On the Origin of the Indian Brahma Alphabet c6.47

c6.47

During the period of the Śaka and Kuṣana kings, from the first century B. C. to the end of the second century A. D., the numerous inscriptions, incised in the Western Panjab, are in Kharoṣṭhī and those on Dr. Bhagvānāl’s Lion Capital prove that the Kharoṣṭhī penetrated during the reign of the Śaka Satrap and king Śuḍasa or Śoḍāsa as far as Mathurā, where however, as the enormous quantity of Jaina and Bauddha votive inscriptions shows, the Brāhma alphabet was at that time and later the usual one. [49] The coins of the earlier Śaka kings from the North like those of Mauos and Azes and of their Satraps, as well as those of Gondopherres and his brothers, have Greek and Kharoṣṭhī legends, while the later Kuṣana kings, Kaniṣka, Huviṣka and Bazodeo or Vāsudeva discard the latter, and their successors finally adopt the Brāhma alphabet. Further east and south the king and Satrap Rājubula and his son Śuḍasa, who ruled over Mathurā and perhaps over other portions of the eastern Panjab, either follow the same practice as Mauos or use Brāhma letters (Cunningham, op. cit., pl. VIII, 2—5