Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages c10.s2.8

c10.s2.8

It should be kept in mind, finally, that spurious inscriptions are not necessarily devoid of historical value or interest. Since most of them are genuinely ancient (if not as ancient as they claim to be), they may well contain at least partially valid historical information especially when, as is often the case, they are more or less faithful (if incompetent) attempts at reproducing a valid original. For example, the dates 5 and 9 given in the spurious copper plates of Samudragupta are taken by some historians as indicating that he, and not Candragupta I, was the founder of the Gupta era (*SI* 270–1 n. 4; cf. 5.5.1.6). Moreover, even if the dates of the inscriptions themselves cannot be trusted, the historical material presented in them by way of genealogical and eulogistic preamble is usually unaltered from the original; in Fleet's words, "[T]here are . . . no general grounds for assuming any deliberate falsification of such items of real history" (206). For these reasons, then, spurious ancient inscriptions—as opposed to modern forgeries—are normally felt to be legitimate objects of scholarly study and worthy of publication in the usual channels (with, of course, due attention being called to their spuriousness).