150 
Ii. Banerjea —Note on a Copper-plate from Cuttack. [No. 2, 
S'iva Gupta (not Yajati) gives the village o£ Chandra in the Bisaya or fiscal 
division of Marada in the province of Dakshina Kosala, to one Ganga- 
pani, the son of Divakara and grandson of Ananta Bhatta, a Brahman of 
the Bharadvaja clan, for so long as the sun, moon and stars would continue 
to shine in the firmament. The edict then enumerates a number of Sastric 
quotations, as usual in such records, cursing the robbers of land given in gift, 
extolling those who preserve and protect such gifts, and expatiating on the 
shortness of human life, which is said to be as unstable as a drop of water 
on the slippery surface of a lotus leaf. The concluding verses are an eulogy 
on Champati Chhinchata of the minister of war and peace of Yajati, (not of 
S'iva Gupta), and then comes the date of the plate and the name of the 
engraver Madhava. The date is the 9th of the waxing moon in Jyeshtha, 
on the ninth year or Sanvatsara of the reign of Yajati. 
The discovery and decipherment of this plate, establish two hypo¬ 
thetical points advanced by me in my paper on the Chaudwar plate, namely : 
1st, that Orissa, or a part of it, was, during the Gupta rule, called after their 
mother-country “ Kosala,” and 2nd, that the Kesaris of Orissa acknowledged 
the Guptas as the Paramount Power. 
In support of the first of these two points, we have in unmistak¬ 
able terms the names of Dakshina Kosala or South Kosala followed by that 
of the fiscal division of Marada, and the name of the village Chandra. The 
last two names still exist in the district of Kataka : the pargana of Hari- 
harpur is up to this day called in common parlance Marada Hariharpur, 
and there still exists in that pargana a village called Chandra. The latter 
is written with a final long a, whereas that of the plate is a short one, but 
the difference is so slight, and such phonetic changes are so very common 
in Indian names, that it scarcely deserves a comment here. The village is 
still a Brahman village of note. 
As to the subordinate position of the Kesaris, the indication in the 
plate is plain enough. The gift is made in the name of the Guptas with 
the imperial and dignified designation of Maharajadhiraja , while Yajati 
is simply called Maharaja , and his ancestor Janamejaya, a raja only. The 
S'astras very distinctly enjoin that it is the sovereign only who has the 
power of giving land in perpetuity, even Samantas or tributary kings, 
when making such gifts, must take the permission of the Paramount Power. 
The quotations above referred to prove this beyond a question ; these men¬ 
tion the names of Sagara and Kama, the emperors of India, as the givers of 
land. This law has much relaxed in the present iron-age, despite the in¬ 
junctions of the Smritis. 
A new link in the royal lineages of Orissa is gained by the reading of 
this monument, and of another which was found under ground in a place 
called Puran, in Pargana Sybir. According to the Madlapanji and the 
