South Indian Inscriptions

EPIGRAPHIA INDICA

Considering the complete agreement of the six dates previously treated of, I have no doubt whatever that Sunday, the 3rd June A.D. 1123, is really the day intended by the date No. 10, and that the writer of this date, in recording the tithi, has erroneously written saptamiyum, instead if ashṭamiyum.

Since the date No. 10 is stated to have been the 340th day of the 5th year of the king’s reign, the first day of that year would now have been the 29th June A.D. 1122, and the accession of Vikrama-Chôḷa must have taken place on (approximately) the 29th June A.D. 1118.^[1]

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The result now arrived at receives an unexpected confirmation from a reconsideration of the date No. 43 (above, Vol. VI. p. 281). This date is of the seventeenth year (given in words) of the king’s reign, and of the Śaka year 1054 (given in figures only), and gives us for calculation Thursday, the third tithi of the bright half of Vaiśâkha. When previously examining it, I found that for Śaka-Saṁvat 1054 current it would correspond to Thursday, the 2nd April A.D. 1131 ; and as I found it to be incorrect for what I then had to consider the 17th year of the king’s reign I felt no hesitation in accepting Thursday, the 2nd April A.D. 1131, as the true equivalent of the date, and in assuming that the regnal year had been quoted erroneously.

But now, with the 29th June A.D. 1118 as the date of the king’s accession, a date in the month Vaiśâkha of his seventeenth year will be expected to fall in A.D. 1135, and for this year the date regularly corresponds to Thursday, the 18th April A.D. 1135, when the third tithi of the bright half of Vaiśâkha ended 9 h. 30 m., after mean sunrise. I now therefore assume that the date is really of the 17th year of Vikrama-Chôḷa’s reign, and that the Śaka year 1054 has been erroneously quoted instead of 1057 (expired).

59.- In the Vaidyanâtha temple at Tirumalavâḍi.^[2]

This inscription is dated in the 15th year of the reign of “king Parakêsarivarman alias the emperor of the three worlds, the glorious Vikrama-Chôḷadêva.” In the introduction it is stated that he made gifts to the temple at Chidambaram on the following date :^[3] ─ 24 . . . . . . = ppattâm-âṇḍil [Ś]i[t]tirai-ttiṅga[ḷ] Atta- 25 m perra Âdittavârattu = [t]tiru-vaḷar-madiyin trayôdaśi=ppakkat[tu].

“In the tenth year, (in) the month of Śittirai, on a Sunday which corresponded to (the day of) Hasta, (on) the thirteenth tithi of the fortnight of the auspicious waxing moon.”

This date, of the month of Śittirai (or Mêsha) of the 10th year of the king’s reign, would be expected to fall in A.D. 1128, and for that year it would actually correspond to Sunday, the 15th April A.D. 1128, while was the 23rd day of the month of Śittirai, and which the 13th tithi of the bright half (of the month Vaiśâkha) ended 1 h. 25 m. after mean sunrise. But the nakshatra on this day was Chitrâ, by the equal space system and according to Garga for 17 h. 44 m., and by the Brahma-siddhânta for 14 h. 27 m., after mean sunrise.─ If the week-day of the

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^[1] The following statement will shew at a glance what mistakes the seven dates Nos. 10, 21, 22, 41, 42, 57 and 58 would necessarily contain, if the accession had taken place on either the 18th July 1108 or the 29th June A.D. 1118.
If it had taken place on the 18th July A.D. 1108,─
in No. 22, Ârdrâ would have been wrongly quoted for Punarvasu ; in No. 42, the 9th year would have been wrongly quoted instead of the 19th ; No. 58 would be entirely incorrect. On the other hand, assuming it to have taken place on the 29th June A.D. 1118,─ in No. 10, saptamiyum is wrong for ashṭamiyum.
^[2] No. 82 of the Government Epigraphist’s collection for 1895 ; South-Ind. Inscr. Vol. III. No. 79.
^[3] The same date is quoted in the introduction of an inscription of the 11th year at Âlaṅguḍi (No. 165 of 1895 1, 4 f.).