Vikramkhol or Bikramkhol cave is a prehistoric archaeological site known for prehistoric inscriptions.
Vikramkhol or Bikramkhol cave is a prehistoric archaeological site known for prehistoric inscriptions.
Vikramkhol cave is located near Jharsuguda, Odisha, India and lies in Reserved Forest of Belpahar range, at a distance of 12 km from Belpahar.
The inscriptions at Vikramkhol cave are written on an uneven rock surface in a natural rock shelter using red Ochre paint which is later incised into the rock. The inscriptions were discovered around the 1930s and first studied by Dr K P Jayaswal. [1] who tentatively dates it 1500 BC. There are two theories regarding the inscription – one declares it a writing, while others doubt it as a rock art and nonliterate rock carvings.
According to Jayaswal, the prehistoric scribblings at Vikramkhol represent a picto-syllabic writing system which represents a mixture of Harappan and Brahmi hence forming a connection between the two. The inscribed portion covers an area of 35 feet by 7 feet, The evidences which support it as a writing system are as follows;
Other scholars such as Naresh Prasad Rastogi state that Its date of the Vikramkhol inscription is still debatable and its letters deserve a more searching scrutiny. [2]
Scholars such as Richard Salomon have completely dismissed the Vikramkhol cave inscriptions as pseudo inscriptions [3] According C.L Fabri, the topsy turvy incised signs may have some resemblance with Brahmi script but may not represent writing but possibility of a primitive rural writing cannot be denied either. [4]
Eminent researcher and calligrapher Dr. Subrat Kumar Prusty's study of the pre Brahmi script shows that
In this context, yogimatha script, Indus Vally Scripts, Vikramkhol script and Brahmi script can be taken as a gradual development of the Indian script. [6]
Some historians have felt that, due to negligence and apathy by Government agencies, the inscriptions are fading out and damaged by vandals. Activities of coal mines in surrounding hills, industries like sponge iron are putting environmental pressure on this prehistoric archaeological site. [7] The rock shelter, where the inscriptions are found, is not fully protected and kept open to atmosphere, [8] giving scope for vandals and visitors to deface the inscriptions. [9] As it is located inside Reserve Forest of Belpahar range, the remote access to the place has also contributed to neglect by Government Agencies.
Another set of proto Brahmi or pre historic inscriptions have been found at Garjan Dongar in Sundergarh district, and Ushakothi in Sambalpur district in Orissa. [10]
Brahmi is a writing system of ancient South Asia that appeared as a fully developed script in the third century BCE. Its descendants, the Brahmic scripts, continue to be used today across South and Southeast Asia.
The Gupta script was used for writing Sanskrit and is associated with the Gupta Empire of the Indian subcontinent, which was a period of material prosperity and great religious and scientific developments. The Gupta script was descended from Brāhmī and gave rise to the Śāradā and Siddhaṃ scripts. These scripts in turn gave rise to many of the most important Indic scripts, including Devanāgarī, the Gurmukhī script for Punjabi, the Bengali-Assamese script and the Tibetan script.
The Indus script, also known as the Harappan script, is a corpus of symbols produced by the Indus Valley Civilisation. Most inscriptions containing these symbols are extremely short, making it difficult to judge whether or not they constituted a writing system used to record the as-yet unidentified language(s) of the Indus Valley Civilisation. Despite many attempts, the 'script' has not yet been deciphered, but efforts are ongoing. There is no known bilingual inscription to help decipher the script, which shows no significant changes over time. However, some of the syntax varies depending upon location.
The Hathigumpha Inscription is a seventeen line inscription in a Prakrit language incised in Brahmi script in a cavern called Hathigumpha in Udayagiri hills, near Bhubaneswar in Odisha, India. Dated between the second century BCE and the first century CE, it was inscribed by the Jain king Kharavela of the Kalinga kingdom.
Belpahar is a town and a municipality in Jharsuguda district in the state of Odisha, India. Belpahar is famous for its geographical location, as it is the center for many coal mines areas nearby. Krosaki TRL Limited is located in Belpahar while there is Mahanadi Coalfields Limited and Ib Thermal Power station in the vicinity. It has a railway station which levels 55 metres high above the sea level. This area is among the fastest-growing industrial zones in Odisha.
Tamil-Brahmi, also known as Tamili or Damili, was a variant of the Brahmi script in southern India. It was used to write inscriptions in the early form of Old Tamil. The Tamil-Brahmi script has been paleographically and stratigraphically dated between the third century BCE and the first century CE, and it constitutes the earliest known writing system evidenced in many parts of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and Sri Lanka. Tamil Brahmi inscriptions have been found on cave entrances, stone beds, potsherds, jar burials, coins, seals, and rings.
Udayagiri and Khandagiri Caves, formerly called Kattaka Caves or Cuttack caves, are partly natural & partly artificial caves of archaeological, historical and religious importance near the city of Bhubaneswar in Odisha, India. The caves are situated on two adjacent hills, Udayagiri and Khandagiri mentioned as Kumari Parvata in the Hathigumpha inscription. They have a number of finely and ornately carved caves built during the 1st century BCE. It is believed that most of these caves were carved out as residential blocks for Jain monks during the reign of King Kharavela. Udayagiri means "Sunrise Hill" and has 18 caves while Khandagiri has 15 caves.
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Iravatham Mahadevan was an Indian epigraphist and civil servant, known for his decipherment of Tamil-Brahmi inscriptions and for his expertise on the epigraphy of the Indus Valley civilisation.
The Kalinga script or Southern Nagari is a Brahmic script used in the region of what is now modern-day Odisha, India and was primarily used to write Odia language in the inscriptions of the kingdom of Kalinga which was under the reign of early Eastern Ganga dynasty. By the 12th century, with the defeat of the Somavamshi dynasty by the Eastern Ganga monarch Anantavarman Chodaganga and the subsequent reunification of the Trikalinga(the three regions of ancient Odra- Kalinga, Utkala and Dakshina Koshala) region, the Kalinga script got replaced by the Siddhaṃ script-derived Proto-Oriya script which became the ancestor of the modern Odia script.
The Bhattiprolu script is a variant of the Brahmi script which has been found in old inscriptions at Bhattiprolu, a small village in the erstwhile Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, India. It is located in the fertile Krishna river delta and the estuary region where the river meets the Bay of Bengal.
The Minor Inscriptions of Kharavela are the shorter inscriptions found near the major and celebrated Hathigumpha inscription of Kharavela in the twin hills of Udayagiri and Khandagiri Caves near Bhubanesvar, Odisha, India. These are inscribed on the walls or front of the caves in Brāhmī script and Prakrit language. They were published and deciphered by R. D. Banerji during the years 1915–16. Others such as B. M Barua have also published their comments on these. These minor inscriptions mention the construction of caves for Jain monks during or during the decades following the reign of Kharavela.
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Subrat Kumar Prusty is an Indian Odia-language scholar, activist, social entrepreneur, literary critic and author. He is Member Secretary of the Institute of Odia Studies and Research, Bhubaneswar, Odisha. He was instrumental in preparing the research documents, advocating the awarding of Classical Language status to Odia, forming Central Institute of Classical Odia, Odia University and implementation of the Odisha Official Language Act, 1954. He was awarded the Presidential Certificate of Honour and Maharshi Badrayan Vyas Samman – 2019 for Classical Odia.
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Gudahandi also known as 'Gudahandi Hills' and 'Gudahandi Caves' is a pre-historic site in Odisha, India. It is located in the Ampani sanctuary of Kalahandi district of Odisha. It is close to the Nabarangpur district Border and about 17 km and 88 km away from Ampani and District Headquarters Bhawanipatna respectively.
Yogimath is situated in Nuapada district at a distance of about 9 km from Khariar western Odisha border area and 67 km from Bhawanipatna of Kalahandi District. This place is famous for its neolithic cave paintings. In Yogimath caves the paintings are drawn by red paint over rock surfaces. The most significant pictures are of a bull followed by cow, calf and a man indicating the domestication of animal by man and agriculture. The past glory of this place is still unexplored. Near Yogimath, there is a mountain named Risipiti which is well known for producing clear echoes.
The Sitabenga and Jogimara Caves, sometimes referred to either as Sitabenga Cave or Jogimara Cave, are ancient cave monuments nested in the north side of Ramgarh hills in Puta village, Chhattisgarh, India. Dated between the 3rd-century BCE to 1st-century BCE, they are notable for their non-religious inscriptions in Brahmi script and Magadhi language, and one of the oldest colored frescoes in Asia. Some scholars state that the Sitabenga cave is the oldest performance theatre on the Indian subcontinent, but others question whether it was indeed a theatre and suggest that it may have been a resting place (dharmashala) along an ancient trade route. The inscription at the Jogimara cave is equally disputed, with one translation interpreting it as a love-graffiti by a girl and a boy, while another translation interpreting it as a female dancer and a male sculptor-painter creating the two caves together to serve others. The inscription is also the oldest known mention of the word "devadasi", but this seems just a name and it is unlikely that this was related to any ancient Indian temple since the site and nearby area has no evidence of any Buddhist, Hindu or Jain temple built between the 3rd-century BCE and 8th-century CE.