

x Vroceedings of the Asiatic Society. [Jan. 1845. 



gold coins, discovered in the village of Heeolee in the Malwan Talooka of the Rut- 

 nagherry Collectorate, and at the same time to forward a copy of a descriptive me- 

 morandum by the Secretary to the Bombay Branch of the Uoyal Asiatic Society. 

 Bombay Castle, \2th December, 1844. M. Escombe, 



Secretary to Government. 



Notice by the Secretary of the Society on ten H indie gold coins, found at the village 

 of Hewli in the Southern Konkan, and presented by Government; also on a collection 

 of gold Zodiac coins of the Emperor Jehangir. 



The ten gold coins transmitted by Government, for the acceptance of the Society, 

 weigh each — grains, and have generally, on one side, the figure of a lion, with an in- 

 scription below on Telagu letters, Baliji Shri, which may be translated prosperity 

 to the Bali, and which are oblations of food offered, at the four cardinal points, to 

 Indra, god of the firmament, Yama judge of the dead, Varuna the ocean, and Soma 

 the moon** Two of the coins are hammered, and quite plain on one side ; having 

 on the other, stamped symbols for the four preceding deities, indicated by letters, 

 among which I recognize the Telagu letter k standing for Yama, and the cave 

 ch for Soma. The centre symbol must therefore be intended for Vivaswa, or 

 the sun. On the reverse of six of the coins we find written within a circle the 

 word Rudra, a name for Siva ; and on another of them, the Trisul, or emblem of Siva, 

 with an inscription below in Deva Nagari or Shrimanya Devaya S^JfJc^recfJiJ* 

 to the prosperous god ; this last is the newest of the series, and indicates the establish- 

 ment of the Saivite worship. 



In the McKenzie collection of Hindoo gold coins, two of them are enumerated as the 

 Sinha Mudra Fanam, or the Fanam with the lion impression, without any further 

 information being given regarding them. These, and the ones now under considera- 

 tion, may, with much probability, be assigned to the successors of the Andhra kings of 

 Telingana, the Narapati sovereigns of Warangal; who appear to have been origi- 

 nally feudatories of the Chalukya kings of Kalyani. This family is known by the name 

 of the Kakataya princes of Warangal, who at the commencement of their career, in 

 the end of the eleventh century of our era, were Jains. Their original residence was 

 Anumakonda, from whence, sometime after Sal 1010, A. D. 1088, these princes remov- 

 ed to Warangal, which became their capital, and represented the chief Hindu state 

 of Southern India, till destroyed by the Mahomedans during the reign of Ghias-ad-din 

 Toghluk of Delhi, Hejirah 721, A. D. 1321. The then reigning Prince of Warangal 

 is called, in Colonel Brigg's translation of Ferishta, Sudder Dew, being an evident 

 mistake for his real name Rudra Deva ; whose possessions appear to have been 

 bounded on the North-west by those of Rama, Raja of Devagiri, the modern Daola- 

 tabad. 



The coins now submitted for examination, having on the reverse the name of Rudra, 

 may have been struck during the reign of the prince just mentioned ; but there are 

 good "rounds for assigning them a higher antiquity, or the beginning of A. D. 1100, a3 

 at this time the second of the Kakataya princes of Warangal, named Rudra Deva, 

 adopted the Saiva in place of the Jain faith, and built many temples to Siva or Ma- 



* See perpetual obligations of a householder in Wilson's translation of the Vishnu Purana, 

 Quarto, p. 302. 



