Mḻopaṟṟu grant attributed to Maṅgi Yuvarāja

Seal śrī-sarvvasiddhi

Plates

svasti. śrīmāad-bhagavaT-svaāmi-mahāsena-pādānudhyātaānāṁ maātr̥-gaṇa-paripālitānāṁ maānavya-sagotrāṇāṁ hāritī-putrāṇāṁ kauśikī-vara-prasāda-labdha-rājyānāṁ Aśvamedha-yājinām amvrombhodhi-paryyanta-prathita-yaśasāṁ caḷukyānāṁ kula-jaladhi-samuditendor nnaya-vinaya-vikramopaārjita-bhūri-kīrttieḥ kīrttivarmmaṇaḥ sūnor aneka-sama~~saṁ~~ra-saṁghaṭṭopalabdha-jaya-śrī-latiā-praśsūta-yaśaḥ-prasūty-āmoda-gandhādhivāsita-sakala-diṅ-maṇḍalasya śrī-viṣṇuvarddhana-mahārājasya priya-tanayaḥ trailokya-vikramoddyotita-sakala-lokāśrāayaḥ bhujabhuja-bala-bhāaya-namitaāśeṣa-ripu-nr̥pati-makuṭa-taṭa-ghaṭita-maṇi-kiraṇa-rāga-raṁjita-caraṇa-yugaḷlaḥ parama-bhaāgavata-śrī-maṁgi-yuva-vallabha-mahārājaḥ cavuḻpallya-viṣaye rāṣṭrakūṭa-pramukhān kuṭiuṁbinas sarvvān itthāam aājñāpayati

viditam astu vo ’smābhiḥ vanapaṟṟu-vaāstavyāya vacchtsa-gotrāya rinyakesinehiraṇyakeśine Agniśarmmaṇe|aḥ pautrāya guṇavato Āḍiśarmmaṇaḥ putraāya maṇḍaśarmmaṇe veda-vedāṁga-paāragaāya ṣaṭ-karmma-niratāya Astiśahasanamaṁñcūdhūkaṁ maṁgi-yuvarājaḥ svāmi-bhaktāḥ maṇḍaśarmmaṇe Udaka-pūrvvas sarvva-kara-parihāraMUttāarāyaṇa-nimittaḥṁ mḻopaṟṟu-nāmā grāmo dattaḥ

tasyāvadhayaḥ. pūrvvataḥ velḻavaṟṟu.dakṣiṇataḥ pulgoṭlapabulūru. paścimataḥ Agūnakṣayyaṁ. Uttāarataḥ kḻocce ḍoḍu ca.Eteṣām madhya-varttiḥī. Asyopari na kenacid bādhā kāaraṇīyaā. yaḥ kāaroti saḥ pañca-mahāpātaka-saṁyukto bhavati. vyāsenāpy uktāaM

bahubhir vvasudhā dattā bahubhiś cānupālitaā yasya yasya yadā bhūmais tasya tasya tadā phalaṁ sva-dattāṁ para-dattāṁ vā yohareta vasundhaāraāṁ ṣaṣṭhṭi-varṣa-sahasrāṇi viṣṭhāyāṁ jāyate kr̥miḥ gavāṁ koṭi-pradānena Aśvaśemedha-śatena ca taṭākānāṁ sahasreṇa bhūmi-harttā na śuddhyati na viṣaṁ viṣam ity aāhur brahma-svaṁ viṣam ucyate viṣam ekākinaṁ hanti brahma-svaṁ putra-pautrakaṁ mad-vaṁśa-jāḥ para-mahīpati-vaṁśa-jāś ca pāpād apeta-manaso bhuvi bhaāvi-bhūpāḥ ye pālayanti mama dharmmam imaṁ samastaṁ teṣāṁ mayā viracito ’ṁjalir eṣamūrdhni yānīha dattāni puraā narendra dānaāni dharmmārttha-yaśas-karāṇi nirmmaālyāa-vānti-pratimaāni tāni ko naāma saādhuḥ punar ādadītaḥ sarvvān etaān bhāvinaḥ pārtthivendraāN bhūyo bhūyo yaācate rāmadevaḥ sāmānyo ’yaṁ dharmma-setur nr̥paāṇāṁ kāle kāle pālanīyobhavadbhiḥ Ājñaptir asmin ghanarāśir īśaḥ śrī-bhaānuśaktir hitavān prajaānaāṁ śāśsanāasya li

Seal

Plates -bhagavaT- bhāgavata hāritī- haāritī- amvrombhodhi- ambhodhi- samuditendor nnaya-vinaya- -samudita Compare the Nutulapaṟu grant and London Plates of Maṅgi Yuvarāja, both of which use the same wording, though for Jayasiṁha rather than Kīrtivarman. -sama~~saṁ~~ra- -samara- According to RM's note, ra looks like ru. However, the ū sign is curved upwards. In fact, it looks like saṁ was first engraved, then corrected to ra. In addition to this character, there may be something added below the line at this point, just to the right of the descender of ra. The strokes are quite conspicuous in the estampage, but not visible at all in the photos. No insertion seems to be required either here or in the next line at this point. I cannot read the inserted text, if that is what it is. Its first character may be a small ṇa, and this may be followed by one to three further small characters of whose shape nothing can be discerned. saṁghaṭṭopalabdha- The engraved text may in fact be saṁghāṭopalabdha-. -jaya-śrī-latiā-praśsūta-yaśaḥ-prasūty-āmoda- jayaśilatiā-praśsūtāya praroha-prasūty-āmoda- The characters taya are at the lower edge of the binding hole, and are therefore reduced in size and slightly distorted in shape. I cannot fully reconstruct RM's reading and emendation. At the end of line 4, he apparently reads jayaśilati and emends the final vowel to ā. A footnote by his editor completes this emendation to jayāsi-latā. In line 5 it is also clear that RM emends śū to sū, but I fail to understand what he intends with the word praroha, shown in his edition in round parentheses. He probably means this to replace the preceding word he reads as praśūtāya, but if so, then I do not see why he first emends that to prasūtāya. No matter what RM intended, we have a close parallel in lines 10-11 of the Koṇeki grant of Viṣṇuvardhana II, which describe Jayasiṁha I as °āneka-samara-saṁghaṭṭa-labdha-vijaya-śīlatā-prasūta-yaśaḥ-prasūtāmoda-gandhādhivāsita-sakala-dig-maṇḍalasya (where -prasūtāmoda- is probably erroneous for -prasūty-āmoda-). The phrase jaya-śrī-latā in place of jaya-śīlatā is unexpected, but the subscript r is unmistakeable in the photo even in its worn state. It is possible that all of praśūtaya at the beginning of line 5 was intended to be cancelled, in which case we are left with a more elegant compound involving jaya-śrī-latā; but the text is interpretable with the above minor emendations even if all characters are retained. -lokāśrāayaḥ -lokāśraya- I am certain that the compound ending here is not subordinate to the one beginning after this point. -bhujabhuja- I follow RM in dismissing the second bhuja as superfluous dittography. There is a slight possibility that the first bhuja is in fact a different word beginning with bhu, and thus the second is not redundant. It is also possible that the second bhuja is not simply a product of dittography, but an erroneously engraved word influenced by the first bhuja. The Koṇeki grant of Viṣṇuvardhana II has sakala-lokāśraya-bhuja-yugaḷa-bala-namitāśeṣa- (describing Jayasiṁha), and the composer's intent may have been -bhuja-yuga- here. -bhaāgavata- -bhaāgavataḥ śrī-maṁgi- I endorse RM's reading, which he prints as clear. In fact, the first character differs conspicuously from instances of ma in the same line: it has an exaggerated headmark and its right is attached too low. Given its closeness to the next character, it may be a correction from va. cavuḻpallya- canuḻpallyā-viṣaye The ARIE report says the granted village is in canūṟpalli viṣaya, having probably read the locative ending pallyāṁ. On the testimony of the Pulgoṭlapaṁbuluru grant of Vijayāditya III, I prefer to read the partly effaced second character as vu. I believe there is neither an anusvāra nor an ā marker here; the dot at the top right of llya is simply a serif-like feature of the engraving, like the dot at the top right of the subscript p, or that at the top left of ṣa, both of which clearly lack a function. itthāam aājñāpayati ittham ājñāpayati vacchtsa- The lower part of ccha is lost to the edge of the binding hole. It may also have been c. guṇavato Āḍiśarmmaṇaḥ śusuśarmmaṇe| vveṁgiśarmmaṇaḥ Although RM prints most of this text as clearly legible, neither the estampage nor the photo confirms his reading. Though the syntax of the sentence is garbled, I expect only one name here (see the note to the translation). My own reading is largely conjectural, based on very faint and ambiguous vestiges. What I read as va looks in fact more like vā or ma. In the name, my tentatively read Ā (apparently ignored or read as a punctuation mark by RM) could, on its own, be dra or vra, and my tentative ḍi (RM's gi, which I find impossible) may also be di or dhi. Astiśahasanamaṁñcūdhūkaṁ Astivihasana-maṇḍūṟūre I am unable to propose a meaningful reading here, and show what I deem to be the most likely reading on the basis of the vestiges. This is unlikely to be exactly what was inscribed on the plates, and an examination of the original may reveal some further clues. I cannot agree with RM's reading maṇḍūṟūre even though his editor in a footnote suggests that this is a toponym identifiable as the village Maṇḍūru near the modern village Mopaṟṟu, which he believes was the camping place (presumably of Maṅgi Yuvarāja). I note that, on Google Maps at least, that village's name is Manduru with a dental d. In line 11, what I and RM read as A us identifiable only by a large and curling tail; the body is fully effaced. In principle, almost any consonant with a subscript r is also conceivable. The second character is most likely to be sti, but a different subscript consonant is possible. Reading smai (for Asmai) is not entirely out of the question, although the vowel is unlikely to be anything other than i. The third character is almost certainly śa, discernible both in the estampage and the photo. What RM reads as an i marker is the subscript m of śarmmaṇaḥ in the previous line. After this, ha and sa are reasonably clear. The former could perhaps also be ḷa; the latter is badly worn, but not too ambiguous. At the end of the line, na might also be va. In line 12, the second character, which I read as ñcū, is definitely not ṇḍa: compare the very different ṇḍa further on in this line, and the very similar ñca in line 15. It is preceded by a conspicuous dot that may be an anusvāra or an irrelevant pit in the metal. The following character is somewhat distorted to fit in below the binding hole, and its upper part may be lost to wear at the edge of the hole. Assuming that it is fully preserved, its most likely reading is dhū, but ḻū is also possible. Compare dha in line 13 which, though slightly damaged, looks very similar. If the upper right part is lost to wear, then thū and ṟū are also conceivable. The upper part of the line's fourth character is definitely lost to the widening of the hole, but it seems to have had a crossbar, so ka is a more likely reading than ra. It is followed by another possible anusvāra that may also be meaningless damage, but since the next character is inscribed at some distance, an anusvāra is more likely. -bhaktāḥ -bhaktāya The plate is worn here, but the reading is unambiguous. -parihāraM -parihāraṁ -nimittaḥṁ -nimittaṁ mḻopaṟṟu mḻoṁpaṟṟu The ARIE report reads the name as mṟōpaṟṟu. I see no anusvāra here. The subscript part of the first character is more likely to be ḻ than ṟ. -nāmā -nāma velḻavaṟṟu Ilavaṟṟu Although this is in all probability the modern village Yellavarru identified in an editorial footnote in RM's edition, RM's reading cannot be right. The first character is probably ve. The subscript part of the second looks like ḻ, but could be ṟ or th. A clumsily reduced l cannot be excluded, but it is definitely not the usual cursive simplification of subscript l. pulgoṭlapabulūru pulgoḷḷipaṟu These characters are quite effaced in the estampage, but all are reasonably clear in the photo. The name is attested in the as yet unedited Pulgoṭlapaṁbuluru grant of Vijayāditya III. Agūnakṣayyaṁ Agūnakṣayya Uttāarataḥ Uttarataḥ kḻocce ḍoḍu ca.Eteṣām madhya- kṟocce dopu mmadhya- If RM's reading at the end of 2r is interpretable, then it may be correct. Both the estampage and the photo are quite clear, but many of the characters can be ambiguous. The first may perhaps also be kṣo. The first character on 2v seems to belong to this phrase, but it may be va rathre than ca. The Sanskrit words from the second character onward are reasonably clear in the photo. kāaroti karotai °pālitaā °pālitā bhūmais bhūmis vasundhaāraāṁ vasundharāM ṣaṣṭhṭi- ṣaṣṭir koṭi-pradānena koṭi-pradānena Aśvaśemedha- Aśvamedha- In this place, śe or ge was first inscribed, then the right-hand side of the consonant was incorporated into an m, but the left and top parts were left in place. aāhur āhuḥ hanti haṁnti bhaāvi- bhāvi- pālayanti pālayaṁti imaṁ imāṁ mūrdhni mūrddhni narendra narendraaiḥ Since the text is meaningful as received, I prefer not to emend to the standard version of this stanza. dānaāni dānāni dharmmārttha- dharmārttha- nirmmaālyāa-vānti- nirmālyāa-mvāntia- -pratimaāni -pratimāni naāma nāma saādhuḥ sādhuḥ sarvvān etaān sarvān etān bhāvinaḥ pārtthivendraāN bhāv-naḥ pāratthivendrāN Seems to be a typo in RM. yaācate yācate rāmadevaḥ Since the reading is clear, intelligible and metrically correct, I do not emend. However, this stanza normally has Rāmabhadra here. dharmma- dharma- -setur -setur nr̥paāṇāṁ nr̥pāṇāṁ asmin ghaghanarāśir asmin dhana-rāśir The problematic is quite worn and faint, but is quite certainly ngha, especially from the photo. Since RM does not mention Dhanarāśi in his discussion, this is probably not a typo in his edition. -bhaānu° -bhānu° prajaānaāṁ prajānāṁ śāśsanāasya li śāśsanasya li The last symbol on the page may be a circle with a concentric dot instad of a spiral.

Seal

Plates

Greetings. From the ocean that is the lineage of the Caḷukyas—who were deliberately appointed to kingship by the Divine Lord Mahāsena, who are protected by the band of Mothers, who are of the Mānavya gotra, who are sons of Hāritī, who attained kingship by the grace of Kauśikī’s boon, who perform the Aśvamedha sacrifice, and whose fame has spread as far as the oceans—had arisen a moon who was Kīrtivarman, who earned his great reputation by his political acumen naya, discipline vinaya and valour. His son was His Majesty King mahārāja Viṣṇuvardhana, who perfumed the complete circle of the quarters with pleasant fragrance from the efflorescence, which is glory, sprouting from the liana that is the victory goddess attained in the clash of many a battle. His son, His Majesty the supremely pious Junior Vallabha King yuva-vallabha-mahārāja Maṅgi, a shelter to the complete world sakala-lokāśraya illuminated by his valour unique in the three worlds, whose pair of feet are tinted by the hues of the rays from the gems fitted to the surfaces of the crowns of all the enemy kings bowed down by fear of the power of his arms, commands all householders kuṭumbin—including foremost the territorial overseers rāṣṭrakūṭa—in Cavuḻpallya district viṣaya as follows.

Let it be known to you that on the occasion of the winter solstice we have given the village named Mḻopaṟṟu with exemption from all taxes, the donation being sanctified by a libation of water, to Maṇḍaśarman, who is thoroughly versed in the Vedas and Vedāṅgas and devoted to the six duties, and who is the grandson of Agniśarman, a hiraṇyakeśin of the Vatsa gotra residing in Vanapaṟṟu and the son of the talented ĀḍiśarmanAlthough the case endings in the text indicate otherwise, I am quite certain on the basis of the structure of the sentence that the donee is Maṇḍaśarman, son of Āḍiśarman and grandson of Agniśarman. According to RM’s commentary, there are three donees: Agniśarman, Suśarman (read by RM where I show a lacuna) and Maṇḍaśarman. This matches the syntax implied by the endings. However, by this reading, only Agniśarman would have a residence, gotra and school; moreover, the next person (the ostensible Suśarman) would be the grandson of Agniśarman with no other family ties specified, while Maṇḍaśarman would (as in my interpretation) be the son of Āḍiśarman (whose name RM reads as Veṁgiśarman), again with no other family ties specified. It is much more logical in my opinion to assume a single Brahmanical lineage of three generations, with residence, gotra and school recorded only for the grandfather, as commonly done in related grants.—to this Maṇḍaśarman who is astiśahasana maṁñcūdhūkaṁI cannot interpret this phrase; see the apparatus to line 11. devoted to his lord Maṅgi Yuvarāja.

Its boundaries are as follows. To the east, Velḻavaṟṟu. To the south, Pulgoṭlapabulūru. To the west, Agūnakṣayyaṁ. Could akṣayya mean a previously granted Brahmanical holding akṣaya-nīvī? To the north, Kḻocce and Ḍoḍu. The donated land is situated in between these. Let no-one pose an obstacle to the enjoyment of rights over it. He who does so shall be conjoined with the five great sins. Vyāsa too has said:

Many kings have granted land, and many have preserved it as formerly granted. Whosoever at any time owns the land, the fruit reward accrued of granting it belongs to him at that time.

He who would seize land, whether given by himself or by another, shall be born as a worm in faeces for sixty thousand years.

A seizer of granted land cannot be purified even by donating ten million cows, nor by performing a hundred Aśvamedhas, nor by constructing a thousand tanks.

It is not actual poison that is properly called poison: it is the property of a Brahmin that is said to be poison. Poison kills just the one man, while seizing the property of a Brahmin destroys his progeny.

Hereby I offer my respectful obeisance añjali to all future kings on earth, born in my lineage and in different royal lineages, who with minds averted from sin observe this provision dharma of mine in its integrity.

The donations given by kings in olden days to generate merit dharma, wealth artha and fame are now comparable to discarded garlands or vomit. What decent man would ever partake of them again?

Over and over again, RāmadevaThe name in this stanza is normally Rāmabhadra. begs all these future rulers: “Each in your own time, you shall respect this bulwark of legality that is universally applicable to kings!”

The executor ājñapti in this matter is the lord īśa Ghanarāśi.Or, given the ending of his name rāśi, perhaps īśa should be understood to mean that Ghanarāśi is Śiva, i.e. a fully initiated Śaiva. His Honour Bhānuśakti, beneficent to subjects

is the writer of this decreeThe text ends abruptly here. See the commentary.

The text ends abruptly with the last line on 3r. I agree with RM that only a very small amount of text seems to be missing here, most probably identifying the writer of the text. RM believes a date was also lost here, but I do not find this likely on the basis of parallel grants. It is not clear whether the last bit of text in line 26 is prose or a garbled continuation of the indravajrā hemistich identifying the executor; nor is it clear whether Ghanarāśi and Bhānuśakti are two separate persons or only one. The intended text may for instance have been something like tac-chāsanasyāsya ca lekha-karttā. The photographs published by the National Museum include a picture of 3v, which bears no trace of writing there whatsoever. Perhaps the text was intended to be complete as it is. The last character, li, may have been intended as an abbreviation for likhita, and the symbol after it might be an abbreviation marker. Assuming that the second hemistich intended by the composer was shortened meaningfully by the scribe to fit the text on the plate, it seems most likely that Ghanarāśi was the executor and Bhānuśakti was the writer.

The issuer of these plates was identified in the ARIE report as Jayasiṁha I on the grounds that the seal bears the legend sarvasiddhi and only Kīrtivarman and Viṣṇuvardhana (I) are mentioned as ancestors in the genealogy. RM, however, asserts that maṅgi-yuva-vallabha-mahārāja is clearly the donor. While neither instance of the name maṁgi is entirely clear, the reading is indeed quite secure. RM adds that, since Maṅgi Yuvarāja’s seals have the legend vijayasiddhi, the seal may not be the original seal of this grant. He further supposes that reference to the closer ancestry of Maṅgi Yuvarāja was apparently left out by oversight, which I find preposterous. His editor in EI (probably K. G. Krishnan) adds in a footnote that there may have been a mix up of two different plates at a distant time, which is even more preposterous. Moreover, RM notes that the donor’s epithet is sakala-lokāśraya in line 6, but says only that this means the same as Maṅgi Yuvarāja’s regular epithet sarvalokāśraya. However, the two epithets are evidently not interchangeable. It is now known that Jayasiṁha II also used sarvasiddhi on his seals, but no other ruler of the dynasty did. The question of the issuer needs further study.

Some details to consider are the following. 1, The phraseology of the grant has much in common with known grants of Maṅgi Yuvarāja. However, it has just as much in common with grants of Jayasiṁha I and Viṣṇuvardhana II, most especially with the Koṇeki grant of Viṣṇuvardhana II. Particularly noteworthy is the fact that all grants of Maṅgi known to me commence with a more mature version of the stock text śrīmatāṁ sakala-. 2, The genealogy begins with Kīrtivarman, whereas grants of Maṅgi known to me begin either with Jayasiṁha I or with Kubja Viṣṇuvardhana. Genealogies beginning with Kīrtivarman are found in practically all grants of Jayasiṁha I, the single known grant of Indra Bhaṭṭāraka, and one grant of Viṣṇuvardhana II (of the seven that I know). 2, The genealogy begins with Kīrtivarman, whereas grants of Maṅgi known to me begin either with Jayasiṁha I or with Kubja Viṣṇuvardhana. Genealogies beginning with Kīrtivarman are found in all grants of Jayasiṁha I that I know, one grant of Viṣṇuvardhana II (of the two I know), and the single known grant of Indra Bhaṭṭāraka. 3, The exhortatory verses are uncommon. The first five are identical (down to their details and their sequence) to those in the Pulgoṭlapaṁbuluru grant of Vijayāditya III and the Uṟuvuṭūru grant of Vijayāditya III, and each of the five (or a variant thereof) also occurs, not necessarily in the same order, in the Ciṁbuluru plates of Vijayāditya III (with the lines in a different sequence). Variants of stanza 4 occur sporadically in grants of Viṣṇuvardhana II and Vijayāditya I, but the first closely related variant is in a grant of Kali Viṣṇuvardhana, and its only exact parallels are in the above grants of Vijayāditya III. Stanza 6 is common in the grants of the Bādāmi Cālukyas, but in the Veṅgī corpus it is only paralleled in the Peddāpurappāḍu plates (set 2) of Viṣṇuvardhana II and the Bezvāḍa plates of Bhīma I. Variants of stanza VII occur sporadically in the corpus, but variants where the speaker is named Rāmadeva rather than Rāmabhadra only occur in grants of Vijayāditya III. 4, I have not verified this, but the elaborate headmarks of this inscription (usually long horizontal lines with the ends curved up) seem late to me. It may be that a later scribe was attempting to imitate an earlier style of writing, but 9th-century production without any attempt at a different writing style seems most likely. A more detailed study of the palaeography is warranted.

All in all, it seems likely that the plates were inscribed at a time several generations after Maṅgi Yuvarāja. Given the elegant execution of the writing and the plates’ overall similarity to those of Vijayāditya III, it is in my opinion likely that the present grant was legitimately produced in Vijayāditya III’s chancellery, and is probably a reissue of a damaged earlier grant.Vijayāditya III also donated the adjacent village in his Pulgoṭlapaṁbuluru grant. Given the presumably original seal and the archaic preamble, the original on which the text is based probably hailed from the time of Jayasiṁha I, whose genealogy is correctly presented and who is also known to have used the epithets sakala-lokāśraya and trailokya-vikrama, applied to the issuer in the present text. The name of Maṅgi Yuvarāja may have been inserted into the new text at the insistence of the owner of the earlier grant, but this insertion has rendered the genealogy inaccurate, and the repeated mention of Maṅgi in lines 11-12 is unintelligible. The exhortatory stanzas would have been added according to the custom of the day (there may have been none or much fewer in the original), and the mutilated colophon may be the best copy of a damaged original that the latter-day scribes could manage.

Another fanciful way to explain the inconsistencies would be to assume that the original grant on which this text is based was issued by Jayasiṁha I’s younger brother who subsequently reigned as Indra Bhaṭṭāraka. Although there is no evidence for this, his birth name may have been Maṅgi and he may have been his elder brother’s yuvarāja. If so, then yuvarāja may have stuck to him as a permanent epithet, explaining to some degree why his grandson bore the name Maṅgi Yuvarāja even as a crowned king.

Reported in 12A/1919-209 with discussion at 99. Edited from inked estampages by S. S. Ramachandra Murthy (), with facsimiles,No image of the seal has been published. without translation. The present edition by Dániel Balogh is based on a collation of Ramachandra Murthy's edition with his facsimiles and with photographs published by the National Museum.http://museumsofindia.gov.in/repository/record/nat_del-56-151-1-8727; http://museumsofindia.gov.in/repository/record/nat_del-56-151-2-8728; http://museumsofindia.gov.in/repository/record/nat_del-56-151-3-8729; accessed 31 March 2021.

12A/1919-209 99