Mountain Temple inscription
Ancient Sanskrit inscription
Indian Museum, Kolkata
WritingSanskrit
Created~ 1st Century CE
PlaceMathura, Uttar Pradesh
Present locationIndian Museum, Kolkata
IdentificationNS 6482

The Mountain Temple inscription was found near Mathura, India. It is on a broken slab, and now housed at the Indian Museum, Kolkata.[1][2]

The Mountain Temple inscription makes an early mention of Hindu and Jain temple architecture, where its shape is described to be like a mountain and accompanied with an assembly hall (sabha). The inscription's wording and arrangement, state Luders and Janert, closely resembles the Mora Well inscription, now in Mathura museum. Both describe a donation of a stone temple, halls and slabs; however, the Mora Well inscription is more detailed and mentions pratima. The Rajula in line 3 of the Mountain Temple inscription is likely the Northern Satraps Great Satrap Rajuvula, found in Mathura lion capital.[2]

The Mountain Temple inscription lacks a date. The similar Mora Well Inscription is dated to the early decades of the 1st-century CE and is related to early Vaishnavism: the Mora Well inscription mentions stone shrines dedicated to five Vrishni heroes.[3]

Inscription

The discovered inscription is incomplete, in not quite correct Sanskrit.[2] It reads:[1]

1. . . . uvulasya putrasya mahaksatrapasya so ...
2. . . . ti parvato prasade(or do) sabha silapata ...
3. . . . taviryo rane rajulas ca pi[ta] ...
4. . . . sasyedam arca ...

Translation

Sonya Quintanilla translates it as,[1]

. . . of the mahaksatrapasya So(dasa), son of (Raj)uvula . . .
a temple like a mountain, an assembly hall, stone slabs...
whose heroism in battle, and (his) father Rajula . . .
this . . . of his is adored.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Sonya Rhie Quintanilla (2007). History of Early Stone Sculpture at Mathura: Ca. 150 BCE - 100 CE. BRILL Academic. p. 260. ISBN 90-04-15537-6.
  2. 1 2 3 Heinrich Lüders and Klaus Ludwig Janert (1961), Mathurā inscriptions, Göttingen : Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, OCLC 717966622, pages 203-204, 154, image on page 318
  3. ↑ Doris Srinivasan (1997). Many Heads, Arms, and Eyes: Origin, Meaning, and Form of Multiplicity in Indian Art. BRILL Academic. pp. 211–214, 308-311 with footnotes. ISBN 90-04-10758-4.
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