CHAPTER 13 – Girnar Rock Edicts and Inscriptions

Chapter outline and page reference:

Girnar Edict and Inscription Rock 197
Ashoka’s Edicts 199
Rudradaman’s Inscription 219
Skandagupta’s Inscription 224
Subsequent Dam Rupture Resulting in Shift of Capital Away from Junagadh 231

Chapter preview (first three pages only):

Figure 41. Ashoka Edict Rock, Junagadh.

Girnar Edict and Inscription Rock
Open 09.00–13.00, 14.00–18.00, daily. Entry: Indian Rs 5, Foreigner Rs 100. Photography is forbidden without a permit from the Archaeological Survey of India, New Delhi.
The Ashoka Edict Rock, a Notified Archaeological Site, is a rounded boulder, on the north-east face of which is engraved the 14 Ashokan Edicts, and is situated at the entrance to the valley providing access to Mount Girnar, 700 m east of Uparkot, near the edge of what was once the Sudarshan Lake. The Archaeological Survey of India has officially designated the Ashokan Edict Rock, as one of four sites in the Junagadh and Girnar area, in its list of 203 Monuments of National Importance in Gujarat State (Archaeological Survey of India 2011a, Wikipedia 2013a).
The edicts were engraved in 257 BC. On the same rock were also engraved two subsequent inscriptions, each by a significant king of India. The first is the Girnar Prasasti, a eulogy in praise of the Sudarshan Lake, by Mahakshatrap Rudradaman I, written in about 150 AD. The other is a prasasti of Skandagupta,written in about 457 AD, which also refers to the restoration of the embankment of the Sudarshan Lake. These inscriptions presuppose a flourishing centre of learning and culture at Girinagara.
Rapson (1914, page 149) said of the Girnar Edict Rock that it: ‘is without question one of the most interesting and valuable of all historical monuments. It is about twelve feet in height and seventy-five feet in circumference at the base; and it has engraved on its surface records of three kings belonging to three different dynasties which have ruled over Western India…’. Similarly, Rich (2008, page 16) said that it is: ‘…one of the most extraordinary written records in India, and indeed in all of history.’ Jamindar (1983) was another who stressed the significance of this edict rock: ‘This rock, known as Asokan rock, can rightly be called the treasure house of Indian Epigraphy. It has a unique place in the history of world epigraphy.’
Beattie and Chowdhury (1996) noted about the Edict Rock, that: ‘Those who make the long trip to Junagadh, venturing out to the far western edge of India, usually come to see the most ancient of Junagadh’s historical monuments: the Asokan Edicts. Little if anything is known about Junagadh’s pre-Asokan history. The inscription of the Asokan Edicts onto rocks in the Junagadh area allowed this fairly isolated city to enter into the Indian historical record. Without these inscriptions, Junagadh’s recorded history may not have begun until long after, and certainly would not have carried the importance Asoka’s name lent it’.
The Edict Rock is of a type that consists of an extremely tough and durable quartz-felsite, containing plagioclase, quartz, and magnetite in a micro-crystalline base (Fedden 1884). Although the rock has occasionally been referred to as granite (e.g. Postans 1838, J Wilson 1838, A Wilson 1876c), Fedden (1884) suggested that there is no granite in any part of the country of Girnar or Kathiawar.
In about 1880 the Nawab Bahadur Khanji III erected a small building over the original rock, and in 1900 the Nawab Rasul Khan, under the advice of Sir Charles Olivant, the Political Agent, erected a more suitable shed. For this latter building Colonel Sealy, the Alienation Settlement Officer, Junagadh State, laid the foundation stone (Anonymous 1900). According to Anonymous (1906, page 12): ‘…during the year 1904–05 the Junagadh Darbar spent Rs. 8,663 upon the building erected over the famous inscribed Asoka rock at the foot of Girnar’. Bhandarkar (1910, page 43), the Assistant Superintendent of the Archaeological Survey of India, Western Circle, made the following comment about the building over the inscription rock: ‘…the antiquarian world can never be too thankful to the Darbar for having erected a substantial structure over it to reserve it from further injuries. But the structure is a little too ornamental and too much in modern style to be in keeping with the object of hoary antiquity which it preserves. A plain structure similar to that raised over a rock inscription of the Chohan family at Bijolia in the Udaipur State by the local chief would have suited the purpose here much better, not to speak of the expenditure which also it would have saved. Again, enough space is not left between the inscription rock and the walls of the shed to enable one to photograph it if he wishes’.
It is interesting to note a superstition among the people of Junagadh about the Edict Rock during the 1850s and 1860s. According to Anonymous (1940): ‘The Stone was supposed to be the haunt of genii, who guarded an ancient treasure-trove, and the uncanny inscription on it was believed to be a ‘charm.’ Some even thought that Bhagavanlal [Indraji] was trying to secure the treasure by reading the ‘charm’.’ Postans (1838, page 874) noted that: ‘The popular belief in the spot is, that the unknown characters refer to immense treasures, buried in the neighbourhood of, or under the rock.’
The Archaeological Survey of India has occasionally undertaken preservation measures to ensure conservation of the rock monument, as they have at other Junagadh monuments such as the Uparkot Jami Masjid (e.g. Archaeological Survey of India 2000, 2003). Nevertheless, in mid-July 2014, the old bricks-and-mortar building collapsed onto the edict rock, fortunately causing no serious damage to the monolith (Anonymous 2014).

Ashoka’s Edicts
The Ashokan inscription at Girnar, the earliest epigraphic record discovered yet in Gujarat, was first noticed by James Tod in 1822 (see Tod 1839), but it was not till a few years later that Tod (1829–32, volume 1, page 54) referred to the undeciphered edict rock at Junagadh, when he remarked: ‘Let us master the characters on the…rocks of Junagarh…’. It was copied and sent to James Prinsep only in 1837 by Rev. Dr. John Wilson, after they had been traced on cloth by Captain Lang in 1835. Prinsep (1799–1840 AD) was the first European scholar to decipher the edicts in the Brahmi script, on pillars and rocks, of the ancient Indian Emperor Ashoka. His ‘Essays on Indian antiquities, historic, numismatic, and palaeographic, of the late James Prinsep … to which are added his useful tables illustrative of Indian history, chronology, modern coinages, weight measures, etc’ were edited by E Thomas, and published in