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

20 CORPUS INSCRIPTIONUM INDICARUM, VOL. III.
reading was unfortunately accepted without further investigation; and has stood up to the
present time. And, in particular, it was most emphatically endorsed by Mr. Thomas, who,
in 1876, and again in 1881, stated that he had previously had doubts as to the correctness
of the reading and translation, but had then become quite satisfied concerning it, from a
personal comparison of Dr. Bhau Daji's materials with others.¹ It is undoubtedly only to
this erroneous opinion, that we must attribute Mr. Thomas' later belief ² that on certain
coins of 'Syalapati,' he could read the syllables Gu and Gupta, with possible indications of
even Guptasya, shewing, it was supposed, that the dates on these coins referred to an era
of Gupta, or the era of the Guptas. These, however, are purely imaginary readings. And
the fact remains that, in the Junâgaḍh inscription, the expression Guptasya kâla does not
occur. And,—apart from the obvious meaning of the words; and from the fact, which
will be insisted on more strongly further on, that the Mahârâja Gupta, the founder of the
family, being only a feudatory Mahârâja, had not the power of establishing an era at all,—
that, in the real reading Gupta-prakâle, we are to interpret the first member of the com-
pound as representing the genitive plural, not singular, is expressly indicated by the use of
the full genitive plural, Guptânâm, governed by kâla, in another date in line 27 of the same
inscription. Of course, both these passages connect the era with the Guptas, as belong-
ing to them, and as being used by them; which had then been the case, so far as their epi-
graphical records go, for at least three generations. But not either of them suffices to
shew that it had been established by them; or even that it had, at that time, acquired the
technical name of the "Gupta era." And what the first expression really shews, is, simply
that the date was being recorded in an era which was new to Kâthiâwâḍ, and was not
the customary era of that part of the country.
In dated records, the genitive plural, Guptânâm, occurs again in line 2 of the
Kahâum pillar inscription of Skandagupta, No. 15, page 65. But there it is gov-
erned by vaṁśa, in vaṁśa-jasya · "of Skandagupta, who is born in the lineage of the
Guptas." So, also, we have Gupt-ânvayânâm in line 1 of the Udayagiri cave inscrip-
tion of the year 106, No. 61, page 258. But it is governed by kulasya; "in the augment-
ing sovereignty of the family of those who belong to the lineage of the Guptas." These
two passages, therefore, do not bear on the question at all.
Again, in the grants of the Parivrâjaka Mahârâjas Hastin and Saṁkshôbha,
No. 21, page 93, to No. 23, page 106, and No. 25, page 112, we have the expression Gupta-
nṛipa-râjya-bhuktau, "in the enjoyment of sovereignty by the Gupta kings." And this
¹ Archaeol. Surv. West. Ind. Vol. II. p. 22; and Jour. R. As. Soc. N. S. Vol. XIII. p. 538.
² See Sir E. Clive Bayley's "Remarks on certain Dates occurring on the Coins of the Hind
Kings of Kâbul," in the Numismatic Chronicle, Third Series, Vol. II. p. 128 ff.