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The Indian Analyst
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South Indian Inscriptions |
EPIGRAPHIA INDICA Kundarage seventy, the Kundûr five-hundred, and the Purigere three-hundred. And it mentions also a son of Baṅkêya, named Kundaṭṭe, who was governing the group of village known as the Niḍugundage twelve. The primary object of it was to record the grant of some lands to a temple of the god Mahâdêva (Śiva). The short supplementary record at the top of the stone, indicates a certain Viṇakadêva as the person on whose instigation the grant was made. The date of this record is expressed in a very exceptional and peculiar manner. The Śaka year is not mentioned. Nor is the name of the saṁvatsara given. And the record only refers itself to the time,─ Amôghavarsha . . . . ond-uttaraṁ râjyaṁ-geyyutt-ire,─ “ while Amôghavarsha was reigning increased by one.” Evidently, there was here an omission of some kind or another, whether intentional or accidental. And we have to consider whether we can supply that omission. Now, from the Sirûr inscription, which quite clearly and unmistakably places the new-moon day of the amânta month Jyaishṭha of the Vyaya saṁvatsara, Śaka-Saṁvat 788 expired, in the fifty-second year of his reign, we know, as shew on page 204 f., that Amôghavarsha I. began to reign in A.D. 814 or 815. One of the Kaṇheri inscriptions supplies for him the date, without full details, of Ś.-S. 799 (expired), = A.D. 877-78.[1] Though he had then been reigning for at least sixty-two full years, we might, if we should like, as there is nothing as yet in the dates of his successor to oppose it, add another two years to his reign. And it might thus be thought possible to take the date of the present record as equivalent to “ (the Śaka year 800) increased by one,” that is to say, Śaka-Saṁvat 801 (expired), = A.D. 879-80. We have, however, not any proved instance of Indian historical dates having been expressed in that elliptical manner, with omission of the centuries, except in connection with the Laukika reckoning of Kashmîr and of some adjacent parts of Northern India. That reckoning was devised in only the tenth, or possibly the ninth, century A.D. There is not anything that can give us a reasonable cause for believing in the existence of any Indian custom of recording historical dates with “ omitted hundreds,” except in those parts and in connection with that particular reckoning. And I do not for a moment think it possible that the present date is to be explained in that way.
Some other explanation must be found. Now, we know that the reign of Amôghavarsha I. lasted for at least sixty-two full years, and that it thus included one complete revolution of the sixty-years cycle of the planet Jupiter. We know, also, that the use of that cycle, in the Kanarese country, was definitely established by the Râshṭrakûṭas, and that it was already being freely used there in the time of Amôghavarsha I. There is, indeed, one epigraphic instance of its use in those parts before the Râshṭrakûṭa period ; namely, in the Mahâkûṭa pillar inscription of the Western Chalukya king Maṅgalêśa, which is dated in the fifth year of his reign and in the Siddhârtha saṁvatsara, with other details which place it on exactly the 12th April, A.D. 602.[2] That, however, is at present only an isolated epigraphic instance of earlier times. But the use of the cycle was definitely established by the Râshṭrakûṭas. Amongst the records of Gôvinda III., the father and predecessor of Amôghavarsha I., we have it in the plates from the Kanarese country of A.D. 804, in the Waṇî plates of A.D. 807, in the Râdhanpur plates of A.D. 808, and in the Tôrkhêḍê plates of A.D. 813.[3] Amongst the records of Amôghavarsha I., we have already found it used in the Kaṇheri inscription of A.D. 851,[4] in the Mantrawâḍi inscription of A.D. 865,[5] in the Nîlgund inscription of A.D. 866,[6] and in the Sirûr inscription of ______________________________ | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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