Indian Palaeography

Book Specification

Book Description

About the Book

The study of Indian palaeography grew out of the necessity for deciphering the large number of inscriptions found in the sub-continent. A further development came through the need to use the changing forms of letters as an aid to determining the dates of some inscriptions. For this latter purpose we now have a large number of charts at our disposal. Yet an absolute chronology has not been possible. The present work is intended to explain the difficulty, to redefine palaeography in the context of our technological advances and to seek, through its study, a better understanding of the civilization of south Asia. The book covers a wide field and deals with written materials from the earliest period to the eighth century AD found all over this far-flung area, and it explains, with the help of figures and charts, the interrelation of the cultures to the various zones.

This second edition carries a new Preface with a section of Indian Numerals.

About the Author

Dr A.H. Dani, the Professor Emeritus at the Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan, has been founder General Secretary of Asiatic Society, Dhaka, where he started Journal of Asiatic Society; in 1962 he founded the Department of Archaeology, University of Peshawar, and introduced the annual bulletin, Ancient Pakistan to make the new archaeological discoveries known to scholars; in 1972 he organised the Faculty of Social Sciences as its Dean in Islamabad and was instrumental in initiating the Islamabad University Press with his own book on Alberuni as its first publication; since the foundation of International Association for the Study of Cultures of Central Asia in 1973 he has been its Vice-President and publishing the biannual Journal of Central Asia on its behalf; presently engaged in exploring and deciphering the inscriptions along the Karakorum highway, his latest book is a new study on the Historic City of Taxila (1984).

Foreword

The study of Indian palaeography began nearly 180 years ago with the interpretation of a number of medieval inscriptions by members of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. During the last century knowledge of ancient Indian scripts progressed rapidly, until practically all the epigraphs of the sub-continent were intelligible. About sixty years ago the accumulated knowledge of over 100 years was consolidated in Buhler’s Indische Palaographie, which became the standard textbook on the subject. Since its appearance the only similar work of major importance to be published was Professor G. S. Ojha’s Bharatiya Lipimala (1918) in Hindi. In the last forty years many new inscriptions have been published, and the technique of the palaeographer has much advanced; hence both books are now out of date in many respects. Moreover, both have long been out of print, and the student of Indian palaeography has been much hampered by the impossibility of obtaining a suitable manual for use outside the library reading-room.

My friend Dr. A. H. Dani has rendered a great service to Indology in producing this detailed study. Taking into account the many epigraphs not available to Buhler and Ojha, he has given a more complete survey of the evolution of the Indian scripts than any earlier scholar, and has brought the study of Indian palaeography to a degree of precision well beyond that reached by his two predecessors. His charts show many forms not recorded in those of the earlier scholars, and his text is the result of much original thought and study.

Our knowledge of early Indian history depends very much on epigraphs, many of them undated. Thus this work is of great importance to the historian, and will long remain an essential companion to his studies. It is to be hoped that Dr. Dani will continue his researches and produce a second volume, covering the medieval period, and providing a complete survey of Indian scripts down to recent times.

It is particularly gratifying that this is the work of a Muslim scholar. Many Hindus have in the past studied the ‘Muslim Period’ of Indian history, and have produced works of major importance on it, but hitherto no Muslim has made a major contribution to the study of the history of the subcontinent before the coming of Islam. It is to be hoped that other Muslims will be encouraged by this work to take up the study of ancient Indian history, and of the culture of the people who were their own ancestors, as they were the ancestors of the Hindus. This may well be the first of many studies of early India from Muslim scholars, and a token of developing friendship and cultural collaboration between India and Pakistan.

Preface

The following pages attempt to trace the evolution of the scripts originating from the Indian Brahmi and Kharoshthi, As