History of Orissa from the Earliest Times to the British Period v1.c12.17

v1.c12.17

On the metalled road from Cuttack to Puri, a little distant from the river Prāchī, Aśoka’s edicts were engraved on a low hill above which is carved in relief the forefront of an elephant. The rock surface was smoothed and carved as a sunken panel in which the edicts were inscribed. The surface of the panel was highly polished like the shafts of Aśoka’s pillars. On the road from the river to the low rock one sees the ruins of a vast city containing hundreds of small and large mounds with small and large tanks in all stages of decay. Twenty-two years back, when I was editing the Patiakella plate of Śivarāja of the Gupta year 283, it was suggested to me by my venerable teacher Mahāmahopādhyāya Dr. Hara Prasada Śāstri, M. A., PH. D., C. I. E., at that time the Principal of the Government Sanskrit College of Calcutta, that these ruins represent the ancient city of Tosali. These ruins have so far been neglected by the Archæological Survey of India, and we do not know to what period they belong. The earliest mention of Tosali in historical records is to be found in the Patiakella plate of Śivarāja of the Gupta year 283, where the village granted is stated to have been situated in Southern Tosali.¹ The second mention of Tosali in a contemporary record is, therefore, approximately 866 years after the death of Aśoka. The next mention is to be found in the Neulpur plate of Śubhākara from which we know that the two villages granted were situated in the district of Northern Tosali.² As Śubhākara was the contemporary of the Chinese Emperor Te-tsong, the second mention of Tosali has to be placed towards the close of the 8th century A. D., *i. e.*, approximately 1,050 years after the death of Aśoka.³