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Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c11.s1: § 37. — Writing materials

Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c11.s1

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§ 37. — Writing materials

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⁹ Compare B.ESIP. 84—93; RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA, in Gough's Papers relating to the Collection and Preservation of Ancient Sanskrit MSS., p. 15 ff.; FÜHRER, Zeitshrift f. Bibliothekswesen 1, 429 ff., 2, 41 ff.

A. — Birch-bark

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**[88]** The inner bark of the *Bhūrja*-tree (Baetula bhojpattr), which the Himālaya produces in great quantity, probably is alluded to already by Q. Curtius (see above, page 6) as a writing material used by the Hindus at the time of Alexander's invasion, and later it is frequently named as such in Northern Buddhist and Brahmanical Sanskrit works.¹⁰ It is even called *lekhana*, "the writing material," and written documents go by the name of *bhūrja*. According to Berūnī,¹¹ pieces, one ell in length and one span in breadth, were prepared for use by rubbing them with oil and polishing them. The art of the preparation has however been lost in Kashmīr, when the introduction of paper during the Moghal period furnished a more convenient material.¹ But a not inconsiderable number of old birch-bark MSS. still exist in the libraries of the Kashmīr Pandits. According to a statement made to me by Bhāū Dājī, birch-bark MSS. occur also in Orissa, and amulets, written on Bhūrja, are still used throghout all the Aryan districts of India.² The use of the *bhūrjapattra* of course began in the north-west; but it seems to have spread in early times, as the copper-plates of Central, Eastern and Western India appear to have been cut according to the size of the Bhūrja, which in Kashmīr mostly corresponds to our quarto (Burnell). As stated in many classical Sanskrit works and by Berūnī, all letters were written on Bhūrja at least in Northern, Central, Eastern and Western India.

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² IA. 7, 73, pl. 2, line 20; 13, 84, lines 37, 40; 15, 340, line 57.

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¹⁰ BRW., sub voce *bhūrja*.

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¹¹ India, 1, 171 (SACHAU); the description seems to fit the Kharoshṭhī Dhammapada from Khotan.

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¹ Kashmir Report, J.BBRAS. 12, App., 29 ff.

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² Rājendralāl Mitra, Gough's Papers, 17; Kashmīr Report, 29, note 2.

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The oldest documents on Bhūrja, which have been found, are the Kharoṣṭhī Dhammapada from Khotan, and the inscribed "twists," tied up with threads, which Masson discovered in the Stūpas of Afghanistan (see above, page 18, and note 6). Next come the fragments from the Godfrey Collection and the Bower MS., the leaves of which have been cut according to the size of palm-leaves, and, like these, are pierced in the middle in order to pass a string through, intended to hold them together.³ Next in age is the Bakhshālī MS., and then follow after a considerable interval the birch-bark MSS. from Kashmīr in the libraries of Poona, London, Oxford, Vienna, Berlin, &c., none of which probably date earlier than the 15th century.

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³ J.ASB. 66, 225 ff.; facsimiles in Hoernle's Bower MS.; WZKM. 5, 104.

B. — Cotton cloth

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The use of well-beaten cotton cloth is mentioned by Nearchos (see above, page 6), and some metrical Smṛtis, as well as some inscriptions of the Andhra period, state that official and private documents were written on *paṭa*, *paṭikā* or *kārpāsika paṭa*.⁴ According to Burnell, and Rice (Mysore and Coorg Gazetteer, 1877, 1, 408), the Kanarese traders still use for their books of business a kind of cloth, called *kaḍatam*, which is covered with a paste of tamarind-seed and afterwards blackened with charcoal. The letters are written with chalk or steatite pencils, and the writing is white or black. In the Bṛhajjñānakoṣa at Jesalmīr, I found a silk band with the list of the Jaina Sūtras, written with ink. Recently Peterson (Fifth Report, 113) has discovered at Aṇhilvād Pāṭaṇ a MS., dated Vikrama-Saṁvat 1418 (A. D. 1361-62), which is written on cloth.

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⁴ J. Jolly, Recht und Sitte, Grundriss, II, 8, 114; Nāsik inscription No. 11, A, B, in B.ASRWI. 4, 104 f.

C. — Wooden boards

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The passage of the Vinayapiṭaka (see above, page 5), which forbids "the incising" of precepts for religious suicide, bears witness to a very early use of wooden boards or bamboo chips as writing materials. Equally, the Jātakas, and also later works, mention the writing board, used in the elementary schools. Chips of bamboo (*śalākā*), with the name of the bearers, served as passports for Buddhist monks (Burnouf, Introd. à l'histoire du Bouddhisme, 259, note). An inscription from the time of the Western Kṣatrapa Nahapāna⁵ speaks of boards (*phalaka*) in the guildhall, on which agreements regarding loans were placarded, and Kātyāyana prescribes that plaints are to be entered on boards with *pāṇḍulekha*, *i. e.*, with chalk.⁶ Daṇḍin narrates, in the Daśakumāracarita, that Apahāravarman wrote his declaration, addressed to the sleeping princess, on a varnished board.⁷ MSS. on varnished boards, which are common in Burma, have hitherto not been discovered in India proper; but there are indications that the Hindus, too, used boards for literary purposes. Winternitz informs me that the Bodleian Library possesses a MS. on wooden boards, which comes from Assam. [**89**] And RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA asserts, in Gough’s Papers, p. 18, that in the North-West Provinces poor people copy religious works with chalk on black boards.

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⁵ Nāsik inscription No. 7, line 4, in B.ASRWI. 4, 102.

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⁶ B.ESIP. 87, note 2.

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⁷ Daśakumāracarita, Ucchvāsa 2, towards the end.

D. — Leaves

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According to the canon of the Southern Buddhists (see above, page 5), leaves (*paṇṇa*) were in ancient times the most common writing material. Though the texts¹ do not mention the plants which furnished these leaves, it is not doubtful that they came then, as in later times, chiefly from the large-leaved palm-trees, the *tāḍa* or *tāla* (Borassus flabelliformis) and the *tādī* or *tālī* (Corypha umbraculifera, or C. taliera), which, originally indigenous in the Dekhan, are found at present even in the Pañjāb. The earliest witness² for the general use of palm-leaves throughout the whole of India is Hiuen Tsiang (7th century). But we possess clear proof that they were used even in north-west India during much earlier times. The Horiuzi palm-leaf MS. certainly goes back to the 6th century, and some fragments in the recently discovered Godfrey Collection from Kashgar belong, as HOERNLE has shown on the palaeographical evidence, at least to the 4th century, and are older than the Bower MS.³ Again, the *bhūrjapattra* leaves of the Bower MS. are cut according to the size of palm-leaves, and that is also the case with the Taxila copper-plate (see above, page 25), which certainly is not later than the 1st century A. D. As the coppersmith then chose a palm-leaf for his model, it follows that palm-leaves must have been commonly used for writing, even in the Pañjāb. A Buddhist tradition, preserved in the Life of Hiuen Tsiang,⁴ asserts that the Canon was written on palm-leaves at the first Council held immediately after Buddha’s death. And the story regarding Saṃghabhadra’s “dotted MS. of the Vinaya,” published by TAKAKUSU in *J.RAS.* 1896, 436 f., shows that this tradition is at least two centuries older; one inference, which may be drawn from it, is, that about A. D. 400 the Buddhists believed palm-leaves to have been used for writing since immemorial times.

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¹ B.IS. III^2, 7 ff., 120.

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² Siyuki, 2, 225 (BEAL).'

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³ J.ASB. 66, 225 ff.

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⁴ Life of Hiuen Tsiang, 117 (BEAL).

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According to RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA,⁵ the palm-leaves, to be used for writing, are first dried, next boiled or soaked in water, then again dried, and finally polished with stones or conch-shells and cut to the proper size. It agrees with this statement, that the leaves of the ancient MSS. from Nepāl and Western India frequently show traces of an artificial preparation. Their length varies between one and three feet, and their breadth between one and a quarter and four inches.⁶ Against this, BURNELL⁷ asserts that the people of Southern India take no trouble with the preparation, and mostly even neglect to trim the leaves properly. The last assertion is not borne out by the appearance of the South-Indian MSS. known to me, though it is no doubt true of the leaves used by clerks and men of business in offices and for letters.

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⁵ See RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA, in Gough’s Papers, p. 17.

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⁶ See Gough’s Papers, 102, and the measurements in KIELHORN’s Report for 1880-81, and PETERSON’s Third Report.

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⁷ B.ESIP. 83.

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The Horiuzi MS., and the fragments in the Godfrey Collection, as well as the numerous palm-leaf MSS. of the 9th and later centuries from Nepāl, Bengal, Rājputāna, Gujarāt and the northern Dekhan, prove that since ancient times the palm-leaves were written on with ink all over Northern, Eastern, Central and Western India. Since the introduction of paper, they are no longer used in these districts, except in Bengal for MSS. of the Caṇḍīpāṭha.⁸

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⁸ RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA, Gough’s Papers, 102.

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In the Draviḍian districts and in Orissa, the letters were, and still are, incised with a *stilus* and afterwards blackened with soot or charcoal. The oldest MS., found in the south, dates according to BURNELL⁹ from A. D. 1428.

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⁹ B.ESIP. 87; further researches in Southern India will probably show that older MSS. exist.

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All palm-leaf MSS. are pierced either with one hole, usually in the middle, more rarely, in specimens from Kashgar, on the left, or with two holes on the left and the right, through which strings (*sūtra* or *śarayantraka*)¹ are passed in order to keep the leaves together.

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¹ Vāsavadattā, 250 (HALL).

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In Southern India, raw palm-leaves were, and still are, commonly used for letters, for private and official documents, as well as in the indigenous schools. For the latter purpose they are also employed in Bengal.² According to ADAMS,³ the pupils of the *tolls* write also with lamp-soot on the large Banānā and Sāl leaves.

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² BURNELL, ESIP. 89, 93, RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA, Gough's Papers, 17.

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³ Reports on Vernacular Education, 20, 98 (ed. Long).

E. — Animal substances

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D'ALWIS⁴ asserts that Buddhist works mention skins among the writing materials, but neglects to quote the passages. It is possible to infer from the passage of the Vāsavadattā, quoted above (page 82, § 34, B) that in Subandhu's time skins were used for writing. But the fact that leather is ritually impure makes the inference hazardous. And hitherto no MS. on leather has turned up in India, though pieces of leather from Kashgar, inscribed with Indian characters, are said to exist in the Petersburg collections. A blank piece of parchment [90] lay among the MSS. of the Jesalmīr Bṛhajj ānakośa.

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⁴ Introduction to Kaccāyana, XXVII.

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Manuscripts on thin plates of ivory occur in Burma, and the British Museum possesses two specimens.⁵

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⁵ J. Pali T. Soc., 1883, 135 f.

F. — Metals

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The Jātakas⁶ state repeatedly that the important family records of rich merchants, and verses and moral maxims, were engraved on gold plates, and BURNELL⁷ mentions that they were used for royal letters and for land-grants. A gold plate with a votive inscription in Kharoṣṭhī has been found in a Stūpa at Gāngu near the ruins of Taxila.⁸ Specimens of small MSS. and official documents on silver likewise are preserved,⁹ and among them is one from the ancient Stūpa at Bhaṭṭiprolu. In the British Museum there are also MSS. on gilt and silver plated palm-leaves.

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⁶ B.IS. III.² 10 f.

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⁷ B.ESIP. 90, 93.

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⁸ C.ASR. 2, 129, pl. 59.

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⁹ B.ESIP. 87; REA, Arch. Survey of India, New Imperial Series, No. 15, p. 13, and plate 6, No. 22; J. Pali T. Soc., 1883, p. 134 ff.

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It is a matter of course that the precious metals were used only in rare and exceptional cases. But, as the exceedingly numerous finds prove, copper-plates (*tāmrapaṭa*, *tāmrapaṭṭra*, *tāmraśāsana*, abbreviated *tāmra*) were since ancient times the favourite material for engraving various kinds of documents which were intended to last, and especially land-grants, to the donees of which they served as title-deeds.

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According to Fahian (about A. D. 400), the Buddhist monasteries possessed grants engraved on copper, the oldest of which dated from Buddha's time.¹⁰ Though this statement requires confirmation, the Sohgaura plate (see above, page 32) teaches us that during the Maurya period official decrees were committed to copper. Another Buddhist tradition, preserved by Hiuen Tsiang,¹¹ asserts that Kaniṣka caused the sacred books to be engraved on sheets of copper. And a similar story, which BURNELL declares to be untrustworthy, is told regarding Sāyaṇa's commentaries on the Vedas.¹² But it is undeniable that copper has been used also for the preservation of literary works, as plates with such contents have been found at Tripatty, and specimens from Burma and Ceylon (some of which are gilt) are now in the British Museum.¹³ Photographs of quite modern copper-plates with lists of goods in Gurumukhī and Nāgarī, sent from Kashgar to St. Petersburg, have reached me through the kindness of S. VON OLDENBURG.

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¹⁰ Siyuki (BEAL) 1, xxxviii.

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¹¹ See B.ESIP. 86.

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¹² R. V. (MAX MÜLLER), 1, xvii.

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¹³ J. Pali T. Soc., 1883, 136 ff.

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As regards the technical preparation, the oldest *tāmraśāsana* known, the Sohgaura copper-plate (see above, page 32), has been cast in a mould of sand, into which the letters and the emblems above them had been previously scratched with a stilus or a pointed piece of wood. Hence both the letters and the emblems appear on the plate in relievo. All other copper-plates have been fashioned with the hammer, and many among them show distinct traces of the blows. Their thickness and size vary very considerably. Some are very thin sheets, which could be bent double and weigh only a few ounces; others are exceedingly massive and are eight or nine pounds in weight or even heavier.¹ Their size is partly determined by the nature of the writing material commonly used in the districts where they were issued, and partly by the extent of the document to be engraved, the size of the clerk's writing, and so forth. The smiths always imitated the originals given them. If these were written on palm-leaves, the plates were made narrow and long. If the material was birch-bark, the plates became much broader, often almost square. Of the first description are all the copper-plates from Southern India, with the exception of those of the Yādavas of Vijayanagara, which imitate stone stelae.² To the second class belong all the Śāsanas issued further north, with the exception of the Taxila plate, which, as stated already, is the size of a palm-leaf. A comparison of the numerous plates of the Valabhī kings shows very clearly how their size gradually grows with the increasing length of the Praśasti.

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¹ [^1] The Taxila plate weighs 3¼ ounces and was found bent double; the Alīnā plates of Śīlāditya VI. of Valabhī weigh together 17 pounds, 3½ ounces, see F.GI (CII. 3), 172. But there are still heavier plates, see B.ESIP. 92, where however the historical notes require correction.

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² [^2] B.ESIP. 92; compare the facsimiles at EI. 3, 26, 38, &c.

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If, as is mostly the case, several plates were required for one document, they were usually connected by copper rings passed through round holes in the plates. The single ring is usually found in Śāsanas from Southern India, and then the hole is usually made in the left side of the plate. If there are two rings, the holes go through the lower part of the first plate, the upper part of the second, and so on alternately. The rings correspond to the threads which keep the palm-leaves together, and they make of many *tāmraśāsanas* small volumes,³ which can be opened quite conveniently. The lines run always, except in the Vijayanagara plates, [91] parallel to the broadest side of the plate. The letters have mostly been incised with a chisel, rarely with a graver (compare above, page 19). In order to protect the writing, the rims of the plates are usually thickened, and slightly raised,⁴ and the first side of the first plate, as well as the second side of the last, is left blank. The copper seals attached to the plates seem to have been cast, and their inscriptions and emblems are raised on a countersunk surface. According to Bāṇa,⁵ the state seal of king Harṣa was made of gold.

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³ [^3] The Kaśākūḍi grant (8th century) is written on eleven plates, the Hirahaḍagalli grant (4th century), EI. 1, 1 ff., on eight.

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⁴ [^4] See FLEET, GI (CII. 3), 68, note 6.

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⁵ [^5] Harṣacarita, 227 (Nirṇayasāgar Press ed.).

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Various copper statues show votive inscriptions on their bases. A single inscription on iron, that on the iron pillar of Meharaulī, near Delhi,⁶ has become known. The British Museum possesses a Buddhist MS. on tin.⁷

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⁶ [^6] F.GI (CII. 3), 139.

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⁷ [^7] See the list, J, Pali T. Soc. 1883, 134 ff.

G. — Stone and brick

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Stones of the most various kinds, rough and artificially smoothed blocks of basalt or trap, as well as artistically carved columns of sandstone, or even prisms of crystal, have been since the most ancient times the most common materials for making documents, as Aśoka expresses himself, *ciraṭhitika*, "such as to endure for a long time." And it is indifferent whether the documents are official or private, whether they contain royal proclamations, treaties between kings, or agreements between private individuals, grants and donations or poetical effusions. There are even some instances of the incision of larger literary works; large fragments of plays by the Cāhamāna king Vigraha IV., and by his poet-laureate Somadeva, have been found at Ajmīr,¹ and a large Jaina Sthalapurāṇa in a number of Sargas, impressions of which (unpublished) I owe to FÜHRER and G. H. OJHA, exists in Bijholli (Rājputāna).

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¹ IA. 20, 201 ff. — [Now edited by KIELHORN in Göttinger Festschrift, 1901.]

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Bricks, showing single or a few letters, have been known for some time, as specimens have been found by CUNNINGHAM,² FÜHRER and others in various parts of India, and even in Burma. But recently a set has been discovered in the North-West Provinces by HOEY, on which Buddhist Sūtras are inscribed, the characters having apparently been scratched on the moist clay, before it was baked.³

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² C.ASR. 1, 97; 5, 102.

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³ Proc. ASB. 1896, 99 ff.

H. — Paper

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During the period to which this work refers, paper was hardly known or at least little used in India, as its introduction is only due to the Muhammadans. RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA, however, asserts⁴ that a “letter-writer” by king Bhoja of Dhārā proves its use in Mālva during the 11th century. The oldest paper MS. in Gujarāt is said to date from A. D. 1223-24.⁵

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⁴ Gough’s Papers, 16.

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⁵ See my Catalogue of MSS. from Gujarāt, &c., 1, 238, No. 147.

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Paper MSS. dated Vikrama-Saṁvat 1384 and 1394 (A. D. 1327-28 and 1337-38), the leaves of which are cut according to the size of palm-leaves, have been discovered by PETERSON at Aṇhilvād Pāṭan.⁶ It is very doubtful if any of the ancient MSS. from Kashgar, which are written on a peculiar paper, covered with a layer of gypsum, are of Indian origin; HOERNLE believes that all of them were written in Central Asia.⁷

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⁶ Fifth Report, 123, 125.

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⁷ WZKM. 7, 261; J.ASB. 66, 215 ff., 258 f.

I. — Ink

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The oldest undoubtedly Indian term for ink is *maṣi* or *maṣī*, frequently spelt *masi* or *masī*. The word, which occurs as a *varia lectio* already in a Gṛhyasūtra, is derived from the verb *maṣ* (*hiṁsāyām*), and means etymologically “powder.”⁸ Further, it serves to denote several kinds of pulverised charcoal, which were mixed with water, gum, sugar and so forth, and used for the preparation of ink.⁹ BURNELL is mistaken when he asserts that in classical Sanskrit literature *maṣī*, “ink,” occurs only in late works; it was known to Bāṇa (about A. D. 620) and to his predecessor Subandhu.¹⁰

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⁸ BRW. and BW., sub voce *maṣi*.

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⁹ Indian prescriptions for preparing ink are found in RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA’s notes, Gough’s Papers, &c., 18 f.; Kashmīr Report, 30.

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¹⁰ See, *e. g.*, Vāsavadatta, 187 (HALL); Harṣacarita, 95.

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BENFEY, HINCKS and WEBER have derived *melā*, another word for “ink,” from the Greek μέλας. But it is, no doubt, the feminine (*viz.*, *maṣī*) of the common Prakrit adjective *maïla*, “dirty, black,” which cannot have been borrowed from the Greeks.¹¹ *Melā*, likewise, was known to Subandhu, who uses the denominative *melānandāyate*, “becomes an inkstand.”¹² The Koṣas offer for “inkstand” also *melāmandā*, *melāndhu*, *melāndhukā*, and *maṣimaṇi*, and the Purāṇas *maṣīpātra*, *maṣībhāṇḍa* and *maṣīkūpikā*.¹³

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¹¹ See now also ZACHARIAE, Nachrichten Gött. Ges. Wiss., 1893, 235 ff.

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¹² BRW., *sub hac voce*.

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¹³ *Mandā* and *nandā*, ‘water-vessel’ (compare also *nandīkā*, *nāndī*, ‘well,’ and *nāndīpaṭa*, ‘cover of a well’), are derived from *nandayati* and *mandayati*, ‘to cause to rejoice, to refresh.’

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The statements of Nearchos and Q. Curtius (see above, page 6), according to which the Hindus wrote on cotton cloth and on the inner bark of trees, *i. e.*, Bhūrja, make it very probable that they used ink already in the 4th century B. C. To the same conclusion points the fact, that in some letters of the Aśoka edicts dots are occasionally substituted for loops.¹⁴ The oldest specimen of writing with ink, on the relic-vase of the Stūpa [92] of Andher (see above, page 5), is certainly not later than the 2nd century B.C. From the first centuries A. D. dates the Kharoṣṭhī Dhammapada from Khotan, as well as the twists of Bhūrja and the stone vessels with Kharoṣṭhī letters in ink from the Stūpas of Afghanistan. Somewhat later are the ancient Bhūrja and palm-leaf MSS. with Brāhma characters. Painted inscriptions occur still in the caves of Ajaṇṭā.¹

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¹⁴ B.IS. III², 61 f. 69.

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¹ B.ASRWI. 4, plate 59.

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Coloured ink, which in later times the Jainas especially have used extensively for their MSS.,² is mentioned also in Brahmanical works, *e. g.*, in the sections of the Purāṇas on the donation of MSS.³ Besides chalk (see above, page 82, § 34, B), red lead or minium (*hiṅgula*) was used, already in ancient times, as a substitute for ink.⁴

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² See, *e. g.*, the facsimiles in RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA's Notices of Sanskrit MSS., 3, pl. 1.

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³ Hemādri, Dānakhaṇḍa, 549 ff.

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⁴ D'ALWIS, Introd. to Kaccāyana, XVII; Jātaka No. 509 (4, 489), pointed out by S. VON OLDENBURG.

J. — Pens, pencils, &c

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The general name of "an instrument for writing" is *lekhanī*, which of course includes the *stilus*, pencils, brushes, reed and wooden pens, and is found already in the epics.⁵

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⁵ See BRW. and BW., *sub hac voce*.

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The *varṇaka*, mentioned in the Lalitavistara, no doubt refers to the little stick without a slit, with which the school-boys still draw the letters on the writing-board (see above, page 5). The Koṣas offer the variant *varṇikā*. The *varṇavartikā*, which occurs in the passage of the Daśakumāracarita referred to above (see page 93 above, and note 7), must be a brush or coloured pencil, as, according to other passages, the *vartikā* was used for drawing or painting.⁶ *Tūlī* or *tūlikā* probably denoted originally "a brush," though it is explained also by the modern *salāī*, "graver," a *stilus*.⁷

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⁶ See BRW. and BW., *sub hac voce*.

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⁷ See Maheśvara on Amarakoṣa, p. 243, verse 33 (Bo. Gov. Ed.).

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The most usual name of the reed pen is the word *kalama*, κάλαμος, *Calamus*, which occurs in all eastern languages; the rarer indigenous Indian name is *iṣīkā* or *īṣīkā*, literally "reed."⁸ Pieces of reed, bamboo or wood, cut after the manner of our pens, are used in all parts of India where the use of ink prevails,⁹ and all the existing ancient MSS. on palm-leaves and Bhūrja probably have been written with such pens.¹⁰ The Sanskrit name of the *stilus* used in Southern India is *śalākā*, in Marāṭhī *salāī*.

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⁸ See BRW. and BW., *sub hac voce*.

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⁹ This is the case in all the parts of India known to me; compare also RĀJENDRALĀL MITRA, in Gough's Papers, 18.

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¹⁰ Anecdota Oxoniensia, Aryan Series, 1, 3, 66.

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Regarding the now very generally used "ruler," a piece of wood or cardboard with strings fixed at equal distances, and regarding its probable predecessors, see Anecdota Oxoniensia, Aryan Series, 1, 3, 66, and Anzeiger d. W. Akademie, 1897, No. VIII, where photographs of two specimens have been given. According to a letter from C. KLEMM (April 21, 1897), the Ethnological Museum of Berlin possesses two specimens, one from Calcutta with the inscription *nivedanapattra* and one from Madras called *kīḍugu*.

Cites (11)