592 Interpretation of the inscriptions [Jul*, 



because of their uselessness, or for the sake of amusement they shall 

 Hot be injured. Animals that prey on life shall not be cherished. 



In the three four-monthly periods (of the year) on the evening of 

 the full moon, during the three (holy) days, namely, the fourteenth, 



10 no ripetaviye 14 ; ddve anathdyevd vihdsiyevd no ripeyitaviye' 15 : 



11 jivenajive no pusitaviye 16. Tisuchdtummdsisu tisdyam punnamdsiyam 



*Nt ^R^T *TrWT ^fW i TOfflW? ^faRJT ^T 3FW. But the 

 expression is awkward from the repetition, (particularly in the original) of the 

 participle kakate with its gerund kataviye. Another very plausible reading 

 occurs to the pandit ; making dsanmasike vadhi kakate represent the three holy 

 months of the Buddhist as of the brahmanical year : — ^rf%«THlf% VTT^ W^^ 

 1 in the months of Aswina, Bhddra, and Karkata (or Kartik), to which these 

 prohibitions would particularly apply : but there are two strong objections to 

 this reading, 1st, that the order of the months is inverted, Kdrtik, the first in 

 order being found last in the enumeration ; and 2nd, the gerund kataviye 

 would be left without specification of the act prohibited. Neither of these is 

 however an insuperable objection, as the act had been just before set forth, and 

 the months may be placed in the order of their sanctity. The construction of the 

 gu-cceeding passages may determine which reading is entitled to a preference. 



14. This passage varies little from the Sanskrit ff75^fj^^T ifj ^fqgr?^fT: 

 from the root^rqf to hurt, or injure. I was led to this root from the impossibility 

 of placing the letter ^ of the inscription in any other place in our alphabet than 

 as ^g. In the Girnar inscription the ordinary ^ or r is rendered by j 

 which is not to be found in the lats of Delhi, Allahabad, &c. where r is always 

 expressed by A I, or a curved form of r J f nearly similar in figure. Adding 

 the vowel mark ^ or i, we have precisely p to express the short sharp r\, in 

 which the burring sound of the r is not convertible so easily into the more 

 liquid sound of /. The aspirated letter vnph must necessarily be represented 

 by simple (., p ; at least the corresponding aspirate has not yet been met with 

 n the stone. 



15. The Sanskrit version of this passage hardly differs from the Magadhi f 

 TTT^StT: ^iHlTsN"T fa^TWT ^T ^farT^T:. The termination differs only from 

 the circumstance of the Sanskrit masculine or feminine being replaced by the 

 neuter in the vernacular, as in the Pali language. The contrast, " whether useless, 

 or whether for amusement," does not sound to us so striking as ' whether for use 

 or for amusement,' might have done ; but the meaning of the injunction ig 

 that even the uselessness of the object shall not be an excuse for depriving 

 it of life. ^ ^ 



16. Jivenajive £ fa _]_ £ fa might admit of three interpretations : ' alive 

 or not alive' — jiva najive, i. e. either living or dead, but this is at variance with 

 the gerund Jt UHj A A Jb j Sanskrit ^T^Tf^rT^ITJ not to be nurtured. Again 

 ^ «p»_j. i s one name for a pheasant, or chak6r. But the most obvious and 

 most accordant interpretation is * that which liveth by life,' to wit a carnivorou g 

 animal ; which a strict Buddhist could not countenance with consistency. 



