Studies in the Geography of Ancient and Medieval India c28.8

c28.8

About the beginning of the year 1951, I copied three epigraphs in the Jain temple at Kākan.⁵ The earliest of the three records is engraved on the pedestal of an image of Pārśvanātha and is dated in V. S. 1504 Phālguna-sudi 9 (February, 1448 A.D.) while the latest is incised on the back of an *āyāgapaṭa* and is dated in V. S. 1933 (1876-77 A.D.). The third inscription, dated V. S. 1822 Vaiśākha-sudi 6 (April 1765 A.D.), is engraved around two foot-marks fixed in front of the image of Pārśvanātha and records the installation of the said foot-marks. It clearly states that they represent the foot-marks of the Tīrthaṅkara Suvidhinātha and that they were installed at Kākandī or Kākandinagarī which was a holy place and was the birth place of the said Tīrthaṅkara. Some repairs are also stated to have been carried out apparently in the temple wherein the foot-marks were installed and one of the inscriptions seems to point to the existence of the temple before the middle of the fifteenth century A.D. Thus the tradition that modern Kākan, where the inscription has been found, is the same as Kākandī or Kākandinagarī, regarded by the Jains as the birth place of the Tīrthaṅkara Suvidhinātha, can be referred atleast to the late medieval period.