The Age of the Imperial Guptas c6.51

c6.51

In the Gupta period, as well as earlier periods, according to the discoveries of Spooner at Vaiśālī, clay was the ordinary material used for sealing. Such seals were used both for covers of contracts as well as of letters. In the case of documents intended for permanent record copper or silver was used. Instances of copper seals are those attached to the Gaya plate of Samudragupta of G.E. 9 = 328-9 A.D., the seal of the government of the district of Koṭivarṣa and that of the maṇḍala of Vāraka from Faridpur.¹ The only instance known to us in which silver was used for sealing is that of the great seal of Kumāragupta II discovered at Ṣaiyadpur-Bhitari in the Ghazipur district of the U.P. Bloch described the clay seals and the method of sealing in the following words;—"From the shape of the clay pieces it is evident that they were attached to letters or other literary documents, and that they served to hold together the string which was tied around the wooden boards upon which the letter was written, or which were used as a sort of envelope. In that case either birch-bark or palm-leaf took the place of our modern paper. Fig. 18 gives a view of the reverse of one of the clay lumps. The method adopted for sealing letters at this time seems to have been to press down the ends of the string tied round the boards into a piece of moist clay by means of some instrument, perhaps the broad side of a knife. Evidence of this is the groove which invariably occurs on the back of all the seals. Generally a few thin lines run across its centre. They must have been made by the blunt edge of the knife to press down the strings more deeply, in order to make them adhere tighter to the clay. The other side of the clay bears the impression of the sender's seal. In many cases traces remains of the finger-marks of the persons who handled the seals while moist. As the majority consisted of pieces of unbaked clay, it is clear that it was considered sufficient to allow the seal to dry during the transit of the letter. A few pieces are of a light yellow colour, and look as if the seal had been heated a little before despatching the letter. The present find thus distinguishes itself sharply from other collections of clay seals made at various ancient Indian sites, which as a rule consist of votive tablets, either put down as offerings near holy shrines or taken away as memorials by pilgrims. The reverse of the latter is invariably quite smooth, and the groove and stringholes seen on all the Basarh seals are entirely wanting."¹