîvallabha ;the epithet is there presented as śrîpṛithivîvallabhêndra.─ There is a miscellaneous use of vallabhêndra, otherwise than in a regal biruda or epithet, in a record at Śravaṇa-Beḷgoḷa (Inscrs. at Śrav.- Beḷ. No. 3), which describes the Kalbappu hill as “ worthy to be praised by gods, Vidyâvallabhêndras (i.e. those who are the chiefs of favourites or husbands of Learning, those who are eminently learned people), demons, men, and saints.”
^[11] Above, Vol. III. p. 54, text line 5.
^[12] Ibid. p. 108, text line 43-44.