Dhanyaviṣṇu

The Eran boar inscription of Toramana, is a stone inscription found in Eran in the Malwa region of Madhya Pradesh, India. It is 8 lines of Sanskrit, the first three of which are in meter and the rest in prose, written in a North Indian script. It is carved on the neck of a freestanding high red sandstone Varaha statue, a zoomorphic iconography of Vishnu avatar, and dated to the 6th century. The inscription names king Toramana, ruler of the Alchon Huns, as ruling over Malwa ("governing the earth") and records that a Dhanyaviṣṇu is dedicating a stone temple to Narayana (Vishnu).

Date

The inscription does not give any date, but mentions Toramana is "governing the earth", which is interpreted to mean the Malwa region site where this inscription is found. According to Radhakumud Mookerji, this means that the inscription was made after 510 CE when the Gupta king Bhanugupta and his local chief Goparaja had lost Malwa region after Toramana's invasion. It must be before 513 CE, because Toramana died in Varanasi while on his campaign to conquer eastern India.The Gupta Empire, Radhakumud Mookerji, Motilal Banarsidass Publ., 195
p.120
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The inscription was made by a Vishnu devotee named Dhanyaviṣṇu, the younger brother of the deceased Maharaja Mātṛviṣṇu, who is the same person who also erected a pillar in Eran. John Fleet calls it an inscription belonging to 6th-century Vaishnavism, a tradition of Hinduism.

Description

The inscription is written under the neck of the boar, in 8 lines of Sanskrit in the Brahmi script. The boar represents the God Varaha, an avatar of Vishnu. The inscription was found in 1838 by T.S. Burt, who brought it to the attention of James Prinsep. It was published in 1838 by Prinsep with a translation. In 1861, FitzEdward Hall disagreed with Prinsep's report and published a revised edition of the inscription and a new translation. Fleet published his own translation and interpretation of the inscription in 1888. The translations for the inscription vary significantly, though the central theme is similar.

The region around the inscription, the boar sculpture's wall is covered with reliefs, predominantly of rishis (sages) and saints of Hinduism. This iconography follows the Hindu texts where the boar avatar is symbolically shown to be protective of the saints and scholars. Goddess earth (Bhudevi, Prithivi) is depicted with a woman sculpture hanging on to the right tusk of the boar. On the shoulder of the boar is a small shrine. The boar along with the site is damaged, and cracks run across the boar, one of the cracks passes through the inscription.

John Fleet's Translation

The John Fleet translation of the inscription reads:

Hall & Cunningham Translation

See also

*Gwalior inscription of Mihirakula

References

Bibliography

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{{Hindudharma
Sanskrit inscriptions in India
Gupta and post-Gupta inscriptions
Alchon Huns