Dirghasi inscription of Vanapati

The stone and the site

G. V. Ramamurti described Dirghasi as “a small village four miles north of Kalingapatam in the Ganjam district”.¹ At one end of the village is a rocky hill called Durga-metta.¹ Remains of a temple lie scattered over the place, and an image of Durga was still worshipped in a small cave.¹

The inscription is on a large stone slab, about two yards high, standing near the hill.¹ Ramamurti edited it in Epigraphia Indica IV (1896–97), from an inked estampage (ink copy) supplied by E. Hultzsch.¹ See Dirghasi.

Language and script

The inscription is in twenty-three lines, “the first sixteen being in Sanskrit verse and the rest in Telugu verse”.¹ The alphabet is Telugu, “closely resembling that used in the inscriptions of Anantavarman’s time”.¹

Ramamurti noted that the Telugu part is a poem of eight lines in one metre, followed by four in another.²³ He found it “not good” as a poem.²³ He noted that its nasal sounds should be read as half-anusvara (a half-nasal) for the metre to work.²³ He had not yet seen the half-anusvara sign for this sound in any inscription.²³ See Language and literature.

The record

The record names Vanapati or Banapati, son of Gokarna, a Brahmin of the Atreya gotra (clan).² He was a provincial chief (mandalika) in the service of “king Rajaraja of the Ganga dynasty”.² In Saka 997 (Saka is an Indian way of counting years) he built a hall for dancing in front of the temple of Durga, in the town of Dirgharasi or Dirghasi.² He also gave a lamp to burn for ever, and his wife Padmavati gave another lamp.²

He is called a hereditary door-keeper (pratiharin).² But Vanapati appears from the record to have been the commander-in-chief of Rajaraja’s forces.²

The Sanskrit verses praise him as “a conflagration to the great forest (which was) the army of the Choda king”.⁴ They say that, “having often defeated the king of Vengi, he took away the whole heap of his property”.⁴ He also sent a certain Daddarnava to the god of death.⁴ The last verse says that he “defeated in battle the kings of the Vengi country, Kimidi, Kosala, the Gidrisingi country and the Odda country”.⁵

Interpretation

Ramamurti took the Saka year as expired, which gives 1075–76, towards the end of Rajaraja’s reign.² He identified the Chola king with Rajendra-Choda, that is Kulottunga I, “whose daughter Rajasundari was married to Rajaraja”.² He took the king of Vengi to be the Eastern Chalukya Vijayaditya VII.²

He compared the victories with two statements in the Saka 1040 grant of Rajaraja’s son Anantavarman.² That grant says that Rajaraja defeated the Dramilas, the Cholas, and protected Vijayaditya of Vengi against them.² Ramamurti took Kimidi to be the zamindari (estate) of that name in Ganjam.² He took Kosala to be the upper valley of the Mahanadi, and Odda or Utkala to be Orissa.² He could not identify Gidrisingi.²

Robert Sewell read the claimed victories over Vengi and the Cholas as a reference to two northern campaigns.⁶ One was made by Kulottunga while he was still an Eastern Chalukya prince.⁶ The other was made by the Chola king Virarajendra.⁶ Neither of these kings claimed to have conquered Kalinga.⁶ See Rajaraja I, Kulottunga I and Vijayaditya VII.

V. Rangacharya summarised the record in 1919, under Dirghasi in the Srikakulam (then Chicacole) taluk.⁷ He noted that it was No. 271 of the Madras collection for 1896.⁷

Footnotes

1. G. V. Ramamurti, “Dirghasi Inscription of Vanapati; Saka-Samvat 997”, Epigraphia Indica IV (1896–97), p. 314 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷

2. Ramamurti, “Dirghasi Inscription of Vanapati” (1897), p. 315 and notes 1–4 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶ ↩¹⁷ ↩¹⁸

3. Ramamurti, “Dirghasi Inscription of Vanapati” (1897), p. 316, note 13 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

4. Ramamurti, “Dirghasi Inscription of Vanapati” (1897), p. 317, translation, verses 4–6 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³

5. Ramamurti, “Dirghasi Inscription of Vanapati” (1897), p. 318, translation, verse 9 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩

6. Robert Sewell, The Historical Inscriptions of Southern India (1932), p. 84 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

7. V. Rangacharya, A Topographical List of the Inscriptions of the Madras Presidency, Vol. I (1919), p. 683, Ganjam No. 142 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩²