गुप्त अभिलेख संग्रह (जे. एफ. फ्लीट - गुप्त सम्राटों एवं परवर्ती नरेशों के ऐतिहासिक पाषाण व ताम्रलेख)

96 CORPUS INSCRIPTIONUM INDICARUM, VOL. III.
records, was not apparent. And it only became clear on Mr. Bendall's discovery of the
Gôlmâḍhiṭôl inscription of the Mahârâja Śivadêva I. of Mânagṛiha, which he published
originally in the Ind. Ant. Vol. XIV. p. 97 f., and has given again, with a slight correction
in the reading of the date, in his Journey in Nêpâl and Northern India, p. 72, and Plate
viii. This inscription is dated in the year 316, without any specification of the era. But
the clue to the interpretation of the date is given by its mention of the Mahâsâmanta
Aṁśuvarman, as the contemporary¹ of Śivadêva I. Aṁśuvarman's approximate date, viz.
about A.D. 637, was very well known from Hiuen Tsiang's mention of him.² And, as the
Nêpâl series included three inscriptions of Aṁśuvarman himself, dated in the years 34, 39,
and 44 or 45 of an unspecified era, and another, of Jishṇugupta, dated in the year 48, and
mentioning Aṁśuvarman, Dr. Bhagwanlal Indraji very properly referred these dates to the
era running from the accession of Harshavardhana of Kanauj, and commencing³ in A.D.
606. This much being quite cert in, it follows that the date the year 316 for Śivadêva
I., the contemporary of Aṁśuvarman, must of necessity be referred to a starting-point just
about three hundred years before the Harsha era. And the era which exactly meets the
requirements of the case is the Gupta era; for, 316 + A.D. 319-20 = A.D. 635-36; which
is in due accordance with the recorded dates that we have for Aṁśuvarman in the Harsha
era, representing from A.D. 639 to 649 or 650.
As regards the present inscription of Mânadêv its palæography, as well as a general
consideration of the historical results, shews that the year 386, quoted in it, belongs to the
same series with the year 316 that is quoted in the Gôlmâḍhiṭôl inscription of Śiv. lêva I.
And, accordingly, this record gives us, for calculation, Gupta-Saṁvat 386, current; the
month Jyêshṭha (May-June); the bright fortnight; the first tithi or lunar day; the Rôhiṇî
nakshatra or lunar mansion; and the Abhijit muhûrta or thirtieth part of the day and
night. And, on the analogy of the Verâwal inscription of Valabhî-Saṁvat 945, the given
tithi should belong to Gupta-Saṁvat 386 + 242 = Śaka-Saṁvat 628 current (A.D. 705-
706); and the calculation should be made with the basis of Śaka-Saṁvat 627 expired.
Making the calculations by the Sûrya-Siddhânta, and applying the results to the
longitude of Khâṭmâṇḍu, Mr. Sh. B. Dikshit finds that, with the basis of Śaka-Saṁvat
627 expired, the given tithi, belonging to Śaka-Saṁvat 628 current, ended on Tuesday,
¹ This is also recorded in the other inscription of Śivadêva I., No. 5 of Dr. Bhagwanlal Indraji's
Nêpâl series, Ind. Ant. Vol. IX. p. 168 ff. But, unfortunately for the general chronological results
arrived at by him from those inscriptions,—which involved the application of the Vikrama era for the
interpretation of such of the Nêpâl dates as belong really to the Gupta era,—the date of Śivadêva I.
is there broken away and lost.
² See Beal's Buddh. Rec. West. World, Vol. II. p. 81; also Ind. Ant. Vol. XIII. p. 422, and Vol.
XIV. p. 345.
³ On this point see a note in Appendix IV. below.