66 
N. N. Vasu — Copper-plate Inscription of Madanapala. [No. 1 
The Manahali Copper-plate Inscription of Madanapaladeva . — 
By Babu N. N. Vasu. 
[Read, March 1899.] 
The subjoined edition of a new inscription of Madanapaladeva has 
been prepared from a copper-plate kindly presented to this Society in 
1899 by Mr. N. K. Bose, C.S., then Magistrate of Dinajpur. The plate 
on which the inscription is engraved, was discovered in excavating a 
tank in 1875 within a park of the village of Manahali,^ in District 
Dinajpur, Bengal. 
The Inscription consists of 5S lines of writing, engraved on the two 
.sides of a single copper-plate, measuring 15f" by 16". At the top of 
the plate the Seal is soldered on. It shows the usual emblem of the 
Pala kings, viz., the Buddhistic wheel of Law with a deer kneeling on 
each side, facing it. Below this we may still recognize the* king’s name : 
Cri-Madanapalah, and on the top of the seal traces of small Stupa are still 
visible. The writing belongs to the Bengali variety of the Nagari 
Alphabet of about the 12th century ; as compared with the earlier 
inscriptions of the Pala Dynasty, it shows a marked development to- 
wards more modern forms. 1 ts execution is on the whole done fairly 
well ; in one place, however, it has been impossible to make out exactly 
the meaning of the letters ; unfortunately, this passage contains the 
name of the village, granted by the king (11. 32-33). The avagraha sign 
is frequently used in this inscription ; final letters are marked by the 
sign of virdma, which, however, seems to have been left out by careless- 
ness in some instances, where in order to avoid unnecessary correc- 
tions in the subjoined transcript the letter has been put down as 
final. In regard to orthography, I desire to draw attention to the 
spelling ttajan, for tyajan in 1. 14 ; prattarthi, for pratyarthi in 1. 24 ; and 
also punair, for puny air in 1. 16. Instances of this kind may be taken 
as originating from a pronunciation of the compound letters tya and nya, 
1 The “ Munholee ” of the Indian Atlas, sheet No, 119, 6 miles south of Peokot ; 
Long. 88° 35' E. ; Lat. 25° 19' N. 
