On the Origin of the Indian Brahma Alphabet c5.32

c5.32

Further, some other passages mention official correspondence between kings. In the Cullakāliṅga Jātaka¹ we are told how powerful Kāliṅga, the king of Dantapura, eager for warfare, tried to pick a quarrel with the princes of India, whom he found disinclined to gratify his bellicose inclinations. In order to effect his purpose he sent his four beautiful daughters in a covered cart through the territories of his neighbours and ordered their guards to proclaim that any prince, who might take them into his harem, would have to fight their father. Assaka (*Aśmaka*), the king of Potali, dared to arrest their progress, and made all the four maidens his queens. Thereupon the Kāliṅga marched out with his army. But Nandisena, the minister of the Assaka king, the Jātaka continues, "hearing of his approach sent a royal decree (*sāsana*) to the following effect, 'Let him stop within the boundaries of his territory, let him not cross our frontier, *(else)* a fight will take place between the two kings'. When he *(the Kāliṅga)* had heard this letter read (*lekhaṃ sutvā*), he stopped within his own territory." Here the term *sāsana*, literally 'an order', is of considerable interest, as it is the representative of the Sanskrit *śāsana*, which occurs so frequently as the technical term for landgrants.²