Indian Epigraphy c9.t6: 1. Stone

Indian Epigraphy c9.t6

Language: English

1. Stone

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Stone was used from the earliest times for engraving writing for the purpose of making it *cira-sthitika* or everlasting.¹ Inscriptions were often engraved on rocks, stone pillars or slabs, stone images or their pedestals and stone articles such as jars or their covers, etc.

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¹ Various kinds of stones were used for engraving inscriptions. We have inscriptions on blocks of basalt or trap, columns of sandstone, prisms of crystal, etc. Precious stones were sometimes used for making seals or medals. For a cornelian seal, see *CII*, Vol. II, Part i, pp. 7-8. Among stone inscriptions, we have official and private records, royal proclamations, treaties between kings, agreements between private individuals, grants and donations, poetical effusions, etc.

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Sometimes epigraphs were incised without making the surface of the stone sufficiently smooth; but often, especially when an inscription of the eulogy (*praśasti*) type was engraved, the stone was carefully dressed and made very smooth by chiselling and sometimes it was even made shiny by rubbing it with smooth pieces of stone. A record was often composed by a poet or learned man or a high royal officer and was written with ink or chalk on the surface of the stone by a calligraphist, sometimes only a few lines at a time, and ultimately the letters were engraved by an artisan with the help of a chisel. To ensure the straightness of the lines, straight lines were sometimes drawn on the stone with the help of a ruler and chalk or a pointed instrument or of a string dipped in ink or dye as even now used by the carpenters for drawing straight lines on wooden blocks for splitting them into planks.

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Generally stone slabs were at first inscribed and then fixed into their proper place in the foundations or walls of temples, step-wells, etc. Such slabs had often raised or lined borders. Stone slabs bearing carefully engraved inscriptions, such as the *Lalitavigraharāja* and *Harakelināṭaka* inscriptions in the Ajmer Museum, show that sometimes a break or damage in the stone was covered up with metal.

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A single slab of stone was generally used for engraving an inscription; but in some cases it was incised on several slabs, especially when it was a big eulogy or a book. Rāṇā Kumbhā’s inscription¹ in the Kumbhasvāmin or Māmādeva temple at Kumbhalgadh is written on five stone slabs while the kāvya entitled Rājapraśasti, written in 24 cantos by an Āndhra poet named Raṇachoḍa on the occasion of the excavation of the Rājasamudra tank by Rāṇā Rājasimha of Mewar, was engraved on no less than 24 slabs.² The Rājapraśasti slabs were fixed into the embankment of the said tank. Among other such works incised on stone slabs, mention may be made of Paramāra Bhoja’s Prakrit poem entitled Kūrmaśataka³ and Madana’s Pārijātamañjarī (or Vijayaśrīṇāṭikā).⁴ The Harakelināṭaka by the Cāhamāna king Vigraharāja IV (1153-64 A. D.) and the Lalitavigraharājaṇāṭaka by his court poet Someśvara were similarly engraved on stone slabs.⁵ A Digambara Jain work called Unnataśikhara Purāṇa, composed in 1170 A.D., was engraved on the flat surface of a rock at Bijolia in the Bhilwara District of the Udaipur Division of Rajasthan.⁶

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¹ See Ep. Ind., Vol. XXIV, pp. 304ff.

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² Ibid., Vols. XXIX-XXX, Appendix, pp. 1-123.

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³ Ep. Ind., Vol. VIII, pp. 243 ff.

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⁴ Ibid., pp. 101 ff.

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⁵ See Bhandarkar’s List, No. 289 and note.

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⁶ Ibid., No. 1854; Ojna, Bhāratīya Prācīn Lipimālā, p. 150, note 6.

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Inscribed and uninscribed pillars of stone, found in different parts of India, are innumerable. They were raised for various purposes in all the ages of Indian history. Amongst the inscribed pillars, the earliest belong to the days of the Maurya emperor Aśoka (c. 272-232 B.C.).⁷ These are called stambha or śilā-stambha (i.e. stone pillar) in the epigraphs they bear. There are some pillars which may be classified as dhvaja-stambha⁸ or flag-staff (often standing before a temple and bearing inscriptions in some cases), jaya-stambha or victory-pillar¹ (often bearing the eulogy of a conqueror) and kīrti-stambha or fame-pillar² (often bearing the eulogy of a person who performed a pious deed calculated to render him famous). Certain memorial pillars known as hero-stones³ (often with inscriptions recording the death of warriors while fighting against enemies) and satī-stones⁴ (often bearing epigraphs recording the death of widows burning themselves in fire) are found in large numbers in the southern and western regions of India, though they are also known from other parts of the country. Besides these, we have also other kinds of inscribed pillars bearing small inscriptions. Some of these are votive pillars set up in religious establishments by pious men, especially pilgrims, for acquiring religious merit. They are also generally called stambha in the records incised on them. Instances of such votive pillars are numerous in the inscriptions discovered in the ruins of old Buddhist stūpas like those at Barhut, Sanchi and Nagarjunikonda.⁵ There is yet another class of memorial pillars similar to the hero- and satī-stones. The erection of such pillars in honour of one's dead relatives is referred to in several records of the early centuries of the Christian era,⁶ which mention the object on which they are engraved as yaṣṭi. Sometimes the memorial pillar bore the representation of the person in whose memory it was raised. Such a pillar was called chāyā-stambha (imagepillar).¹ Sacrificial pillars were called yūpa. We have a number of inscribed yūpas of the early period.²

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⁷ See CII, Vol. I, pp. xv ff.

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⁸ Cf., e.g., the Eran pillar inscription of 484 A.D. (ibid., Vol. III, pp. 88 ff.).

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¹ The Eran and Mandasor pillars bearing the inscriptions respectively of Samudragupta and Yaśodharman fall in this class. Cf. Select Inscriptions, pp. 260 ff.; 393 ff. A jaya-stambha could sometimes be regarded as a kīrti-stambha.

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² The Talagunda pillar bearing a praśasti of the Kadamba king Kākusthavarman, who excavated a tank near a Śiva temple, belongs to this category. Cf. ibid., pp. 450 ff.

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³ See, e.g., Ep. Ind., Vol. XXXI, pp. 323 ff.

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⁴ See, e.g., Hiralal's List, p. 46 (No. 78), p. 53 (No. 95), etc. In many cases, the inscriptions on the pillars record both the death of a hero and the self-immolation of his widow (cf. ibid., p. 49, No 83). The satī-stones are called māsti (mahāsati) in Kannada (A. R. Ep., 1951-52, Nos. B69-70, 85); cf. Gujarātī paliyā.

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⁵ See Barua and Sinha, Barhut Inscriptions; Ep. Ind., Vol II, pp. 95 ff.; Vol. XX, pp. 1 ff.; etc. Cf. JRASB, Letters, Vol. XV, 1949 pp. 6-8.

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⁶ See, e.g., Select Inscriptions, pp. 35-36, 167-68. They are also called gotra for gotra-śailikā (Ep. Ind., Vol. XXXIII, p. 172).

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¹ Cf. A. R. Ep., 1957-58, No. B 26. While arranging for the burning of a perpetual lamp before a deity, sometimes the lamp was placed in the hands of the image of a dead person made for the purpose. Such lamps were called chāyā-dīpa (SII, Vol. V., No. 1205).

Linked texts (3)

Sāñcī
Nagarjunikonda
Pārijātamañjarī — Madana Bālasarasvatī, Sanskrit