870 Facsimiles of Ancient Inscriptions. [Oct. 



(Rashtra hums), but still they were called Ghorowa or Gond*, which 

 induces me still to think they must have reigned somewhere in these 

 parts. The villages mentioned have not the slightest resemblance 

 in name to any in this district, nor can I discover any at all like them 

 at Hoshangdbdd or Jubalpur. 



" You will observe that the grantee in the sanad is a Chaubi, (Chatur- 

 vedi,) and the present possessor a gosain, which shews that it must 

 have changed hands though the gosain tells me it has been in his 

 hands for forty generations, — a piece of gross exaggeration ! No one 

 could read or decipher it, and it was looked upon with great venera- 

 tion and respect : indeed I could hardly induce the man to lend it 

 to me." 



My friend Mr. "Ommanney has been very successful in deciphering 

 these plates, there being but few places in which a careful collation 

 with the aid of my pandit has suggested an amendment of his reading. 

 One of the most obvious corrections is that of the name, on the seal, 

 and in the second line of the 3rd page where the plate is much worn, 

 viz. Yudhasura in lieu of Yudhdstara, which the sadar dmin apparent- 

 ly supposed a corruption of Yudhishthira. The first name also read as 

 Datta Ra'ja should be Durgga Raja. 



But the most material correction applies to the date, which Mr. 

 Ommanney interprets as Samvat 1630, or A. D. 1573. The alphabe- 

 tical type at once proves that this supposition is many centuries too 

 modern, nor do I clearly see how the pandit could so far have misled 

 his master in the translation, seeing that the text is read by Mr. 

 Ommanney himself and the pandit s'ateshu shatkena trins'ottareshu. 

 The obvious meaning of this is six hundred and thirty besides, — just 

 about the period we should have assigned to the writing on com- 

 parison with the Gupta and Gujerdti styles. But it is not at all 

 certain that this is the correct reading, or that the era can be assumed 

 to be that of Vikramaditya. The precise letters in modern character 

 are, 



salca kdle samvatsare s'ateshu ? ? trins'ottareshu. 

 Now in the first place, the era is here that of Saka or Salivdhana : 

 in the next, after the word s'ateshu, hundreds, in the plural num- 

 ber, two unknown characters follow which may be very probably 

 numerals. The second has much resemblance to the modern c or 



* The word supposed to be Ghorowa is precisely the same as that on the seal, 

 the surname of the raja, Yudha'sura, the ' hero in battle,' so that the connec- 

 tion with the Gond tribes cannot be thence deduced. — Ed. 



