Vol. X, No. 11. J Four Forged Grants from Faridpur. 429 



at Bod h- Gay a and Ganjam with which he compares this grant." 

 The fact is that in these four grants characters of two or three 

 different centuries are found to be used side by side. In out- 

 of-the-way places it is often found that archaic characters are 

 still being used when a much later form of the alphabet is 

 found to be current in busier and more populous localities. 

 But nowhere will be found that characters used in two or 

 three different centuries are used in one and the same inscrip- 

 tion. I shall now take each of these inscriptions one by one. 



1. The Grant of Dharmmaditya — the year 3. 



In a previous paper I have already shown that two forms 

 of Ha and La have been used in this inscription. 1 The first 

 form is the Eastern variety of the early Gupta alphabet and 

 the other the Western variety. In the Dhanaidaha Grant of 

 Kumaragupta I of the Gupta year 113 we find that the Wes- 

 tern form of the Gupta alphabet was already being used in North- 

 Eastern India with forms of the Eastern variety. So it mast 

 be taken for granted that at that time the older Eastern form 

 of the alphabet was gradually dying out in North-Eastern Pro 

 vinces and the Western form taking its place. So it is not 

 likely than the same admixture of Eastern and Western forms 

 would be found in an inscription which is at least 150 years 

 later than the Dhanaidaha Grant. Mr. Pargiter's analysis of my 

 treatment of the characters of the fourth inscription is very 

 faulty. He asserts that my proposition about the changes in the 

 alphabet of North-Eastern India in the first decades of the 5th 

 century a.d. " must be revised in the light of the three grants 

 edited by him." His arguments are curious in the extreme. 

 He goes on saying M in the grant A of 531 a.d. both forms of 

 H are used, the Eastern 9 times and the Western 6 times." 

 The first point is the date of the grant A. Mr. Pargiter arrives 

 at 531 a.d. after assuming that Dr. Hoernle's assertion 

 about Dharmmaditya's identity with Ya^oclharmman is cor- 

 rect and that the latter began to reign in 628 a.d. In his pre- 



vious article on the subject he says ki He (Dr. Hoernle) thinks 

 that the Emperor Dharmmaditya is the Emperor YaSodharm- 

 man." I would like to enquire whether Dr. Hoernle can cite 

 ^ny reliable proof in support of this assertion. I am sure that 

 among the published records of Indian antiquities there is noth- 

 ing whatsoever which can be cited in support of this pro- 

 posed identification. The three inscriptions of Yasodharmman 

 published by Dr. Fleet are the only sources of information 

 about him and they contain nothing about the identity ot 

 Dharmmaditya and YaSodharmman, or anything that will 



1 Journal of the Asiatic So ety of Bengal. Vol. VII, p. 290. 



