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

84 CORPUS INSCRIPTIONUM INDICARUM, VOL. III.
The second result, Thursday, the 21st June, A.D. 484, is the only one that
answers to the week-day mentioned in the record. And a reference to Appendix II.
Table VI. will shew that it so answers, not only by Prof. K. L. Chhatre's Tables, but
also by the Ârya-Siddhânta, and by all the other leading authorities. It answers, as is
required, to the treatment of the Gupta year as a northern Śaka year; though it does
not, in itself, prove conclusively either the exact epoch of the era, or the scheme of the
year; for the reason that, being a date in a bright fortnight, this Âshâḍha śukla 12 was
the same tithi, and fell on the same solar day, represented by the 21st June, all over
India, in the southern as well as the northern Śaka-Saṁvat 407 current, and in southern
Vikrama-Saṁvat 541 current, as well as in northern Vikrama-Saṁvat 542 current. It
gives Śaka-Saṁvat 407 current (A.D. 484-85), as the equivalent of the given current
Gupta year. And finally, as it is obtained by applying the resulting year, Śaka-Saṁvat
406, as an expired year, so that the given tithi really belongs to Śaka-Saṁvat 407 current,
it shews that, in following Albêrûnî's statement and adding two hundred. and forty-one,
what is really accomplished is the conversion of a given current Gupta-Valabhî year into
an expired Saka year, by which we obtain precisely the basis that is wanted for working
out results by Hindu Tables, viz. the last Śaka year expired before the commence-
ment of the current Śaka year corresponding to a given current Gupta-
Valabhî year; and that the running difference between current Gupta-Valabhî and
current Śaka years, is two hundred and forty-two.¹
The Verâwal Inscription of Valabhî-Saṁvat 945.
In this connection, I will notice next the Verâwal inscription of the Chaulukya
king Arjunadêva, on a stone at the temple of Harsaṭadêvî at Verâwal, the modern
representative of the ancient Sômnâthpâṭan, in Kâṭhiâwâḍ. This date furnishes a specially
crucial test; partly because it is a date in a dark fortnight; and partly because, coming
from Kâṭhiâwâḍ, and belonging to a comparatively late period, and being mentioned in the
same record with a Vikrama year, there was a special chance of finding that its details had
been confused with, or rather had been subordinated to, the reckoning of the southern
Vikrama era, which was, and is, the original national era in Kâṭhiâwâḍ and the neighbour-
ing country of Gujarât. It will be seen, however, that this has not happened.
The details of this date (from Dr. Hultzsch's published text; Ind. Ant. Vol. XI. p. 242,
line 2 ff.) are — śrī-Viśvanâtha-pratibaddha-naujananâṁ bôdhaka-rasûla-Mahammada-
saṁvat 662 tathâ śrī-nṛipa-Vikrama-saṁvat 1320 tathâ śrīmad-Valabhî-saṁ 945 tathâ
¹ Dr. R. G. Bhandarkar arrived at the conclusion (Early History of the Dekkan, p. 99) that the
addition of 241 would turn a past Gupta year into a past Śaka year; and the addition of 242, a past
Gupta year into a current Śaka year. This result is due to the general mistake as regards the epoch
of the Śaka era (see page 64 above, note 2).—For an instance of the actual use by Hindus of the
additive quantity 242, see page 26 above, note 2.