An Encyclopaedia of Indian Archaeology v1.c25.s3.7

v1.c25.s3.7

The use of ink is implied in the work *lipi* in Pāṇini’s *Aṣṭādhyāyī* and the inscriptions of Aśoka. The evolution of some Brāhmī and Kharoṣṭhī letters in many cases shows the use of pen and ink. A pre-Christian relic vessel from Andher contains a record in ink. The Kharoṣṭhī *Dhammapada* from Khotan is among the earliest manuscripts in ink. The Sanskrit terms for ink (*maṣī* or its variants, and *melā*) refer to the powdering and mixing of colour-giving objects. Words for containers (*pātra*, *bhāṇḍa*, *kūpikā*, etc.) were suffixed to those for ink to signify ink-pots [20.2]. Besides the general term *lekhanī*, *varṇikā* was a wooden pen, *isīkā* or *iṣīkā* was a reed or bamboo pen and *varṇa-vartikā* was a kind of brush. The *Kāvyamīmāṃsā* mentions *loha-kaṇṭaka* (an iron needle for writing on *tāla-dala*), *lekhanī* and *maṣī-bhājana* (for writing on birch-bark) and *phalaka* (a board) and *khaṭikā* (a piece of chalk). Plaints written on boards with *pāṇḍu-lekha* (chalk) and royal declarations recorded on a varnished board are referred to in other sources. The *Vinaya-piṭaka* speaks of wooden boards as writing material. Young learners used wooden planks (*phalaka*). Some Gandhāra sculptures portray a child Bodhisattva and his classmates with writing boards and ink-pots. A recently discovered Śuṅga terracotta from Sugh, Dt Ambala, depicts a young boy, possibly Kṛṣṇa, practising alphabets on a writing-board in his lap (Chhabra, 1970).