North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE KALACHURIS OF RATANPUR

MALLAR STONE INSCRIPTION OF JAJALLADEVA II: YEAR 919

whose son Jajalladēva (II) was ruling when the present record was put up.

The inscription next gives the genealogy of Sōmarāja. At the village Kumbhaṭī in Madhya-deśa (Middle Country) watered by the celestial river (Gaṅgā), there lived a Brāhmaṇa named Pṛithvīdhara of Kṛishṇātrēya gōtra with the pravaras Ātrēya, Ārchanānasa and Syāvāśva^¹. His son Gaṅgādhara came, in course of time, to the country of Tummāṇa where he was honoured by Ratnadēva II with the gift of the village Kōsambī.^² Gaṅgādhara's son, Sōmarāja was proficient in both the Mīmāṁsās, the Nyāya and Vaiśēshika systems, and refuted the doctrines of the Chārvākas, Bauddhas and Jainas. He constructed a temple of the god Kēdāra at Mallāla, at which the present inscription was evidently put up. The record was composed by Ratnasiṁha, the son of Māmē, who belonged to the Vāstavya family and owed his rise to the illustrious Rāghava. The latter is evidently identical with the homonymous astrologer who is mentioned as one of the donees in the Amōda plates of Jājalladēva II.^³ Both Mamē and Ratnasiṁha are mentioned in the Ratanpur stone inscription of the reign of Pṛithvidēva II, dated V. 1207, which was composed by Ratnasiṁha's son Dēvagaṇa. The present record was written on the stone by the Kahatriya Kumārapāla of the race of Saharārjuna, who, as already stated, is named as the scribe in several other records.⁴ It was incised by the sculptor Śāmpula.⁵

Of the geographical names mentioned here, Madhya-dēśa roughly corresponds to the present Uttar Pradesh. Kumbhaṭī cannot be identified. Tummāṇa has already been shown to be identical with Tumān, 16 miles north-east of the Ratanpur. Mallāla is clearly Mallār Bilaspur tahsil, where the stone is said to have been found. There is no village in the Bilaspur District exactly corresponding to Kōsaṁvī or Kōsambī, but if Kōsaṁvī of the text is a mistake for Kosandhī,^⁶ the village would be represented by Kōsamḍih, 8 miles from Mallār.⁷

¹ The text gives Ārchanā¬na as the name of the second pravara and Sasyāvāsa as that of the third, but these are clearly mistakes for Archanānasa and Śyāvāśva respectively. See below, text p. 514, n. 11.
² The text actually reads Kōsaṁvī, but as already pointed out, v is used in it everywhere for b.
³ Below, No. 99, 11. 23-4.
⁴ See above, p. 503, n. 1.
⁵ Sāmpula was the sculptor of the Ratanpur stone inscription (No. 93, above) also.
⁶ Such a mistake is not unlikely, though it must be admitted that in the present inscription dh is clearly distinguished from v by the absence of a horizontal stroke at the top, except in dhā which is differentiated from vā by a horizontal stroke joining is two verticals.
⁷ I. C. P. B. (second ed.), p. 124.
⁸ From the original stone.
⁹ Expressed by a symbol.
¹⁰ The aksharas in the brackets are broken away, only the visarga after ma being partly extant.
¹¹ Dr. Keilhorn read jat-āmv(b)u-pallava, but the aksharas are clearly as transcribed above. Read जटाम्रपल्लव-. See below, translation, p. 515, n 12.
¹² Metre: Śārdūlavikṛīḍita.
¹³ Read विभाते as suggested by Keilhorn. The change has not been made in the original.
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