South Indian Inscriptions

INSCRIPTIONS OF THE MINISTERS AND FEUDATORIES OF THE
VATSAGULMA BRANCH

No. 27 : PLATE XXVII
INSCRIPTION IN AJAṆṬĀ CAVE XVII

...THOUGH the present inscription had been copied several times before¹, the first attempt to edit it was that of Dr. Bhau Daji. He personally copied this and other inscriptions at Ajaṇṭā in February 1863, and submitted his papers on them to the Bombay Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society on the 10th July 1863². He published an eye-copy of the epigraph together with a transcript and a sort of English translation in the Journal of the Society Vol. VII, pp. 53 f. He read the names of nine princes, of whom four, viz., Dhṛitarāshṭra, Harisāmba, Śaurisāmba and Ravisāmba, he thought, belonged to one dynasty and the remaining five, whose names he read as Upēndragupta, Skācha, Niladāsa, Skācha and Kṛisḥṇadāsa³, to another. In line 13 he read Anitya as the name of a minister⁴ who, he thought, probably served Ravisāmba. Dr. Bhau Daji failed to notice that Harisheṇa, mentioned in line 21, was identical with the homonymous Vākāṭaka king named in the inscription in Cave XVI at Ajaṇṭā. About the general purport of the epigraph and the location of the kingdom or capitals of these princes he offered no remarks.

...The inscription was next edited, with an introductory note and a translation, but without any facsimile, by Pandit Bhagvanlal Indraji in the Inscriptions from the Cave-Temples of Western India (Archaeological Survey of Western India), (1881), pp. 73 f. The Pandit deciphered the record with his usual skill and thoroughness. He, for the first time, gave correctly the names of the following ten princes, all of whom, according to him belonged to the same royal family and ruled over Aśmaka:− Dhṛitarāshṭra, Harisāmba Śaurisāmba, Upēndragupta, Agaja or Kācha I, Bhikshudāsa, Nīladāsa, Kācha II, Kṛishṇadāsa and Ravisāmba. Again, he drew attention to the name of the king Harishēṇa, whom he identifield with the Vākāṭaka prince of that name and to whom, he thought, this Aśmaka family might have been subordinate. Further, from the fragmentary phrases of verse 12, Bhagvanlal conjectured that the elder son of Kṛishṇadāsa whose name is obliterated murdered his brother Ravisāmba, but afterwards repented. The vihāra where the present inscription is incised was constructed either by this king or his minister whose name Bhagvanlal read as Achintya. As regards the date of the Inscription, he thought that it belonged to the same age as that in Cave XVI which was incised in characters ‘current in Chhattisgarh District and the county round the Bāṇgāṅgā about the 5th and 6th century A.D.’

...The epigraph was next edited with a lithograph and a translation by Dr. G. Bühler in the Archaeological Survey of Western India, Vol. IV(1883), 128 f. Pl. liv. The lithograph was made from a facsimile prepared by Pandit Bhagvanlal Indraji and appears to have been considerably worked up by hand. Dr. Bühler’s transcript does not differ much from Pandit Bhagvanlal’s. He gave the same names of princes, but he corrected the Pandit’s statement about the purport of verse 12. He showed that the correct meaning of the verse was that the younger brother perished suddenly by an accident or died of a disease. The next verse,
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¹ J.A.S.B., Vol. V, p. 554; J.B.B.R.A.S., Vol. VII, pp. 55 f.
² J.B.B.R.A.S., Vol VII, pp. 53 f.
¹³ The correct names Kācha (I), Nīladāsa, Kācha (II) were given for the first time by Pandit Bhagvanlal.
¹⁴ As shown below, no minister is named here. The word sachiva which occurs in verse 13 has misled all previous editors. For its correct meaning, see p. 122, n 3, below