North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE PARAMARAS OF MALWA

MOḌĪ STONE INSCRIPTION OF THE OF JAYAVARMADEVA (II)

I prepared from the original fragments and a facsimile which, at my request, has been kindly prepared and supplied to me by the Chief Epigraphist, Dr. G. S. Gai.

... One of the two fragments. [1] which contains 28 imperfect lines, shows its total height to be 48 cms. while the length of the lines, beginning with 34.5 cms. in the first, is 40 cms. in 11. 11-13, and gradually, though irregularly, decreases again to 24.5 cms. in the last line ; and the second fragment, which contains 23 imperfect lines and which too has equally suffered, measures about 36 cms. high and 23 to 25 cms. broad. The letters were neatly formed and cut, but some of them, particularly on the first of the fragments, are either chocked up with lime or have become more or less illegible due to the shallow engraving or damages, leaving only traces thereof. The average size of the aksharas ranges between 1.2 and 1.5 cms.

... The characters are Nāgarī, marking the intermediate stage between those employed in the Māndhātā grants of Dēvapāla, V. 1282 and Jayavarman, V. 1331. [2] The vowels are gracefully formed, e.g., in ādhāna-, 1. 11, iva, 1. 3, uttaṁka-, 1. 3, and ēsha, 1.2 ; the secondary u, which is generally cut as a curve attached to the foot of the vertical stroke and sharply turned above to the left, is occasionally shown by a curve turned downwards and attached to the middle of the vertical stroke, as in Mēru, 1. 20 and chyuta-, 1. 11, respectively ; dh has a horn which is some-times joined to its vertical, as in sindhau, and its subscript from also shows this horn, e.g., in -varddhana, both in 1. 4 ; the subscript th is laid flat on its side, e.g. in sthiti-, 1.5 ; the letter r is often wedged at its lowest extremity, as in nirjjara-, 1. 2 ; -ari- in 1. 42, this letter shows a different from ; and lastly, we may note the three different forms of the palatal ś in śiśu, 1. 18 and śu- in the last line.

... The language of the record is Sanskrit, and the panegyric part of the fragments now available is all in verses composed in a good kāvya style and mostly in the Śārdūlavikrīḍita and Sragdhrā metres. The last number of the verses on the fragments now available is 74 in 1. 31, and to judge from the contents of the inscription, the lost portion may have contained about 2-3 verses thereafter, followed by the formal part, which was wholly in prose ; and following this, the record appears to have been rounded off with two verses in the Anushṭubh metre.

... The record shows the usual orthographical peculiarities, such as (1) the use of v to denote b also, e.g. in vrahma-, 1. 2 ; (2) the reduplication of a consonant following r, as in –nirggata-, 1.22 ; (3) the general use of the sign of anusvāra to denote the dental and the labial nasals ; (4) sandhis violated between Śrī and the vowel following it, e.g., in Śrī-Arisiṁha-, 1. 42 ; (5) the general use of the pṛishṭha-mātrā and the occasional use of the sign of avagraha ; and lastly, the spellings of khaṇḍa with sh, aṅghri with h, and samvat with m, respectively in 11. 13, 14 and 36.

... The inscription refers itself to the prosperous reign of the illustrious Jayavarman who belonged to the Paramāra dynasty of Mālwā (11. 6 and 38). The immediate object of it is to record some donations in the form of land, villages and money, made to the temples at Mōḍī, by persons who resided in the neighbouring places, and in all likelihood, the construction of the temples also, by a sage of the name of Mallikārjuna (1. 33). The date of the record, as expressed in figures only in 1. 36, is the first tithi of the dark half of Māgha of the (Vikrama) year 1314, which corresponds to 1258 A.C. We have no means to verify the date. [3] To judge from the contents of the fragments now preserved, the inscription may be split up into two parts, the earlier portion containing a laudatory account of the Imperial house of the Paramarās, showing it to have been a praśasti, the word also being used in 1. 51. It was composed by the learned Brāhmaṇa Vāmana ; and it is thus obvious that the stone was set up in a newly constructed temple at the place where it was originally found.
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[1] For the sake of convenience, the fragments are taken here as No. 1. which is earlier, and No. 2. which is later. The inscription was also edited by me in A. H. R. S., XXXV, pp. 221 ff.
[2] Nos. 51 and 60, respectively.
[3] For the Chaitrādi V. 1314, expired, it would correspond to Wednesday, 3rd January, and 1st February. both 1257 A.C., respectively according to pūrṇimānta and amānta reckoning. The figure for the tithi is 1 in the impression and also on the original, and thus D.R. Bhandarkar’s reading of it as 7 is wrong. See his I. N. I., No. 552.

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