8 H. Blochmann — Beglar's Inscriptions from Bohfds, Bihar. [Jan. 



II. 



From the inner entrance to tlie Palace of Rohtas. The letters are in 

 beautiful JVasta'Ug^, and numerous arabesques and flowers are between the 

 lines and the letters. The Persian inscription measures 6 ft. 1 in. by 1 ft. 

 10 in. ; and the Sanskrit inscription on the left of it, 2 ft. 4 in. by 1 ft. 

 10 in. Babu Rajendralala Mitra has promised to furnish a reading and trans- 

 lation of the latter. The metre of the chronogram is ]SIuzara\ 



This cliTOiiogram (was written) in the time of Sultan Jalal uddin Mu- 

 hammad Akhar Badshah. i Ghaz i, — may God perpetuate his kingdom and 

 his rule ! 



1. When the firm gate of the edifice was completed, the gate of heaven ailed from 

 envy. 



2. When the date of its erection appeared to Genius, he said, ' E a j a h Man 

 Singh has erected a firm building.' 



Written on the 27th of the honored month of Eajah, 1005, of the Alfi Era. • 

 The family priest (xyurohit) [was] Sri Dhar ; the Daroghah, Balbhadr the Brah- 

 man ; the architect {fan^atgar), Ustad Mubarak. 



This is the first inscription that I have seen, in which the year is 

 expressed in Alfi years — an invention of the emperor Akbar. As the 

 ' restorer of the millennium' and founder of a new faith, he declared that 

 Islam had done its work, and ordered a history of the first millennium to be 

 written, in which the years were counted from the death of the Prophet, 

 instead of from the flight (Mj'raTi) to Madinah. The death of the Prophet 

 was euphemistically designated ' rililaf , ' departure' ; but a manifest slur 

 cast on Islam lay in the statement that Islam commenced with the death of 

 the Prophet, as if his whole life belonged to what Muhammadan historians 

 style ihQJdhiliyyat, or 'time of ignorance', i. e. the pre-islamitic period of 

 Muhammadan history ; vide Kin Translation I, p. 195 ; and Prof. Dowson, 

 in Elliot's History, V, on the Tarilcli i Alfi. 



The chronogram of the inscription is ambiguous, on account of the 

 Jimnzah in ^J^. ; but as the date has also been expressed in numerals, it is 



