Texts

Texts database last updated .

This interface allows you to look for texts in the DHARMA collection. The search form below can be used for filtering results. Matching is case-insensitive, does not take diacritics into account, and looks for substrings instead of terms. For instance, the query edit matches "edition" or "meditation". To look for a phrase, surround it with double quotes, as in "old javanese". Searching for strings that contain less than three characters is not possible.

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Documents 1–2 of 2 matching.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary: The subjoined Sanskrit inscription is engraved on three sides of an octagonal pillar,1 which was excavated at Amarāvatī by Mr. R.Sewell and sent by Dr. Burgess to the Madras Museum. The top of the pillar and some letters of the uppermost lines of the inscription have been broken off. The inscription has hitherto remained a puzzle, as each line seems to end incomplete. Finding, that the first words of some lines were connected with the last words of the following lines, I was led to suppose that the inscription must begin from the bottom and not from the top. Curiously enough, this is really the case. If the inscription is read upwards, we find that it consists of eleven complete verses and of a prose passage, the end of which is lost through the mutilation of the pillar at the top.

The inscription opens with an invocation of Buddha and with a mythical genealogy of Pallava, the supposed founder of the Pallava dynasty.

[[genealigical table]] Brahman. Bharadvāja. Aṅgiras. Sudhāman. Droṇa. Aśvatthāman, married to the Apsaras Madani. Pallava.

Verse 8 gives a popular etymology of the name Pallava. Then there follow the names of seven Pallava kings:—

1. Mahendravarman, son of Pallava.

2. Siṁhavarman I., son of 1.

3. Arkavarman, son of 2.

4. Ugravarman.

6. Nandivarman, son of 5, Śrī-Siṁhavishṇu.

7. Siṁhavarman II.

The inscription contains no information about the relationship, which existed between 3 and 4, 4 and 5, 6 and 7. Neither does the genealogy agree with the lists derived by Mr. Foulkes2 and Mr. Fleet3 from other Pallava inscriptions, although similar names of kings occur in them. For these reasons great care should be taken in using the above list for historical purposes.

From the incomplete prose passage at the end of the inscription, we learn that, on his return from an expedition to the north, Siṁhavarman II. came to a place sacred to Buddha, which was called Dhānyaghaṭa (line 38) or Dhānyaghaṭaka (line 47). The lost part of the pillar must have recorded a donation, which the king made to Buddha.

Dhānyaghaṭa or Dhānyaghaṭaka is evidently identical with Dhānyakaṭa or Dhānyakaṭaka, “corn-town,” the well-known old name of Amarāvatī. The use of gha instead of ka can perhaps be explained by the Tamil habit of softening a single consonant between two vowels.4

Language: Sanskrit.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv01p0i0032.

Emmanuel Francis.

Summary: The original of the subjoined inscription belongs to the Government Central Museum, Madras. According to Mr. Sewell,1 it “was found at the close of the year 1871 buried in the ground in a field in the village of Eḍeru near Ākiripalle in the Kistna District, 15 miles north-east of Bezvāḍa, a village belonging to the present Zamīndārī of Nūzivīḍu. The plates were presented to the Madras Museum by the then Zamīndār.” A rough transcript and paraphrase of the inscription were published by S. M. Naṭeśa Śāstrī.2 As the inscription deserves to be published more carefully owing to its bearing on a part of the history of the Eastern Chalukyas, I now edit it from the original plates, the use of which I owe to the kindness of Dr. E. Thurston, Superintendent, Government Central Museum.

The document is engraved on five copper-plates with raised rims, which are not less than (1/4) inch thick. Each plate measures 9(1/4) by 4(1/4) inches. The first and fifth plates are inscribed only on their inner sides, while the three middle ones bear writing on both sides. The characters are extremely elegant and must have been engraved by an accomplished calligraphist. The plates are strung on a slightly elliptic ring, which is (1/2) inch thick and measures about 5 inches in diameter. The well-cut circular seal, which is attached to the ring, rests on an expanded lotus-flower and measures 3(1/4) inches in diameter. It bears, at the top, a recumbent boar, which faces the right and is surmounted by the moon and the sun, two chāmaras, an elephant-goad and a symbol which I cannot make out; across the centre, the legend śrītribhuvanāṁkuśa; and at the bottom, an expanded lotus-flower (side-view),—all in relief, on a counter-sunk surface. Both the plates and the seal are in excellent preservation.

The inscription opens with a maṅgala, and then notices in prose and in verse the ancestors of the Eastern Chalukya king Amma I. Of the kings from Kubja-Vishṇuvardhana to Vishṇuvardhana IV. nothing but the names and the length of reigns is mentioned. The next king was Vijayāditya II., who is called Narendra-mṛigarāja in other inscriptions. He fought 108 battles during 12 years with the armies of the Gaṅgas and Raṭṭas, built 108 temples of Śiva in commemoration of his victories and ruled over Veṅgī for 44 years (verses 2 to 4). As Mr. Fleet has pointed out,3 “the Gaṅgas here referred to were mahāmaṇḍaleśvaras, feudatories of the Rāshṭrakūṭas, whose inscriptions are found in the Beḷgaum and Dhārwāḍ Districts.” The Raṭṭas mentioned in the grant were the Rāshṭrakūṭas themselves. If we deduct the sum of the reigns of the Eastern Chalukya kings from Kali-Vishṇuvardhana to Chālukya-Bhīma II. from the date of the accession of Amma II.—Śaka 8674—the accession of Kali-Vishṇuvardhana and the death of his predecessor Vijayāditya II. would fall in Śaka 764. Most inscriptions assign to the latter a reign of 48 years, two inscriptions a reign of 40 years,5 and the subjoined inscription a reign of 44 years. Accordingly, his accession would fall in Śaka 716, 724 or 720. Hence the war between Vijayāditya II. and the Raṭṭas—as suggested by Mr. Fleet—may have taken place during the reigns of the two Rāshṭrakūṭa kings Govinda III. and Śarva Amoghavarsha, who ruled at least from Śaka 7266 to 737 and from 7377 till at least 8008 respectively. As, in a grant of Śaka 730,9 the lord of Veṅgī is described as the servant of Govinda III., and as in a grant of Śaka 78910 it is stated, that Amoghavarsha was worshipped by the lord of Veṅgī, it seems that each party claimed the victory over the other. The fact, that Vijayāditya II. built 108 temples of Śiva, is also alluded to in two other inscriptions, where it is said, that he founded 108 temples of Narendreśvara, i.e., temples of Śiva called after his surname Narendra.11

Nothing of importance seems to have happened during the short reign of Kali-Vishṇuvardhana. His successor Vijayāditya III., who reigned from Śaka 765-66 to 80910, “having been challenged by the lord of the Raṭṭas, conquered the unequalled Gaṅgas, cut off the head of Maṅgi in battle, frightened the fire-brand Kṛishṇa and burnt his city completely” (verse 10.) The killing of Maṅgi and the burning of the city of Kṛishṇa is also reported in another inscription.12 The Kṛishṇa, whom Vijayāditya III. defeated, is probably identical with the lord of the Raṭṭas, who challenged him, and with the Rāshṭrakūṭa king Kṛishṇa II., whose earliest known date is Śaka 825.13

After the death of Vijayāditya III., the Rāshṭrakūṭas, as noticed by Mr. Fleet, seem to have been victorious; for his nephew Chalukya-Bhīma I., alias Drohārjuna, who ruled from Śaka 809-10 to 839-40, had to reconquer “the country of Veṅgī, which had been overrun by the army of the Raṭṭa claimants” (line 28f.) The length of the reign of Vijayāditya IV., the successor of Chalukya-Bhīma I., is not mentioned in the subjoined inscription; according to other grants he ruled six months.

There followed the king, who issued the grant, Amma I., alias Rājamahendra or Vishṇuvardhana VI. He, “having drawn his sword, which broke the dishonest hearts of his feudatory relatives, who had joined the party of his natural adversaries, won the affection of the subjects and of the army of his father (Vijayāditya IV.)” and of his grandfather (Chalukya-Bhīma I.)” (line 39 ff.) The natural adversaries of Amma I. were probably the Rāshṭrakūṭas under Prabhūtavarsha III., whose inscription is dated in Śaka 842.14

The grant proper, which takes up the remainder of the inscription, is an order, which Amma I. addressed to the inhabitants of the Kaṇḍeṟuvāḍi-vishaya, and by which he granted the village of Goṇṭūru15 together with twelve hamlets to Bhaṇḍanāditya, alias Kuntāditya, one of his military officers. The donee belonged to the Paṭṭavardhinīvaṁśa. His ancestor Kāḻakampa had been in the service of Kubja-Vishṇuvardhana, the first of the Eastern Chalukya kings, and had killed a certain Daddara in battle. Bhaṇḍanāditya himself had already served the donor’s father, who is here called Vijayāditya-Kaliyarttyaṅka. The second part of this name corresponds to the Kollabhigaṇḍa or Kollabigaṇḍa of other inscriptions. The grant closes with the enumeration of the four boundaries of the village granted and of the names of the twelve hamlets included in it, and with two of the customary imprecatory verses.

Language: Sanskrit.

Repository: South Indian Inscriptions (Original Edition) (south-indian-inscriptions).

DHARMA_INSSIIv01p0i0036.