History of Orissa from the Earliest Times to the British Period v1.c19.22.5

v1.c19.22.5

A summary of the contents of the inscription was published by the late Rai Bahadur H. Kṛishṇa Śāstri in the annual report of the Archæological Survey of India, Eastern Circle, for the year 1916-17, (p. 4, para. 5). The charter gives the names of Śilābhañja and Śatrubhañja as the grandfather and father of Raṇabhañja I. The object of this charter is to record the grant of the village of Vāhiravāḍā on the banks of the Mahānadī and included in the Dakshiṇapali district of the Khiñjali Maṇḍala to the god Vijayeśvara by the Mahādevi Vijyā or Vidyā, the daughter of the Rāṇaka Niyārṇama. Raṇabhañja I is called the devout worshipper of Vishṇu, born in the family produced from an egg, Lord of both the Khiñjalis, one who had obtained the five great sounds and the favour of the goddess Stambheśvarī, whose feet were worshipped by the great Sāmantas and Rāṇakas. The actual donor of the plates is the *Parameśvarī Mahādevī* Vijayā (Vidyā or Vijayā) the daughter of the Rāṇaka Niyārṇama, who is evidently the principal queen of Raṇabhañja I. The date of this inscription is expressed in the form of a curious chronogram *Indu-Vāk-Viṁśati-Varshe* which would ordinarily mean the year 2011 of some era. But evidently the writer meant *Vāk* to mean 1 and to add it with *Indu*, 1, to twenty, thus making twenty-two. This charter was also engraved by the merchant and goldsmith Śivanāga, son of Paṇḍi.¹