Page:The Pālas of Bengal.djvu/76

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R. D. BANERJI ON

record can be cited as evidence, it cannot be said, on the basis of the verses in the Dānasāgara and the Adbhūtasāgara, that Vallālasena came to the throne in 1159 A.D. and wrote a book on Law ten years later. Only one inscription of this King has been Inscription.discovered up to date. This is a copper-plate grant discovered in January, 1911, at Sītāhāṭī, near Kātwā, in the Burdwan District of Bengal. It records the grant of the village of Vāllahiṭṭa in the Uttara Rāḍhā Maṇḍala of the Varddhamāna bhukti to a Brāhmaṇa named Ovāsudeva-Śarmman as the Dakṣiṇā of the Hemāśva-Mahādāna (the gift of a golden horse), performed by the Queen Vilāsadevi, the King's mother, on the 16th Vaiśākha in the 11th year of his reign.[1] The Dūtaka of this grant was the King's minister of peace and war, Hari-ghoṣa, who is the only officer of Vallālasena whose name has come down to us. Vallālasena married Rāmadevī of the Calukya family and was succeeded by his son Lakṣmaṇasena. As the initial year of the Lakṣmaṇasena era is 1119-20 A.D., so Lakṣmaṇasena must have ascended the throne in that year, consequently, Vallālasena cannot be taken to have reigned more than 12 or 13 years. He seems to have been a peaceably inclined, weak, old man, studious in his habits, and a patron of Brāhmanism. Both he and his father seem to have belonged to the Śaiva sect, as their inscriptions begin with an invocation to Śiva.

Step by step, the Gāhaḍavāla Kings of Kanauj advanced towards the East. Govindacandra seems to have conquered the whole of Magadha in the earlier part of his reign (1114 = 54 A.D.). Gāhaḍavāla Conquest of Magadha.In 1127 he was in a position to grant a village in the Patna District to a Brāhmaṇa. An unpublished grant, a photograph of which has been kindly lent to me by Prof. Jadunath Sircar, M.A., of the Patna College, records the donation of the village of Pādoli, together with the village of Guṇāve in the Maṇiari Pattalā, to a Brāhmaṇa of the Kāśyapa Gotra named Gaṇeśvara-Śarman, after bathing in the Ganges at Kānyakubja, on Sunday, the 11th of the dark half of Jyaiṣṭha of the Vikrama year 1183 = 1127 A.D. The Patna Grant of Govindacandra, v.s. 1183.I have been given to understand by Prof. Sircar that this new inscription will shortly be published in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. The invasion of Magadha by the Gāhaḍavāla King seems to have led to hostilities between Govindacandra and Lakṣmaṇasena. In the Madanapāḍa Grant of Viśvarūpasena and Edilpur Grant of Keśavasena, Lakṣmaṇasena is said to have erected pillars of victory at Benares (Vārāṇasī) and at Allahabad (Triveṇī).

Belāyāṁ dakṣinavdher-mmūśala-dhara gadāpāṇi saṁvāsavedyāṁ Tīrotsaṅge triveṇyāḥ kamalabhava-makhārambha nirvvyājapute yen-occair-yajña-yūpaiḥ saha samara-jayastambhamālā nyadhāyi. v.[2]

The Maṇiari Pattalā mentioned in the copper-plate grant of Govindacandra mentioned above has been identified with the modern Muner, a village of considerable importance in the Patna District, which was a well-known place in the 12th century. Bakhtiyar Khilji directed some of his expeditions against this town before the
  1. Vaṅgīya Sāhitya Pariṣat Patrikā, Vol. XVII, Pt IV, pp. 237-38.
  2. J.A.S.B., Vol. VII, p. 43, and Vol. 1896, Pt. I, p. 9.