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Notes on Aśoka's Fifth Pillar Edict

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

K. R. Norman
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Extract

1. In his fifth pillar edict, issued in the 26th year of his reign, Aśoka forbade the killing of certain animals. The relevant portion of the edict, as it appears on the Delhi-Topra pillar, is as follows: imāni jātāni avadhiyāni kaṭāni seyathā suke sālikā alune cakavāke haṃse naṃdīmukhe gelāṭe aṃbākäpīlikä (Allahabad version -kipilikā) daḷī (Allahabad version duḍī; Araraj, Nandangarh, and Rampurva versions duḷi) anaṭhikamache vedaveyake gaṇgāpupuṭake saṃkujamache kaphaṭasayake (Araraj, Nandangarh, Rampurva versions -seyake) paṃnasase simale saṃḍake okapiṃḍe palasate setakapote gâmakapote save catupade ye paṭibhogaṃ no eti na ca khādiyatī.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 99 , Issue 1 , January 1967 , pp. 26 - 32
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1967

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References

1 The most important publications on the subject up to 1933 were listed by J. Charpentier in “Kleine Bemerkungen zum fünften Säulenedikt des Aśoka,” (Festschrift Moriz Winternitz, 304, n. 1).

2 Les inscriptions d'Asoka, 166.

3 Suttāgame ed., I, 1201.

4 ibid., II, 281–4.

5 BSOS, VIII, 600.

6 Blanford, W. T., Fauna of British India: Birds, Vol. IV, London, 1898Google Scholar.

7 Comparative dictionary of the Indo-Aryan languages.

8 op. cit., 305–6.

9 op. cit., 601.

10 cf. Kapadia, H. R., “The Jain records about birds”, ABORI, 43, 106, § XIIGoogle Scholar.

11 The inscriptions of Aśoka, ed. Hultzsch, E., 1925Google Scholar.

12 Blanford, W. T., Fauna of British India: Mammalia, London, 1888Google Scholar.

13 cf. RE IX(M) where Kalsi has pavasati and the other versions prasavati.

14 Smith, M. A., Fauna of British India: Reptiles, 3 vols., London, 1931–1943Google Scholar.

15 Les Inscriptions de Piyadasi, Vol. II, p. 49.

16 cf. Hultzsch, 38, n. 18.

17 op. cit., 50.

18 cf. Pischel, , Grammatik der Prākrit-Sprachen, § 212Google Scholar.

19 Further examples of this mistake are given in “Notes on the Aśokan Rock Edicts”, to appear in IIJ.

20 cf. Grierson, , On the modern Indo-Aryan vernaculars, § 303–4Google Scholar.

21 Further examples of this mistake are given in “Notes on the Aśokan Rock Edicts”.

22 Shree Gulabkunverba Ayurvedic Society's ed., Jamnagar, , 1949, II, 484Google Scholar. The same section includes śyāmaḥ kākulīmrgaḥ (= sarpaviseṣaḥ) and śallaka-, glossed mahāśakalī and translated “pangolin”.

23 For the alternation cf. Skt. (lex.) anokaśāyin-/Pkt. aṇukkasāin- “not sleeping in a house” (of beggars).

24 < *ghara-kokila-, so-called because of its cry. The name gecko is onomatopoeic.

25 op. cit., 309.

26 op. cit., 51.