Taxila Inscription of the year 136 BY RAMAPRASAD CHANDA OIR JOHN" MARSHALL'S interpretation of ayasa in the Taxila silver scroll inscription of the year 136 as " of Azes " has been the subject of adverse criticism by some of the most eminent antiquarians since the publication of the record in 1914. The latest is by Professor Sten Konow in the Epigraphia Indica, xiv, p. 286. Professor Konow revives two of the objections to Sir John's explanation : (1) "the word (ayasa) could hardly be the name of a king, because no royal title is used " ; (2) " if ayasa were really the name of a king, it would place the inscription in the reign of this king, who would then most likely have to be identified with the Khushana mentioned in 1. 3. " I hope to show in this note that these objections are not a§ insuperable as they are supposed to be. (1) Professor Konow says : " The absence of every royal designation is so extraordinary that I think we must abandon Sir John's explanation of the word ayasa altogether." If the assumption on which the second objection is based were correct, if the explanation of ayasa in the sense of "of Azes " would place the inscription in the reign of Azes himself, the absence of the royal designation could justify the total rejection of Sir John's explanation. But if ayasa may mean " of (the era of) Azes " and not " (during the reign) of Azes ", why should the omission of royal designation in the year 136 of the era of Azes, so long after his death, and probably some time after the destruction of the Saka-Parthian dynasty by the Kushans, be considered " so extraordinary " ? In the inscriptions dated in the Gupta and Saka eras the usual practice, of course, is the addition of a royal title with the terms Gupta and Saka. But the omission of such title is not also uncommon (see Kielhorn's Northern List, appended to Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. INSEAD, on 25 May 2018 at 16:05:52, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00148191 320 TAXILA INSCRIPTION OF THE YEAR 136 Ep. Ind., v, and Southern List, appended to Ep. Ind., viij and also inscriptions published after the compilation of the Lists). It may be argued that the terms Gupta and 6aka as applied to the eras denote dynasties and not individual kings, and the absence of a royal title with dynastic names cannot be considered as serious an omission as the absence of such title with the names of individual kings. But from epigraphic records we know of an Indian era connected with the name of a real king in the mention of which the royal designation is omitted. (1) Bodh-Gaya inscription of Asokachalla : srlmal', = Laksmanasenasy = atita rajye sam 51 Bkddra dine 29 (Ep. Ind., xii, p. 29). (2) Bodh-Gaya inscrip- tion of the time of Asokachalla : srlmal = Lalcsmanasenadeva- •padatiam = at.ita-rajye sam 74 VaiSakha-vadi 12 Gurau 11 (Ep. Ind., xii, p. 30). (3) Janibigha inscription of Jayasena : Lakvmatiasenasy = atlta-rdjye sam 83 Karttikasudi 15 (Journal of the Bihar and Orissa Eesearch Society, 1918, p. 279). I propose to translate No. 3 as, " After the extinction of the dominion of Laksmanasena, (in) the year 83, on the 15th day of the bright half of Karttika."J When the Malava 1 Mr. Panday reads "rdjya. But the sign of e-kara before jy is clear on the heliozincograph. Mr. Panday's translation, " (on) the 15th day of the bright half of Karttika, LakshmanasSna samvat 83 expired" (JBORS. 1918, p. 280), is wrong ; atlta goes with rajye and nob with farhvat. Kielhorn, on the assumption that the Laksmanasena-sarhvat began with the beginning of the reign of Laksmanasena in A.D. 1119, translates No. 2 as "on the 12th of the dark half of Vaisakha of the year 74 since the (commencement of the) reign, (now) passed, of the illustrious Lakshmanasenadeva, on a Thursday" {Ind. Ant. xix, p. 2). But in his synchronistic table for Northern India, A.D. 400-1400 (appended to Ep. Ind. viii), column 7, Kielhorn shows Ballalasena, father of Laksmanasena, reigning in A.D. 1169, evidently in accordance with the date of the compilation of the Danasdgara of Ballalasena as given in the manuscripts of that work (Eggeling's Catalogue of Sanskrit Manuscripts in the India Office Library, p. 545). Sir R. G. Bhandarkar notices a manuscript of the Adbhutasdgara which, according to the introductory stanzas of the work, was begun by Ballalasena in Saka year 1090 = A.D. 1168, and was finished after his death by his son Laksmanasena {Report on the Search for Sanskrit Manuscripts during 1887-88 and 1890-91, p. lxxxv). In the printed edition of the Adbhuta- sdgara (Benares, 1905) the date of the commencement of the work is- Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. INSEAD, on 25 May 2018 at 16:05:52, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00148191 TAXILA INSCRIPTION OF THE YEAR 136 321 (or Krtya) and Saka eras came to be known after Vikramaditya and S'alivahana respectively who were believed to be real Icings, the royal title was not always added to the names of these kings in recording dates (Kielhorn's Northern List, Nos. 61, 72, etc., Southern List, Nos. 370, 379, etc.). So the absence of the royal designation before ayasa cannot necessarily vitiate Sir John Marshall's explanation. (2) In answer to the second objection Sir John Marshall has already drawn attention to the significant fact, that in the Taxila inscription of the year 136, as in the Taxila plate of Patika of the year 78, " the year of the era in which they are dated comes first, then the name of the king, and lastly the month and day," whereas in other inscriptions the name of the king comes first, and then the year and the month (JRAS. 1915, p. 195). Though Professor Konow admits, " I do not know of any other old inscription where we find a similar addition between the mention of the year and the month," he does not recognize the necessity of explaining the date portion of these two epigraphs in a different way, but adds, " If, however, Ayasa is the name of a ruler, the inscription must, aa urged by Messrs. Thomas and Fleet, be dated during the reign of the King." No explanation of this " must" is either expressed or implied, except the analogy of the prevailing explanation of the date portion of the Taxila plate of Patika. It runs :— Samvatsaraye athasatatitamae 20 20 20 10 4 4 Maharayasa Mahamtasa Mogasa, " in the seventy-eighth year 78, (during the reign) of the Maharaja the great Moga " (Konow). In his article on the Ara inscription of Kaniska II, Professor Konow has collected in a very convenient form the date given as Saka year 1089 = A.D. 1167 (p. 4), and on p. 203 it is stated that the first year of the reign of Ballalasena fell in the Saka year 1082=t A.D. 1160. So the tradition recorded by Abul Fazl in his Akbarnama and relied on by Keilhorn that the era of Laksmanasena is counted from that king's accession in A.D. 1119 is without historical basis, and we need not twist the meaning of expressions like Laksmanasenasy = dtita-rajye sarii[vat] in the light of that tradition. Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. INSEAD, on 25 May 2018 at 16:05:52, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00148191 322 TAXILA INSCRIPTION OF THE YEAR 136 portions of all the dated inscriptions of the Saka-Parthian and Kushan periods (Ep. Ind., xiv, pp. 135-139). To this list may be added Nos. 906, 922, 962, 963, 965, 964a (1452) of Liider's List of Brdhmi Inscriptions. It will be seen from the extracts in these lists that the usual way of dating is, first the name of the king with royal titles, then the year of the unspecified era, then the month and the day. There are only four exceptions to this rule. Two of these are the two Taxila inscriptions under consideration, and the two others are the Manikiala stone inscription and the Panjtar inscription. All the authorities — Senart, Liiders, Pargiter—who have recently dealt with the former record, hold very divergent views regarding the reading of the date portion. So it is not yet possible to arrive at any definite conclusion regarding the meaning of the passage that may command general acceptance. The date of the Panjtar inscription runs thus :— Sam 1100 201 lSravanasa masasa di pradhame 1 Maharayasa Gusariasa rajami, " anno 122, on the first, 1, day of the month Sravana, during the reign of the Maharaja the Gushana." Here the addition of rajami, " during the reign," renders the meaning clear. In the Gupta period the inscriptions are also dated on the same plan ; first the name of the reigning king, then the year of the Gupta era (not specified), then the month and day. For examples see Kielhorn's Northern List, Nos. 437, 439, 440, 442, 447, 449, 450. Deviation from this rule is found in one instance (excluding inscriptions the date of which is embodied in verse),1 in the Mankuwar Buddhist 1 Kielhorn's Northern List, No.