Framing the Pattern of the Specification Form of Copper-plate Charters from the Pāla Era Bengal and Bihar

Abstract

The article deals with the charters from Bengal and Bihar of the early Middle Ages (late 8th – early 13th centuries), which are the research subject of two auxiliary historical disciplines – epigraphy and diplomatics, or legal source studies – at the same time. The concept of a document specification form is given, moreover, the author develops a pattern for recording specific forms of copper-plate grants of North India, categorized by region, starting with the Eastern one, which includes both Bengal and Bihar. The complex of Bengali and Bihar charters of the Pāla era (second half of the 8th – early 13th centuries) is currently the most studied. Two lists have been developed as preconditions for constructing a record scheme for specific forms. List 1 is made up of reference designations for the form’s components, such as invocation (address to a deity), genealogy, place of issue, place of grant, annunciation, date, benedictions, and imprecations. List 2 includes reference designations for the Sanskrit formulae that separate large parts of the specification form and its components. As a result, a pattern for the records of individual forms of 26 Pāla dynasty era copper-plate grants was drawn out. The preliminary conclusions state that the resulting pattern is a kind of a standard model, which allows to evaluate the structure and content of the copper-plate charters given by the leaders who ruled the neighboring regions of Bengal and, most likely, fell under political influence of the Pāla dynasty.