|
PREFACE
The work of editing Volume IV of the Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum entitled
Inscriptions of the Kalachuri-Chēdi Era was offered to me by the Director General
of Archæology in India in his letter of the 7th March 1935. As I was already interested in the study of these records for a long time and had also edited some of them, I gladly accepted the offer, though not without some diffidence; for my official duties as
Professor of Sanskrit at the Morris College, Nagpur, left me little leisure, and I knew
full well âhow easy it is to glean a few straws, and how laborious to mow a whole field.'
After spending most of my spare time during nine years on this work, I made over the
typescript of it to the Director General of Archæology on the 6th March 1944. Its
printing could not, however, be taken up immediately on account of war conditions then
prevailing. The delay was not without an advantage ; for it enabled me to include in
the present Volume some important records which were discovered subsequently, and to
shed some more light on the epoch of the Kalachuri era. At last, the work of printing
commenced in June 1949. It was again delayed for some time for want of matrices
with the necessary diacritical marks, but was ultimately completed in December 1954.
The present Volume has been planned to contain all inscriptions of the Kalachuri-Chēdi era, by whatever dynasty they may have been issued. It therefore includes. inter
alia, records of the Ābhīras and their feudatories, the Traikūtakas, the Early Gurjaras,
the Sēndrakas and the Early Chālukays of Gujarat, the Hariśchandrīyas as well as the
Kalachuris of Māhishamtī, Tripurī and Ratanpur, and their feudatories. For completing the sources of the history of the Kalachuris it was found desirable to include a few more
records of the rulers of Tripurī, Sarayūpāra, Ratanpur and Raipur, though they are dated in
other eras. The inscriptions of the Kalachuris of Kalyāna have, however, been excluded
as none of them are dated in the Kalachuri era. The records have been arranged dynasty-
wise in the chronological order, and named uniformly after the reiging kings. Some more inscriptions, because of their being spurious, or for not mentioning the name of any
particular king, or due to some other reasons, have been grouped under the heading
Miscellaneous Inscriptions and, for convenience of reference, have been inserted in three
places where they were chronologically and territorially connected. As the Volume was
going through the press, some more records, either dated in the Kalachuri era or allied to
those already included, came to light. They have been inserted at the end under the heading Additional Inscriptions. All these inscriptions have been edited from their
originals or mechanical ink impressions. In the case of a few other inscriptions, however,
the original stones or copper-plates have since been lost and their facsimiles have not been
published. Their texts, where possible, have therefore been given from previous editions
or notices, with translations added, in an Appendix under the heading Supplementary
Inscriptions. As this matter was being composed, one of these records which had been
very briefly noticed before and had long been given up for lost viz., the Gōpālpur stone
inscription of Vijayasimha, was rediscovered at Jabalpur. I was consequently able to
include its text from an excellent inked estampage kindly supplied by Dr. Chhabra, though
it was too late to have its plate prepared for the present Volume.
Home
Page |
