156

THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.

how much longer we do not know. Being the grandson of his predecessor, this king must have come to the throne at an early age, and hence there is nothing improbable in the duration as signed to his reign. The thing to be noticed is the absence of the minute details regarding

Vardh an a.

[JUNE, 1873.

On attaining to man's estate he

renewed the contest with the Pa 11 a was, in

lars the date of the grant accords perfectly with what we know of the history of this king. We are next introduced to a province named

which he was finally successful, cementing his power by a marriage with a princess of that race, and transmitting the kingdom thus founded to his posterity.” The rivalry, however, was not thus ended. For I have a Chāl ukya inscription in which the first Vikram a dity a is stated to have become “the possessor of Kān chip ur at by the conquest of Pallava Pati, whose insults threatened destruction to the dynasty resembling in purity the rays of the moon,” i.e. the Chāl ukyas, who were of the so m a

Nirggunda. This I conceive to be the name

v arm ša or lunar line.

the date of the donation, which are usually

found in inscriptions. The name of the cycle

year is not given, nor the day of the month or week, nor any astronomical conjunction. But notwithstanding the absence of these particu

that occurs in connection with one of the wit

The next king, V in a y á ditya Saty a Š

nesses to the Merkara plates, but which, from his

raya, who began to reign A.D. 680, is described as having “destroyed the power of Trai rājya Pallava in the same manner as the

being there described as a servant, I conjectured might mean mirganta, the village waterman.* The position of Nirggunda I do not know. Wherever it may have been, the tributary king

of the region had married the grand-daughter of the Palla vä dhirājā .

I am not aware

that anything definite has been published as to the chronology and succession of the Pallava kings. The following are a few scattered notices of the dynasty. Sir Walter Elliot says f: “Previous to the arrival of the first Ch a lukya in the Dakhan the Pall a vas were the dominant race.

In

the reign of Triloch an a Pallava an in vading army, headed by Jay a S in ha, sur named Vijay a dity a , of the Châlukya

heavenly general S of Bálendra Sekhara || smote down the excessively-grown might of the Daityas.” Previously to this, however, we find from the present inscription that Pall a ven dra Nara p a ti had suffered defeat from

Rājā

Sri

Valla bhā k h ya of the

Kong u line. I have also met with two stone inscriptions of the Palla was, but so worn from age as to be almost illegible. On one of them the name No lambá dhi Rājā has been doubtfully made out.

kula, crossed the Nerbudda but failed to

The character in which the inscription now translated is engraved bears much resemblance to that found in the Buddhist stöpa of Am a rā

obtain a permanent footing. Jay a S in h a

v a ti with the addition

seems to have lost his life in the attempt, for

his queen, then pregnant, is described as flying after his death and taking refuge with a Brahman called Vishnu Som a y áji, in whose house she gave birth to a son named

of the characteristic

letters of the Hala Kannada or Ancient Kana rese, namely, the vowels, the four forms of land two forms of r.

These are denoted in the trans

literation thus :—

r = { = d ; Ti = + = 53); r = eo; I = F = 9;

Rāja Sii ha, who subsequently assumed the titles of R a na R a y a and V is h m u II.

! = 3 = 3; 1 = e2; and L = cº.

TRANSLITERATION.

[I.] Svastijitambhagavatāgataghanagaganābhena Padmanābhena. SrimajJähnaveya kulāmalāvyo māvabhāsana bhāskarah sva khadgayka prahāra khandita mahāśilâ stambha labdha bala Parākra modāranā

• + Ind.

Ant. vol. I.Gleanings, p. 365, noteMadras "T. Numismatic Jour. of Lit. and Sc., N. S., vol. IV. pp. 78,79, quoted Jour. R. As. Soc., Series, vol. I. p. 251.

I Conjeveram, S. of Madras.

§

Kumāraswämi. |

Śiva.

Neur