South Indian Inscriptions

INCRIPTIONS OF THE DYNASTY OF THE HARISCHANDRA

they are all to be exempt from all dues, forced labour and special rights; (they are) not to be entered by chātas and bhatas, are to be self-contained,¹ (and) are to continue (as donated villages) as long as the moon, the sun, the ocean and the earth will endure.

(L. 41) Wherefore, our descendants, seeing that the living world is fickle like the waves of the ocean-water agitated by strong wind, should consent to and preserve this Our gift. (And) the merchants (of the town Jayapura), five or even ten (in number), should celebrate the yātrā festival of the god Vishnu for a whole fortnight in the month of Mārgaśīrsha. But he, who, with his mind shrouded in the darkness of ignorance, would confiscate it or allow it to be confiscated, would incur the five great sins. As for this temple, it is entrusted to the town of merchants.² They should all perform the service and take care of the property,³ of the god. The (following) regulation is laid down for the town :–– The merchants residing at (this) place will never have to pay the octroi duty, or to provide for the boarding⁴ (of royal officer). He, who will violate this regulation, shall incur the five great sins.”

(Here follow four benedictive and imprecatory verses).
(L. 54) In the year four hundred increased by sixty-one, (this) charter was written by Bharatasvāmin a resident of Kallivana. Inscription of Tējavarman

L. 56) Success! Hail! The illustrious Tējavarmarāja has relinquished a pasture-land in Pālittapātaka to the south of Jayapura. And in evidence of it, stone sculptures of cows, together with (the image of) the goddess Durgā, have been put up in (all) the four directions (to mark) its boundary. That is the defining limit of the pasture-land. For purchasing land (in honour) of the god Bhōgēśvara, a hundred rūpakas have been deposited with the merchant town of Jayapura. The interest on the hundred rupees should be paid by (the guild of merchants in) the town as the price of bdellium (for the worship) of the god Bhōgēśvara, year after year, as long as the moon, the sun and the stars will endure. He, who will do otherwise, shall incur the five great sins.

(No. 32 ; PLATE XXVI
ANJANERI PLATES (SECOND SET) OF BHOGASAKTI

THIS is a set of two copper-plates discovered together with two others5 in the possession of the Shid family of Anjanēri near Trimbak in the Nasik District of the Bombay State. The inscription was brought to my notice by Rao Bahadur K.N. Dikshit, Director General of Archœology. The plates were kindly sent to me for examination by the Superintendent of the Archœology Survey, Western Circle, who has also supplied me with their ink impressions. _________________

¹ The expression abhyantara-siddhi occurs in several grants, sometimes with a prefix like tri-bhoga or sarva, see Ind. Ant., Vol. XIX, p. 271. It is generally used in the instrumental case denoting the manner in which the grant is made. Abhyantara-siddhya has been variously translated:––(1) by Dr. Fleet as ‘with (full) rights of enjoyment (loc.cit); (2) BY Dr. D. R. Bhandarkar as ‘with heart-felt devotion’ (Ep. Ind., Vol. IX, p.40), and (3) again by the same scholar as ‘for the purpose of internal adjudication’ (ibid., Vol XVIII, p. 257). The context shows that the expression is used here in the sense of ‘self-contained’, i.e., the donated villages will not be dependent on others for the decision of law-suits etc., but they will have full powers of adjudication. The same idea is expressed by sa-danda-das-aparadhah which sometimes takes its place. The Hansot plates of Bhartrivaddha have suh-abhyantara-siddhi; Ep. Ind., Vol. XII, p. 203.
² Viz., the town of Jayapura.
³ Yoga means acquisition of new property and kshema, preservation of what is acquired.
⁴ See p. 156, n. z, below.
⁵ Nos. 22 and 31, above.