1877.] Rajendralala Mitra — On the ILilhlijumpM Inscription. 1G5 



Mr. Prinsep's translation had been prepared under many disadvantages, 

 and, in concluding what he called his " harried and imperfect notice," Prin- 

 sep deemed it necessary to apologize, for " offering it to the Society in so im- 

 mature a shape." With the cast before him the speaker therefore thought 

 it advisable to go over the work, and prepare an independent translation, 

 which resulted in many changes and emendations which have materially 

 altered the sense, and given quite a different turn to several salient points 

 of the record, particularly in the first six lines which were in a better state 

 of jDreservation than the subsequent ones. 



The author of the record was one Aira, a usurper, who overthrew the 

 dominion of an ancient king of Kalinga and, himself becoming the sovereign, 

 repaired the city walls, built Chaityas, caused a tank to be excavated, enter- 

 tained the people with feasting and music, allied himself with the king of 

 a neighbouring hill by marrying his daughter, won over the clergy by rich 

 presents, and had some caves excavated for their use. The most im^^ortant 

 fact mentioned in the record was the overthrow, by this usurper, of king 

 Nanda of Magadha, and this carried him back to the middle of the fourth 

 century before Christ. It was not distinctly stated which of the nine Nandas 

 he overcame in battle ; but assuming the potentate meant to be the last of the 

 line, the time would be a few years before the invasion of India by Alexan- 

 der the Great in 327 B. C, and make the record the oldest yet found in 

 India. Dr. Mitra was of opinion that the caves referred to by Aira were 

 the Queen's Palace and its surrounding caves, and the reasons on which he 

 based this conclusion he had, he said, given at length in the forthcoming 

 volume of his Antiquities of Orissa. 



There were three monograms on the record. The first of these was 

 very like the Tantric symbol called Kurmachakra or the " tortoise sym- 

 bol." The second looked like a lamp post, but Dr. Mitra took it for the 

 " bo tree" with a railing round its base. The third was partly like Swas- 

 tika and partly the JSfanddvarta, the emblem of the twenty-third Jain, Ara. 

 It was avowedly a Jain emblem ; but the Buddhists looked upon it with 

 great veneration, and many of their ancient princes adopted it for the 

 legend of their seals, and impressed it on their coins. In the Tantras of the 

 Hindus it was highly extolled for its mystic virtues. Nor was it confined 

 to India alone, for in its simple form it occurred, according to King's Gnos- 

 tics, on the oldest Greek coins, on Etruscan vases, on the Newton stone, 

 Aberdeen, on Celtic monuments, and in ecclesiastical sculj^tures, styled there 

 the Tetragrammaton. Similarly, the Ibis worshippers of Egypt marked 

 with it the sacred vases of their goddess before using them at their rites. 

 It occm-red further among the Gnostics ; and the Free -Masons had adopted 

 it as one of their mystic symbols. It was the same with the mark recom- 

 mended to be placed on the forehead of the elect; in Ezekiel, and on the 



