Indian Epigraphy c6.s2.6

c6.s2.6

² For a short account of the early phase of epigraphical studies, especially in South India, see J. F. Fleet, *Dynasties of the Kanarese Districts*, 2nd ed. (Bombay, 1882), pp. ii ff. Between 1783 and 1821, Colin Mackenzie collected from various parts of the old Madras Presidency innumerable manuscripts together with transcripts of numerous inscriptions on stone and copper. Walter Elliot collected the impressions of a large number of inscriptions and published a paper on ‘Hindu Inscriptions’ in the *Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society* (London), First Series, Vol. IV, pp. 1 ff., and its revised version later in the *Madras Journal of Literature and Science*, Vol. VII, pp. 193 ff. Manuscripts of his *Karnataka Désa Inscriptions*, Vols. I-II, are preserved in the library of the Edinburgh University and the Royal Asiatic Society, London. In 1885 the Mysore Government published a photographic collection of 150 inscriptions and next year Theodore Hope edited photographic copies of 64 inscriptions in a volume entitled *Inscriptions in Dharwar and Mysore*, for the Committee of Architectural Antiquities of Western India. Some more inscriptions were inserted by him in his *Architecture in Dharwar and Mysore*. A limited edition of these collections, edited by J. F. Fleet, was published in 1878 by the India Office under the title *Pali, Sanskrit and Old-Canarese Inscriptions from the Bombay Presidency and Parts of the Madras Presidency and Mysore*. In 1879 Rice published his *Mysore Inscriptions*. Later he published his *Inscriptions of Sravana-Belgola* and *Inscriptions in the Mysore District* and several volumes of the *Epigraphia Carnatica*.