National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

Sec. ü]   ANCIENT REMAINS IN CHITRAL   39

the same number of seven umbrellas. Was this, too, like the triple square base, a regular feature in the Bactrian Stupa type ?

The inscription incised below the Stûpa carving, about 6 inches from the bottom edge of the Inscription

boulder, is also of distinct interest. Though the incised characters have in places become very of Pakhtôri-

dini.

shallow through weathering, yet they can everywhere be clearly distinguished from natural fissures of the rock, as the photograph (Fig. 5) shows. Owing to the shallowness of the lettering and the rapid evaporation caused by the heat and wind, I did not succeed in my attempts to obtain a satisfactory paper impression. But the reading I made on the spot can easily be tested from my several photographs. The eleven Brahmi characters vary in length from i 2 to 2 inches, and are spread out over a line nearly 3 feet long. Their forms show a close approach to the Western form of the Gupta type, as represented in its cursive variety in Bühler's palaeographic tables by specimens from Toramanâ s inscription found in the Salt Range, which are approximately dated from the close of the fifth century A. D.19

The inscription is in Sanskrit, and according to my reading runs :   Inscription

interpreted.

This, assuming the loss of a Visarga at the end where the surface of the stone has suffered, may be interpreted as : devadharmo 'yam Rajajivarntaitah, ` This is an offering to the divinities from Raja Jivarman '. It is noteworthy that the name is found also as Râjajivarmah in the Charrun inscription. The explanation of it as a Prakrit form 7ivarman derived from 7ayavarman presents no difficulty. As there is close epigraphic resemblance between the two inscriptions, it may be assumed that they name the identical person. Furthermore, the dedicatory character of the short inscription and the wording used indicate that this person was a Buddhist by faith. It is a priori probable that these pious rock-carvings were produced by order of a prince actually ruling in the valley or in a territory closely adjoining. His Indian name and title are therefore interesting evidence of the influence exercised in this region about the fifth century A. D. by Buddhist culture, with its accompanying Indian environment.

It is significant, in proof of the survival of ancient local worship, that this rock-carving is the Local

object of a legend in which the reverence it still inspires is only thinly disguised to appease legend about

inscription.

Muhammadan scruples. According to the story related to me by the Diwan-begi, a man-eating demon or ` Deo ' (Persian dew), called ` Kalamdar', used at this spot to waylay and destroy people, until at last a big Mullah ' caught him and laid him in fetters. The ropes used for binding the demon are supposed to be marked by the outlines of the Stûpa. With regard to the characters inscribed below, the popular belief is that they are of ` Chinese ' origin. I was informed also that a similar rock-carving existed at Rayin in the Mülkhô Valley.

The inscription of Pakhtôridini has been destined to become in recent times the subject of a quasi-historical legend. General Cunningham, to whom Major Biddulph had sent what probably was a mere eye copy, erroneously read it `Dena dharmaya Raja ,diva Peila—" The pious gift of Raja J iva Pâla ",' and the conclusion was promptly drawn that ' the name Jiva Pâla is, no doubt, the Jeipal of early Mahommedan writers', i. e. the name of the Hindu Shahi Jaipal who lost the Peshawar Valley to Mahmûd of Ghazni at the end of the tenth century A. D.20 This case of ` mistaken identity' has since found due acceptance in the official account of Chitr5.1.21

In my personal narrative I have described the ride on May io from Pakhtôridini along the

" Cf. Bühler, Indische PalcYographie, Table IV, col. viii.

20 See Biddulph, Hindoo Koosh, p. 249.

21 Cf. Imperial Gazetteer of India, New Ed., 1908, x. p. 301. ' It is recorded in a Sanskrit inscription carved on

a rock near Barenis in Mastûj that about the year A. D. goo the inhabitants of the surrounding country were Buddhists, and under the sway of Jaipal, king of Kabul.'