North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE SILAHARAS OF KOLHAPUR

..(Line 15-20). Whiles Gaṇḍarādityadēva, endowed with all the titles, born in the lineage of Jīmūtavāhana, the emperor of the Khachara family, the king of the Śiḷāhāras, the Māṇḍalika, Ḍaṁgeya-Barmma, who had made his own the seven members of the royal fortune, a Śiva to the Māṇḍalikas, who is every day augmenting the royal fortune of the Kshatriyas such as Bhōjadēva who were his predecessors in the Śiḷāhāra family, is ruling from his capital at Vaḷavāḍa in the enjoyment of pleasant conversations.

.. (Lines 20-21). In the Śaka year 1040, Viḷambi-saṁvatsara, on the occasion of a lunar eclipse—

.. (Lines 21-24). A grant of one mattar of land free from taxes in Eḍenāḍa and a garden to the deity in between two wells was made with the pouring of water after washing the feet of Śāntivīra-Siddhāntadēva, the Āchārya of Kōllāpura-tīrtha, on instructions from Nāgaladēvī, to the basadi caused to be built by Nēma-gāvuṇḍa at Vagubana-hērilage in Eḍenāḍa.

.. (Lines 24-27). Its boundaries are : in the south-east, a stone set up; in the south-west, a stone set up to the east of the rivulet ; in the north-west, the east of the rivulet flowing from the north ; in the north-east, a stone set up. Thus are the boundaries demarcated.

.. (Lines 27-30). (Here occur two usual imprecatory verses and a maṅgala-vākya.)

No. 48 : PLATES C AND CI
KOLHĀPUR PLATES OF GAṆḌARĀDITYA : ŚAKA YEAR 1048

.. THESE copper plates were discovered some years ago while levelling the Khāsbāg grounds in Kolhāpur. They are now deposited in the Rājārām College Museum, Kolhāpur. They were first edited with facsimiles and an English translation by Dr. A. N. Upadhye in the Epigraphia Indica, Vol. XXIII, pp. 28 f. They are edited here from the same facsimiles.

.. “The plates consist of three copper sheets, each measuring 11 inches (27. 94 cm.) in length and about 7½ inches (19.05 cm) in breadth. They are strung together with a ring of 3 inches (7.62 cm.) in diameter, to which is fixed a square seal 2½ (6.35 cm.) by 2½ inches (6.35 cm.), bearing in relief a well and prominently carved figure of Guruḍa holding a cobra in his left hand. On the prominent border line of the surface there are marks of the moon and the sun. The plates are tolerably thick, at least 1/10th of an inch (.25 cm), and the inside edges are slightly raised to protect the writing. The first side of the first plate is blank. On the second side of the last plate there is a line-drawing of a cow with a liṅga and a sword in front, and the sun and the moon in the corners above. [1]”

.. The characters are of the Nāgārī alphabet. The following peculiarities may be noted: The initial i is more developed here than in the earlier record (see iti, line 13). In initial ē the left member is not yet separated from the right (see ēvaṃ, line 45) ; th has now assumed the modern Nāgarī form (see tathā, line 44); dh had developed a horn on the left by the date of the Tāḷāle plates (Śaka 1032), but it is curious that in the present plates which were incised ten years later that letter shows, in many places, the older form (see e.g. Vidyādharaḥ, line 2), though the horned form also appears in a few places (see dharmma, line 39); ś has attained the modern Nāgarī form (see śrī line 1) ; h has a tail as in the earlier records (see Mahājanāḥ, line 47).
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[1] Ep. Ind., Vol. XXIII, p. 28.