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

144 CORPUS INSCRIPTIONUM INDICARUM, VOL. III.
Saṁvat 499, expired;" and, in quoting it and several subsequent years, would probably
be careful to connect with each year a word distinctly meaning "expired." In course of
time, however, such precision of expression would come to seem superfluous to them;
and, in issuing their almanacs, they would drop the word "expired," and would write,
for instance, simply "Śakē 510 Chaitra-māsa-śukla-pakshaḥ." It would cause no
difference or inconvenience to them; because any initiate would know that this really
designated the bright fortnight of the month Chaitra of Śaka-Saṁvat 511 current after
Śaka-Saṁvat 510 had expired. The people at large, however, including persons who
would use the almanacs for practical purposes without being properly initiated into the
application of them, would be thrown back in their reckoning by a year; and doubtless
at first a good deal of inconvenience and confusion might result. But this would soon
be forgotten; or might, for the sake of convenience, be intentionally put aside. And
thus they would very quickly arrive at the understanding, by which, in Northern and
Western India, Śaka-Saṁvat 1808 answers, popularly, as a current year, not as an expired
year, to the period from the 5th April, A.D. 1886, to the 24th March, A.D. 1887.
Postscript.
In connection with my remarks, on page 140 above, regarding the Sāyana-Pañchāṅg
for Śaka-Saṁvat 1807 and 1808, I would add that I had drawn Mr. Sh. B. Dikshit's
attention to the circumstances of the case; and I now find that, in their almanac for
Śaka-Saṁvat 1810 (expired) (A.D. 1888-89), the editors have reverted to the phraseology
used in their almanac for Śaka-Saṁvat 1807 (expired.)