North Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE SILAHARAS OF KOLHAPUR

No. 52 : PLATE CVI
MIRAJ STONE INSCRIPTION OF VIJAYADITYA : SAKA YEARS 1065 AND 1066

..THE stone bearing this inscription was found on a slab built into the wall in the gateway of the fort of Miraj in the present Sānglī District of Mahārāshṭra. A photograph of it was published in the Pālī, Sanskrit and Old-Kanarese Inscriptions, No. 96. Kielhorn calculated the two dates mentioned in it, and listed the record in his Inscriptions of Southern India, No. 322, p. 18. It was edited with a translation, but without a facilismile, by Dr. L.D. Barnett in the Epigraphia Indica, Vol. XIX, pp. 35 ft. It is edited here from an excellent estampage supplied by the Chief Epigraphist.

.. The stone is now preserved in the Town Hall of Kolhāpur. It has on its top a triangular pediment containing sculptures, namely, in the centre a liṅga on a stand ; to the proper right of this the squatting Nandī facing it; above them, on the right the sun and on the the left the moon. Below this is the inscription which covers a space about 60.96 cm. broad and 125.80 cm. high. The characters are of the Old-Kannaḍa alphabet, and the language Kannaḍa prose of the transitional period. Dr. Barnett has noticed the following peculiarities of it : “The archaic ḷ never appears; it has become ḷ in ēḷ (line 9), ēḷvatta (line 12), aḷi (lines 57 and 59), iḷda (line 58), and r in ērchchhāsirada (line 12). Initial p in pure Kanarese and tadbhava words has become h, except in padinaruvaru (line 6), perggaḍe (line 15), Piriyu guvārdha (line 18), piriya, ( line 40, in a formula), pasarigaru (line 50), pomma (line 51), and ponnalu (line 56, in a formula). The use of genitive as quasi-nominative is found in line 29, seṭṭiguttaṁ tanna biṭṭ-āyam. The lexical interest of the record is considerable as it contains a large number of the special names of the classes of traders (notably bachcha, line 7 ; maṁka, line 8 ; bārika, line 8) and some other technical words, e.g. hasara as a measure of capacity (lines 27 f.), saṁḍage (line 29), moru (line 37), krēṇikāra, (line 44), pomma (line 51), and āṭhāṇāntara (line 53).

.. The record refers itself to the reign of the Mahāmaṇḍalēśvara Vijayāditya, who is describbed as governing his kingdom from his permanent camp at Vaḷavāḍa. He is evidently the Śilāhāra king of that name of the Kolhāpur branch. The object of it is to record that certain merchants who were foremost in the Trading Corporation of the Vīra-Baṇañjas and belonged to the localities Miriñje, Bāge, Dōṇikōḍa, Toḷakale, Kūṇḍili, and Sēḍam bāḷ, assembled at Sēḍambāḷ as the General Body representing the district of Piriyuguvāra, Siriguppa, Juguḷakoppa and one other place, the name of which has become illegible, and donated certain dues on commodities such as areca-nuts, oil, clarified butter etc. sold in the market evidently at Seḍambāḷ in favour of the god Mādhavēśvara, whose temple had been constructed by Mādirājayya, the Prabhu of Sēḍambāḷ. The Chief Merchants on their part made certain donations is cash or kind for the same purpose. The people of the town, the guilds, potters, goldsmiths, shoemakers and cobblers also made similar other gifts for the festival of Chaitra and that of Dīpāvali as well as for use in the service of the god.

.. These gifts were made at the meeting of the Friday market held on Friday, the sixth Tithip [1] of the bright fortnight of Bhādrapada in the Śaka year 1065 (expressed in figures),
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[1] Barnett read this date as Śaka 1065, Bhādrapada śuddha 2, Friday, and thought that it was irregular ; for that tithi fell on Monday (the 24th August A.D. 1142), not on Friday as required. But Fleet had already shown that the originally written figure of the tithi was later corrected to 6. Says he, “In this case, the reference to Friday shows that the mistake must be in the tithi, not in the week-day. And a closer examination of the ink-impression shows that, at some subsequent time, the number of the tithi was undoubtedly corrected from 2 into 6. The alteration is discernible in the photograph ; but not very conclusively. In the ink-impression, however, it can, on close examination, be recognised very clearly ; and it is seen that the resulting 6 is more like the figure as it stands in line 47 of this record, in the date

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