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New Documents for the Early History of Puṇḍravardhana Arlo Griffiths

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New Documents for the Early History of Puṇḍravardhana Arlo Griffiths New Documents for the Early History of Puṇḍravardhana Arlo Griffiths To cite this version: Arlo Griffiths. New Documents for the Early History of Puṇḍravardhana: Copperplate Inscriptions from the Late Gupta and Early Post-Gupta Periods. Pratna Samiksha: a Journal of Archaeology, Centre for Archaeological Studies & Training, Eastern India, 2015, New series 6, pp.15-38. halshs- 01538645 HAL Id: halshs-01538645 https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-01538645 Submitted on 19 Jun 2017 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Copyright Pratna Samiksha A Journal of Archaeology New Series Volume 6 2015 CENTRE FOR ARCHAEOLOGICAL STUDIES & TRAINING EASTERN INDIA •KOLKATA Pratna Samiksha, New Series The responsibility of the facts stated, opinions expressed is an annual journal published by the and conclusions reached are entirely those of the author of Centre for Archaeological Studies & Training, the respective article. Centre for Archaeological Studies & Eastern India, Kolkata. Training, Eastern India does not accept any responsibility for them. Editorial Address Pratna Samiksha © 2015 Centre for Archaeological Studies & Centre for Archaeological Studies & Training, Training, Eastern India Eastern India, State Archaeological Museum Old Building, First Floor, 1 Satyen Roy Road All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be Behala, Kolkata 700 034 reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any email: [email protected] form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Editor Sharmi Chakraborty ISSN 2229 7979 Founding Editor Gautam Sengupta Periodicity: Annual Editorial Assistant Subscription (per volume): ` 1,000.00 Mithu Karmakar Published by the Member Secretary for the Editorial Advisory Board Centre for Archaeological Studies & Training, Krishna Bose Eastern India (An Autonomous Institution of the Chairperson, Centre for Archaeological Studies Government of West Bengal) State Archaeological Museum & Training, Eastern India, Kolkata Old Building, First Floor Member Secretary 1 Satyen Roy Road, Behala Centre for Archaeological Studies & Training, Kolkata 700 034 Eastern India, Kolkata email: [email protected] K. Paddayya Printed in India at Calcutta Art Studio Professor Emeritus, Deccan College, Pune 185/1 B.B. Ganguly Street, Kolkata 700 012 B.D. Chattopadhyaya email: [email protected] Former Professor, Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi Pratip Kumar Mitra Former Keeper, State Archaeological Museum, West Bengal Suchandra Ghosh Associate Professor, Department of Ancient Indian History & Culture, University of Calcutta, Kolkata The Director (ex officio) Directorate of Archaeology and Museums, Government of West Bengal EPIGRAPHY New Documents for the Early History of Pupdravardhana: Copperplate Inscriptions from the Late Gupta and Early Post-Gupta Periods Arlo GRIFFITHS École française d’Extrême-Orient (French School of Asian Studies) ABSTRACT: From all of undivided Bengal, less than two dozen copperplate charters are known for the entire period preceding the ascent of the Pala dynasty, and only a single (fragmentary) stone inscription. Two new copperplates have recently come to light, both from the Pupdravardhana area, i.e. North Bengal. The first is dated to year 159 of the Gupta era (478 CE), and hence issued during the reign of Budhagupta; the second is dated to the year 5 of a previously unknown king named Pradyumnabandhu, who must have ruled in the period between about 550 and 650 CE—a period for which Pupdravardhana had heretofore lacked any historical documentation. This article makes the new inscriptions available in edition with translation and some discussion of what the contents might contribute to the historical study of early Bengal. KEYWORDS: Pupdravardhana, North Bengal, copperplate inscription, Sanskrit, land-sale grant, Budhagupta, Pradyumnabandhu, Garuda-seal, Raktamala, Ghopadvipaka Preliminary Remarks a previously unrecorded king (maharajadhiraja) Compared to other historical periods and other named Pradyumnabandhu, who must have ruled regions of South Asia, the epigraphic record in the period between about 550 and 650 CE—a of pre-Pala Bengal is slim, in the near-total period for which Pupdravardhana had heretofore absence of stone inscriptions and with less than lacked any historical documentation. Like almost two dozen copperplate charters for the entire all previously published pre-Pala copperplates of period preceding the ascent of the Pala dynasty. Bengal, they belong to the locally prevalent class Nevertheless, in recent years, scholarship has of ‘land-sale inscriptions’ (Yamazaki 1982). seen the discovery of a few new copperplate inscriptions that have surfaced in West Bengal Conventions and Bangladesh, elucidating various aspects In my editions, line numbers are indicated of the region’s early history. Some of these in parentheses and marked off from the text copperplates have entered into public collections, proper by use of bold typeface. Prose parts of while others are held by private collectors. the inscriptions are run together into single Among the latter, an unknown number has paragraphs; stanzas (here uniformly in anuxtubh come into foreign hands. The purpose of this meter) are always indicated as such by a special contribution is to publish two documents from layout and roman stanza numbering. Consciously private collections that elucidate the early history breaking with a long-standing tradition in of the Pupdravardhana area, corresponding to Indian epigraphy, I strive to keep my edited what is today northern West Bengal and northern texts as free as possible from editorial elements Bangladesh. The first is dated to a year 159, not reflecting anything in the original, and do undoubtedly of the Gupta era, i.e. 478 CE, and not mark emendations in the text, but relegate hence issued during the reign of Budhagupta. these to a separate section, presented line-by-line The second is dated to the fifth regnal year of below each inscription, containing observations Pratna Samiksha, New Series 6, 2015. © Centre for Archaeological Studies & Training, Eastern India, Kolkata, pp. 15–38. 16 ARLO GRIFFITHS on my readings and on necessary emendations. places known from other sources to have been Slight deviations from the norm of Sanskrit situated in North Bengal. orthography, of the type commonly found in The text includes the date of 8 Jyextha in year manuscripts and inscriptions, are generally not 159, certainly of the Gupta era, a date which indicated. The following further editorial signs possibly corresponded to Thursday, 11 May are used: 478 CE.2 Since Gupta-period inscriptions from (…) graphic elements whose reading is uncertain greater Bengal are rare to begin with, since the […] graphic elements wholly lost or wholly history of their exclusion from or inclusion in unreadable on the plate but restorable on the publications concerning Gupta epigraphy is a bit basis of philological considerations haphazard, and since the dating of some plates +…+ secondary insertions made by the engraver is or could be object of debate, it will be useful to below/above the line recall at the outset what other land-sale deeds on _ one totally illegible or lost akxara copperplate are so far known for this period from space for one akxara left blank by the engraver North Bengal and the immediately neighbouring areas of present Bihar, and what dates may be x °V a vowel that forms an ak ara, i.e. ‘independent 3 ⨆ vowel’, of the type V assigned to them with what degree of certainty. See the table on the facing page. Among the dates · the virama sign indicated in it, two require further comments. * a consonant stripped of its inherent vowel by The date of the Paharpur plate falls just short other means than the sole virama sign (e.g. by reducing the size of the akxara or otherwise of three months after the date of the plate under differentiating its shape from the normal study here, and its numeral signs precisely agree akxara with inherent vowel) with those seen in l. 26 of the present plate. The date 224, assigned to the Damodarpur I. Conflicting Land Transactions in the plate #5 by scholars since Dikshit 1923–4, has Kuddalakhata Settlement: A Copperplate recently come under criticism from Michael Inscription of [Gupta] Year 159 Willis (2005: 145 n. 68), who argues for the plate belonging to the reign of Budhagupta.4 His This important inscription has been brought argument hinges on the name of the nagarasrexthin to public attention in a recent article published Ribhupala, which has been read both in online (Dubey and Acharya 2014). The level of Damodarpur #5 and #4, the latter indubitably epigraphical scholarship brought to bear on the from the reign of Budhagupta. Willis supports inscription in that article is not satisfactory, and his argument by the suggestion that it might be none of the authors’ historical conclusions are acceptable. For these reasons, it is necessary to possible to read the date of #5 as 100 50 4. But submit the inscription to a fresh study, which is he fails to note that the reading Ribhupala in #5 attempted below.1 is entirely conjectural, and that this conjecture is The plate is held by Noman Nasir, a unlikely because none of the names of officers numismatist based in Dhaka, Bangladesh. I am positively legible on #5 agree with those on any 5 sincerely grateful to this gentleman for furnishing of the other Damodarpur plates. Moreover, me the visual documentation on which my work examination of the available reproduction clearly is based and actively contributing to my research reveals the middle numeral to be 20, and the in other ways.
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