54 V. A. Smith— On the Civilization of Ancient Lulia. [No. 1, 
borrowed from the Romans. “ Inscriptions on bronze tablets sometimes 
occur. These are tabulae honestce missionis , diplomas, or good conduct 
discharges. They are copies of decrees, promulgated at Rome, confer¬ 
ring upon the soldiery, as a reward for distinguished service, the privi¬ 
lege of Roman citizenship and the right of marriage. They seem to 
have been usually inscribed on two sheets of metal, which, being united 
by thongs, folded together like a book. Examples of these tablets 
have been found from the year A. D. 34 of the Emperor Claudius to the 
year of the Emperor Maximian, A. D. 300. They were invariably 
suspended on the walls of the temple in the Capitol for public exhibition.”* 
Mr. Senart devotes several pages to the consideration of the dated 
Haslitnagar inscription first published by me in the Indian Antiquary 
for 1889, and to a discussion of the era used in it and other inscrip¬ 
tions from the same region. The subsequent publication in this Journal 
of a photograph of the inscribed pedestal from Haslitnagar will, I think, 
remove the doubts which Mr. Senart felt as to the presence of the symbol 
for 100. He was inclined to read the date, as shown in the rougher 
facsimile of the Indian Antiquary, as being 84 only, but it is certain that 
the date is either 274, as formerly read by Sir A. Cunningham, or 284. 
The character preceding the 4 is certainly almost identical with each of 
the three characters for 20 which precede it, and so may be read also as 
20, but it is not absolutely identical, being slightly straighter and narrower 
in shape, and this minute difference may be held sufficient to warrant us 
in reading it as the symbol for 10. So far as the historian is concerned 
it makes little matter whether the date is 274 or *284, but I think it 
more probable that 274 is the correct interpretation. 
I altogether disagree with the opinion of Mr. Senart that “ nous 
sommes forces d' admettre que 1’ alphabet du Nord-Ouest, dans lequel 
est gravee T inscription, etait, au milieu du IV e siecle, des longtemps 
hors d’ usage.” But on this question I have nothing to add to w r hat I 
have already printed, nor have I anything to retract. 
Mr. Senart makes an important correction in the reading cf the 
inscription by substituting praushthapada for emborasma as the name of 
the month.f 
# Westropp, Handbook of Archaeology, p. 500, 2nd edition, Bohn’s Illustrated 
Library, 1878. 
f In ‘Coins of Ancient India’ (Quaritch, 1891) Sir A. Cunningham incidentally 
{page 37) accepts Mr. Senart’s reading of the date as 84. But the figures for the 
centuries are certainly in the record. Dr. Buhler reads “Sam II C XX XX XX X 
IV Postavadasa masasa di[va] sammi pam[cha]mi 5 [11*]”, and translates “The 
year 274, on the fifth, 5, day of the month of Praushthapada ( i. e , Blmdrapada or 
August-September).” He observes that in the name of the month the reading 
