A replica of the original Halmidi inscription at Halmidi village
The Halmidi inscription is the oldest known Kannada-language inscription in the Kadamba script. While estimates vary slightly, the inscription is often dated to between 450 CE - 500 CE. The inscription was discovered in 1936 by Dr. M. H. Krishna, the Director of Archaeology of the (princely) State of Mysore (present-day Karnataka region of India), in Halmidi, a village in the Hassan district.
The original inscription is kept in the Office of the Director of Archaeology and Museums, Govt. of Karnataka, Mysore,[1] and a fibreglass replica has been installed in Halmidi.
In a report published in a Mysore Archaeological Department Report (MAR) in 1936, Krishna dated the inscription to 450 AD, on paleographical grounds.[1][2] Later scholars have variously dated the inscription to 450 AD,[3] 470 AD,[4] 500 AD,[5] "about 500",[6] and "end of the fifth century A. D. or the beginning of the 6th century A.D."[7] Epigraphist, D. C. Sircar has dated the inscription to "about the end of the 6th century."[8]
Epigraphist, K. V. Ramesh has written about the differing estimates:
And I attribute the origin of this doubt in their minds to the fact that scholars, even the reputed ones, have held differing views, mostly to prop up their preconceived notions, on the palaeographical dating of any given undated or insufficiently dated inscriptions. ... The undated Halmidi (Hassan District, Karnataka) inscription, allegedly written during the reign of Kadamba Kakusthavarman, is taken by some scholars to belong, on palaeographical grounds, to the middle of the 5th century AD, while a few other scholars have held, on the same grounds of palaeography, that it is as late as the second half of the 6th century A.D.
He also hypothesized that, compared to possibly contemporaneous Sanskrit inscriptions, "Halmidi inscription has letters which are unsettled and uncultivated, no doubt giving an impression, or rather an illusion, even to the trained eye, that it is, in date, later than the period to which it really belongs, namely the fifth century A.D."[10]
Epigraphist G. S. Gai however disagrees with the view that Halmidi is a record of the Kadamba dynasty identified with King Kadamba Kakusthavarman. According to (Gai 1992), the inscription, which is dedicated to『Kadambapan Kakustha-Bhaṭṭōran,』refers to another ruler, Kakustha of the Bhaṭāri family, who is explicitly identified in line 13, "baṭāri-kuladōn=āḷu-kadamban;" in addition, the inscription does not "include any of the epithets like Mānavya-gōtra, Hāritī-putra, and most important Dharma-maharājā"[11] that are a part of all Kadamba inscriptions.
The replica of the Halmidi inscription mounted on a pedestal
The inscription is in verse form indicating the authors of the inscription had a good sense of the language structure.[12] The inscription is written in pre-old Kannada (Puruvada-hala Kannada), which later evolved into old Kannada, middle Kannada and eventually modern Kannada.[13] The Halmidi inscription is the earliest evidence of the usage of Kannada as an administrative language.[14]
Gai, Govind Swamirao (1996), Inscriptions of the early Kadambas, New Delhi: Indian Council of Historical Research and Pratibha Prakashan. Pp. xv, 170, 88 plates, ISBN81-85268-47-9
Habib, Irfan (2000), "India", in Al-Bhakhit, M. A.; Bazin, L. A.; Cissoko, S. M. (eds.), History of Humanity, Volume IV: from the Seventh to the Sixteenth century, Paris: UNESCO and London: Routledge. Pp. xxiii, 682, 44 maps, 138 plates, pp. 398–410, ISBN0-415-09308-2
Master, Alfred (1944), "Indo-Aryan and Dravidian", Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 11 (2): 297–307, doi:10.1017/s0041977x00072487, S2CID170552998
M. A. R. (1937), Mysore Archaeological Department, Annual Report-1936 (MAR 1936), Bangalore: Government Press, pp. 73–80
Pollock, Sheldon (2003), Literary cultures in history: reconstructions from South Asia, Berkeley: University of California Press, ISBN0-520-22821-9
Pollock, Sheldon (2006), The Language of the Gods in the World of Men: Sanskrit, Culture, and Power in Premodern India (Philip E. Lilienthal Books), Berkeley: University of California Press, ISBN0-520-24500-8
