The Katni copper-plate of Jayanātha is an epigraphic record documenting the donation of the village of Kalabhikuṇḍaka in the time of the Uccakalpa ruler ''mahārāja'' Jayanātha (''circa'' 493-502 CE). It is dated year 182 in the

Gupta Gupta () is a common surname or last name of Indian origin. It is based on the Sanskrit word गोप्तृ ''goptṛ'', which means 'guardian' or 'protector'. According to historian R. C. Majumdar, the surname ''Gupta'' was adopted by se ...

era (''circa'' 502 CE).

Location

Katni Katni officially Murwara is a city on the banks of the Katni River in Madhya Pradesh, India. It is the administrative headquarters of Katni District. It is in the Mahakoshal region of central India. The city is from the divisional headquarters ...

is a town in

Jabalpur District Jabalpur district is a district of Madhya Pradesh state in central India. The city of Jabalpur is the administrative headquarters of the district. The area of the district is 5,198 km² with population of 2,463,289 (2011 census). As of 201 ...

Madhya Pradesh Madhya Pradesh (, ; meaning 'central province') is a state in central India. Its capital is Bhopal, and the largest city is Indore, with Jabalpur, Ujjain, Gwalior, Sagar, and Rewa being the other major cities. Madhya Pradesh is the seco ...

, India. The plates, however, are not from Katni itself, but are reported to have been recovered at Uchahara, the ancient Uccakalpa, in

Satna district Satna District is a district of Madhya Pradesh state in central India. The city of Satna is the district headquarters. The district has an area of 7,502 km², and a population of 22,28,935(2011 census), 20.63% of which is urban. The distric ...

. The inscription is currently located in the museum at

Jabalpur Jabalpur is a city situated on the banks of Narmada River in the state of Madhya Pradesh, India. According to the 2011 census, it is the third-largest urban agglomeration in Madhya Pradesh and the country's 38th-largest urban agglomeration. J ...

Publication

The inscription was first published by Usha Jain in 1972-73. The record is listed also in Madan Mohan Upadhyay, ''Inscriptions of Mahakoshal'', no. 2: 10.

Description and Contents

The inscription is in the

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

language. The inscription records how ''mahārāja'' Jayanātha divided a village named Kalabhikuṇḍaka into a sixty shares and donated these to twenty-five different people.

Historical Significance

The donees are individually named as is their caste affiliation: ''brāhmaṇa'', ''kṣatriya'', ''vaiśya'' or ''śūdra''. This is one of the first inscriptions in India to specifically list the four '' varṇa''-s. The implications of this are explored by Michael Willis in his book ''The Archaeology of Hindu Ritual''.

Michael D. Willis Michael Willis is an Indologist and historian based in London, England. Born in Vancouver, British Columbia and raised in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, Willis took his B.A. degree at the University of Victoria where he studied with Siri Gunasinghe and ...

, ''

The Archaeology of Hindu Ritual ''The Archaeology of Hindu Ritual: Temples and the Establishment of the Gods'' is an archaeological study focusing on the early development of Hinduism within the Gupta Empire between the 4th and 6th centuries CE. Written by the British archaeolog ...

'' (Cambridge, 2009), p. 378. Partly available online: http://www.cambridge.org/gb/knowledge/isbn/item2427416/?site_locale=en_GB

Metrics

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Text

Katni copper-plate charter..jpg , first plate Copper-plate charter of maharaja Jayanatha, the Uchchakalpa ruler dated circa 502.jpg , second plate Katni copper-plate charter of Jayanātha, third plate..jpg , third plate

References

External links

Other Uccakalpa inscriptions online
{{DEFAULTSORT:Katni copper-plate of Jayanatha Sanskrit inscriptions in India Gupta and post-Gupta inscriptions