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 Noi 25.] TWO PRAKRIT POEMS AT DHAR. 241 expired (according to both the Arya- and the Surya-siddhanta) would have been Jyesbtha, and the 6th May A.D. 673 the full-moon day of the first or intercalated Jyeshjha. But this very' intercalated month, by an earlier— Brahmagupta's — rule, would have received its name, not from the following month Jy&ahtha, but from the preceding month VaiSakha, it would have been called Vaisakha, not Jy&shtha, and, by the earlier rule referred to, the 6th May A.D. 673 would thus have been correctly described as the full-moon day of Vai&kha (or, more fully, of the second Vaisakha). This date at once reminds us of the date of the Kaira plates of Dharasena IV. (Northern List, No, 484), which quotes a * second MargaSira,' and falls in A.D. 648 or 6aka-saihvat 570 expired. In the case of that date, by the rules of mean intercalation and according to the Arya- and Surya-siddhantas, a month was intercalated in 8. 570 expired before the month Pausha. By the ordinary rule that month would have been called Pausha, so that there would have been two months called Pausha ; but the date, in quoting ' the second M&rgasira,' shows that there really were two months called Margasira, and that therefore the intercalated month, by the earlier rule, had received its name from the preceding M&rgafiira. I would besides compare the Ch61a date No. 33, of the 25th November A.D. 1033 (above, Vol. V. p. 21), where the given name of the month — Margasura, instead of Pausha — likewise can be accounted for only by the assumption that a month, by the rules of mean intercalation intercalated before Pausha, had taken its name from the preceding, not from the following month. In that Chola date the month M&rgasira which is quoted was the second Margasira, just as in the date under discussion the month Vaisakha in my opinion was the second Vaisakha. For a date (of the 5th February A.D. 817, with a lunar eclipse), which proves the obser- vance of the rules of mean intercalation, but is otherwise of no importance here, see my Southern List, No, 68.

The two Prakrit poems here edited were discovered at Dhar, in November 1903, together with the corresponding slab of black stone which contains the praSasti of Arjunavarman publisheoVabove, p. 96 ff., by Professor B. Hultzsch. Prof. Hultzsch was good enough to send me two inked estampages which had been forwarded to him by Dr. Vogel and Mr. Couaens, and one of which is reproduced on the three accompanying Plates.

Like the pradasti, the poems are on the whole well preserved ; in the second poem, however, the beginning of lines 26-38 is broken away, as may be seen from Plate iii. The inscription consists of 83 lines and is engraved with great care. Only one serious mistake occurs in A. verse 65, where instead of chammakkanam anamaggo apparently must be read ohakkammanam anamagge.

The alphabet is the same as in the praiasti and has been already discussed by Prof. Hultzsch. I would draw special attention to the initial t, u, o ; to tha, e.g. in thakkarh, A. verse 40 (Plate i. 1. 16), tha f A. 58 (Plate i.l. 23), thdhid, B. 2 (Plate ii.l. 1), anathakkarn, B.40 (Plate iii. 1. 14), thdhavid, B. 87 (Plate iii. 1. 32) ; to kkha, e.g. in rakkhau, A. 2 (Plate i. 1. 1) ; to jjha, e.g. in majjhe, A. 6 (Plate i. 1. 3) ; to £a, e.g. in Sivdya (Plate i. 1. 1), °param$svara°, irf, °satam, mahdsrth (Plate ii. 1. 42) ; and to nga, e.g. in kayan garudna (Plate i. 1. 18) and mangalam (Plate ii. 1. 42). Ohchha and ttha, though resembling each other, are more clearly distinguished than in the manuscripts of the Jainas, where these two letters are constantly confounded ; compare, e.g. itthdro aud °chchhdya, A. 2 (Plate i. 1. 1) ; °sarichchhant and 8ttha % A. 15 (Plate i. 1. 6). There occurs in A. 87 (Plate ii. 1. 34) one letter about the reading of which I am not certain. It 2 i Digitized by