The Dynastic History of Northern India (Early Mediaeval Period) v2.c31.350

v2.c31.350

(17) *Veraval praśasti of Bhāva-Bṛhaspati.*—Contains 54 lines, incised on a stone slab fixed in the porch of the temple of Bhadrakālī at Veraval (Somnath) in S. Kathiawar. The record opens with *Oṁ namaḥ Śivāya* and invocations to Bhavānīpati (Śiva), Gaṇeśa, and Soma (Moon). It then gives an account of the birth and career of Bhāva-Bṛhaspati. He was born in the city of Vāṇārasī in the Kānyakubja-Viṣaya in a Brāhman family, and took the vow of the Pāśupatas. When he reached Dhārā and Avanti in the Mālava country he was highly honoured, and the Paramāra lords became his pupils. Next he bound to himself Jayasiṁha in a close bond of brotherhood. After his death, when Kumārapāla, ‘who was a lion to jump on the heads of (those) elephants-Ballāla, king of Dhārā and the illustrious ruler of Jāṅgala,’ ‘quickly mounted the throne of his kingdom,’ the *Gaṇḍa*⁴ Bhāva⁵-Bṛhaspati, ‘seeing the temple of the Foe of Cupid (Somanath) ruined,’ exhorted him ‘to restore the house of the god.’ We are told that the temple of Somnath was first erected in stone by Bhīma I.¹ Kumārapāla agreed, made Bṛhaspati the lord of all the *gaṇḍas*, and appointed him governor of Somanātha-pattana. When the temple of Somnath was finally rebuilt the king made his office of chief temple-priest hereditary and granted him the village of Brahmapurī, near Maṇḍalī.² When Bhoja, the son of the king's sister Premalladevī, worshipped Somanātha under the guidance of Bṛhaspati, Kumārapāla, characterised as *Māheśvara-nṛpāgraṇīḥ* gave another village to the priest. The record was written by Rudra Sūri, and is dated in the last line in Valabhī *Saṁvat* 850 (A.D. 1169).³