North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE SILAHARAS OF KOLHAPUR

No. 43 : PLATES LXXXVIII-XC
MIRAJ PLATES OF MĀRASIṀHA : ŚAKA YEAR 980

..THESE plates were discovered at Miraj. Mr. Wathen, Secretary to the Government of Bombay, collected a number of copper-plate grants, which he translated in the early volumes of the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society. He briefly noticed the present inscription in Vol. II (pp. 384-386) of that Journal. Subsequently, he gave a Nāgarī, mostly incorrect, transcript of the record together with a translation and a facsimile of the figures engraved on the back of the first plate, in Vol. IV (1837), pp. 281-285 [1].

.. The plates were deposited with the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, but they have since been lost. Fortunately, their impressions had been taken and were in the possession of the Society. As the paper had become rotten, Pandit Bhagvanlal Indraji got the impressions mounted and published the facsimiles in the Inscriptions from the Cave-Temples of Western India, together with a transcript of their text made by Dr. Fleet. The latter supplied a short analysis of their contents, but did not translate them. He intended to publish a full translation at some future date, but apparently found no time to do so. Dr. Kielhorn calculated and published details of the date of the grant in the Indian Antiquary, Vol. XXIII, p. 115. I edit the plates here from the facsimiles published by Pandit Bhagvanlal.

.. The characters are of the Kannaḍa alphabet, more cursive than in some other records of the period. The language is Sanskrit. The author of the inscription had little command over it. He has used several words, the meaning of which is very obscure. His formation of sentences is irregular and in many places the meaning is uncertain. He has used some Kannaḍa words, especially in stating the birudas of the ruling king, the meaning of which is not quite clear. As regards orthography, we may note that the consonant following r is reduplicated in many places, the dental s is used for the palatal ś as in dēsa, line 11, and vice versa in śahasra-, line 46, and ḷ is, almost throughout used for l (see e.g. sakaḷa-, line 1).

.. The inscription refers itself to the reign of the Śilāhāra king Mārasiṁha, ruling over Kolhāpur and the surrounding country. He bears several birudas which were continued by his successors, but some like Gōṁkanaṁkakāra are noticed in this record only. The description of this king is otherwise quite conventional. The grant mentions his grandfather Jatiga (II), his father Gōṅka, and uncle Gūhala. Gōṅka is described as the ruler of Karahāṭa and Kuṇḍi vishaya, Miriñja-dēśa and Kōṅkaṇa-mahādēśa. Mārasiṁha was residing in his capital of the Khiḷigiḷa fort at the time of the grant.

.. The object of the inscription is to record the grant, by Mārasiṁha, of the village Kuṇṭavāḍa, situated on the southern bank of the Kṛishṇavērṇā and bounded on the east, south and west by the villages Kannavāḍa, Hāḍalivāḍa and Gāḷikuṭṭi. These places were included in the territorial division of Sirivōḷaḷa-24 in the Miriñjadēśa-3000. The donee was the ascetic Chikkadēva, who was a disciple of the Pāśupata Paṇḍita Brahmēśvara. The purpose of the grant seems to have been to provide for the worship of the pañchāyatana at Miriñja by Chikkadēva. The grant was made on the occasion of the Uttarāyaṇa Saṅkrānti which occurred on Thursday, the seventh tithi of the bright fortnight of Pausha in the Saka year 980
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[1] J.R.A.S. (Old Series), Vol. IV, p. 281.