The Chalukyan Architecture of the Kanarese Districts c44: Inscribed Tablets and Memorial Stones
The Chālukyan Architecture of the Kanarese Districts c44
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Contents
- c44.3 — 3 parts
Inscribed Tablets and Memorial Stones
c44.1
THERE is, perhaps, no part of India so full of inscribed tablets and memorial stones as the Kanarese districts. There is hardly a village that does not possess one or more; and, at the same time, there is hardly a place where they are at all cared for by the people. Very few of these slabs are now found standing upright in their original positions; for the most part, they lie about many half buried in the mud of the fields. Some have been found built, as convenient slabs, in municipal culverts, others have been used in the banks of tanks and sluices, or are laid by the water's edge to wash clothes upon; while others, again, are set up on the outskirts of the village for the cattle to rub themselves against. How many of these precious records have already perished by the neglect of man or the vicissitudes of the climate will never be known. It is mainly from these lithic grants and deeds, often demanding infinite patience in their decipherment, that the knowledge we have of the dynasties who, with their feudatory chiefs, ruled over these districts, has been gleaned. Another important source of that knowledge is the copper plate grants and charters.
c44.2
Fig. 40.—Specimen of writing upon old Kanarese stone inscriptions.
c44.3.1
The stone inscriptions are divided into two classes—those that record grants of land, money or periodical payments in kind to temples, communities or private persons, and those which are memorials of deceased persons. The former are generally upright slabs, with surfaces varying in size from a foot or two square to thirty or more square feet, having most of their surfaces covered with closely-engraved lines of inscription, above which is often a sculptured head-piece representing religious symbols. It is very seldom, indeed, that these slabs are found engraved upon both sides. The older inscriptions, like those engraved upon the walls of the older temples, are in large, bold and somewhat straggling characters, while the later ones are in much smaller letters, averaging about half an inch in height, and, generally, most beautifully cut (Fig. 40). They occur singly or in groups, such as we find them at Gadag and Baḷagāmve. In some cases old inscriptions are found to have been erased and later ones engraved upon the same stone, due, as a rule, to the first grant being cancelled and superseded by the second. Again, the sculptures at the head of a stone have sometimes been tampered with, where, for instance, a *linga* has been formed by whittling down an image of a *jina*¹.
c44.3.2
The greater part of each inscription is usually devoted to an account of the king during whose reign the grant had been made, and these accounts have been of great use in reconstructing the family trees of the various dynasties, beside giving a fair amount of detail concerning their intercourse with, and their expeditions against their neighbours. The praises of the kings mentioned are sung *ad nauseam*, and in the most extravagant language. The statement of the object for which the slab had been set up occupies but a few lines at the end, while the closing sentences utter a terrible curse upon all who should dare to alienate the same. Here is an account of a king's virtues: He is described as "A sun to the darkness of the Chōḷa king, Garuḍa to the extended serpent Kaḷinga, a thunderbolt to the mountain, the Nēpāḷa king, a lion to the rogue-elephant the Āndhra king, a wild-fire to the forest Maḷava, a moon to the Chālukya lotus". Such was Baḷḷāḷa Hoysaḷa, on hearing the sound of whose twanging bow "Chōḷa was driven out of his mind, Pāṇḍya escaped by night to the summit of a mountain together with his army, Vaṅga, Kaḷinga, and Magadha, though kings over mighty hosts, fled. When he flashed his sword, Lāḷa stood bewildered, Magadha trembled, Āndhra was blinded, Gaula was split in two, the Koṅkaṇa king was terror-stricken, Nēpāḷa dropped his bow, Maḷava in despair fled to the desert and fell, Chōḷa took to howling"².
c44.3.3
A panegyric upon the learned Lakuḷiśvara *pandita*, who spent some time in Baḷagāmve about A.D. 1036, and who made a grant to the Pañcha Liṅga temple, runs: "Having crossed over to the furthest shore of the ocean of logic and other sciences, to speakers a Rudra, a young lion in splitting the skull of the elephant speakers, a wild fire to the great forest speakers, a fierce and powerful tiger to evil speakers, a submarine fire to the Bauddha ocean, a thunderbolt to the Mīmāmsaka mountain, a saw for cutting down the Lōkāyata great tree, a great kite to the Sāṅkhya serpent, an axe to the tree Advaita speakers, a Trinētra in burning the Tripura Akalanka, displacer of Vādigharaṭṭa, a millstone to Mādhava-bhaṭṭa, breaker of the pride of Jñānānanda, a fierce fire of dissolution to Viśvānaḷa, a fire of the last day to Abhayachandra, a śarabha to the lion Vādibha, sealer up of the mouth of Vādirāja, displacer of Ayavādi, the sole able supporter of the Naiyāyikas, in maintaining his own side and in disgracing the other side an able Virinchi, an ornament to the speech goddess, at court a Padmāsana, in intelligence Nārāyaṇa, among declaimers Mahēśvara, in disputation like the river of the gods, in the sport of making commentaries a bee to the lotuses the minds of those who love it, his white fame his banner, of pure character, a noose of Yama to hostile proud pandits, to Digambara speakers a falling star, having the name Vādi-Rudraguṇa, Lakulīśvara-pandita,” etc.¹
c44.4
¹ *Epigraphia Carnatica*, Vol. VII, part I, p. 31. Intro
c44.5
² *Epigraphia Carnatica*, Vol. VII, part I, pp. 31 and 32
c44.6
¹ Epigraphia Carnatica, Vol VII, part I, p 98, Trans.
c44.7
Near the village of Mantur, about six miles to the east of Hubli Junction, is a very curious stone (Plate CLIV). The upper portion of the face of the stone has a representation of a three-storeyed Dravidian temple or gopura, on each storey of which are portions of an old Kanarese inscription in letters of the tenth century A.D. The uppermost line tells us that the stone-cutter, Kante, fashioned this stone. The rest of the inscription is decipherable more or less, but it is not easy to make sense of it. There does not appear to be any other name in it, nor anything to give a clue to its meaning. On either side of the base of the gopura is the familiar waterpot such as we have found upon some of the older temples.
c44.8
Beneath all this is a group of symbols, the meaning of which is not clear. In the centre is a hand mirror and around it are two conch shells, an elephant, two fishes, a drum, a wheel and a boar. The foot of the stone is carved as a lotus. The mirror may possibly be the crest of a paramount sovereign surrounded by those of neighbouring kings whom he had conquered. The boar was the crest of the Chālukyas, the elephant that of the Chera or Gaṅga kings of Maisur, and the two fishes that of the Pāṇḍyas. The wheel is found on Nepalese inscription tablets.
c44.9
Hero or memorial stones, known as vīragals, or vīrakals, or Vīra-Śasadas, are very widely distributed over the Kanarese districts, either singly or in groups (Plates CIII—CLVI). Like the others, they are upright slabs of stone upon the faces of which are horizontal bands of sculpture with inscribed bands between. The lowest band, or bands of sculpture, usually represents a battle scene in which the hero, of gigantic proportions, to whose memory the stone has been raised, is causing havoc all around him. The next bands show him being carried to paradise after his death, and seated in that elysium surrounded by fair attendants waiting to do his will. The uppermost compartment contains representations of various objects of worship and symbols of the religion to which he was attached when living. The inscriptions upon the bands between the sculptures record the death of the hero, which may have taken place in battle, in reclaiming stolen cattle, in self-defence against robbers or in the hunting field. Some, again, record deliberate suicides. At Baḷagāmve there is a lofty Gaṇḍa-bhēruṇḍa column over thirty feet high, which is described further on, near which is a vīrakal on it being a representation of this column, down beside which is a man lying prone upon a row of spikes or stakes. An inscription upon it tells us that a certain man, after making a grant to the temple, climbed to the top of the column and leaped thence on to the points of spears, and gained the world of the gods.² This was in A.D. 1060, thirteen years after the erection of the column.
c44.10
² Epigraphia Carnatica, Vol. VII, part I, p 109, Trans.
c44.11
One of the largest and most interesting groups of these stones is that in the middle of the village of Betgere, not far from Gadag railway station (Plates CLIII and CLIV). It is walled in and so protected from injury. There are fifteen stones, fourteen of which are very large, some standing from twelve to thirteen feet out of the ground, with a width of about four feet six inches. The tops of most of these great slabs are finished off like the topmost ridge-roof member of the gopuras of Dravidian temples, only that, instead of a row of many water-pot kalaśas, there is but one kalaśa. It will be seen that many of these have the symbol of the man's trade or caste sculptured at the bottom—a plough, a mason's mallet and block of stone and an oil-mill.¹ Some of these are Śaiva and others Vaiṣṇava, while two have been made objects of worship, the sculptures and inscriptions of which have been thickly caked all over with many applications of oil. In the sculpture we find several different military standards, and it would be interesting if we could assign them to specific leaders or kings. The staff of the standard, in one case, carries the effigy of an elephant, and in another a Nandi or sacred bull.
c44.12
¹ In this respect they are very like certain old tombstones in the abbey graveyard at Dunblane in Scotland, which, also, have the symbols of the deceased's trade upon them.
c44.13
There is an isolated group of seven similar stones, which are even more interesting, near the village of Borivali in Sālsette island, north of Bombay, which, though not coming within the boundaries of the Kanarese districts, might well be included in this account (Plates CLIII and CLIV). They were probably set up during the time of the Śilāhāras of the Koṅkaṇ. They are memorials of heroes who fell in some great battle which took place partly upon land and partly on sea. Upon some of the stones are long rows of galleys approaching each other in well-formed alignment; in others they are mixed up in the general engagement, archers and swordsmen fighting each other from deck to deck. The long banks of oars make the vessels look strangely like old Roman biremes, and the urns and drapery which surmount these stones give them a further flavour of classic times. In the land battle, as depicted, are seen elephants clothed with coverings of mail armour. Unfortunately the lines of inscription which were engraved on these are, with the exception of a few traces, completely effaced.
c44.14
Another fine group of these memorial stones is to be found at Murdeśvara, about thirteen miles south of Honāvar on the coast (Plates CLV and CLVI). Murdeśvara is situated on the sea shore, which, with its broad sandy beach, is fringed with a deep belt of palm trees. Amongst the palms, at intervals, are clusters of thatched huts and single homesteads, while the principal part of the village is a little bāzār where the chavadi is located. The whole is embowered within a forest of cocoanut palms and other trees, is intersected by many a shady lane, and wears an aspect of quiet content. Standing out into the sea, at one point, is a small hill which, in olden times, was fortified; but only the remains of its walls now exist together with traces of a few buildings of rubble masonry. Scattered about there are the remains of buildings and temples which shew that the place was of much more importance a few hundred years ago than it is now.
c44.15
The principal remains are some thirty-five vīragals and other inscribed stones. The largest group is at the junction of the main road, from Bhatkal to Honāvar, with the branch road running to Murdeśvara village. There are, here, twenty stones, in a line, canted over at different angles, one of which has fallen and is broken. Just beyond the bridge, near the last, in a field on the east of the main road, is a small cluster of stones, some being partly buried in the bank between the fields.