Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c7.s14.t2.6

c7.s14.t2.6

All these peculiarities, as well as the advanced forms of the medial vowels, of *ā* in *rā* (32, IV), of *u* in *ku* (7, IV, V) and in *stu* (43, V),² and of *o* in *to* (21, IV), reappear constantly in the northern alphabets of the next period, those of the Gupta inscriptions (pl. IV, cols I—VII) and of the Bower MS. (pl. VI, cols. I—III), or are precursors of the forms of those documents. The literary alphabets used in Mathurā during the first two centuries A. D., very likely were identical with or closely similar to the later ones, and the admixture of older forms, observable in the inscriptions of the Kuṣana period, may be due purely to an imitation of older votive inscriptions.