The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) has discovered remains of an ancient temple dating back to the Gupta period in a village in Uttar Pradesh’s Etah district.
- The stairs of the temple had ‘shankhalipi’ inscriptions, which were deciphered by the archaeologists as saying, ‘Sri Mahendraditya’, the title of Kumaragupta I of the Gupta dynasty.
The Bilsarh site was declared ‘protected’ in 1928.
What is Shankhalipi ?
- Shankhalipi or “shell-script” is a term used by scholars to describe ornate spiral characters assumed to be Brahmi derivatives that look like conch shells or shankhas.
- They are found in inscriptions across north-central India and date to between the 4th and 8th centuries.
- A similar inscription was found on the back of a stone horse sculpture from that period that is at present in the State Museum at Lucknow.
(Financial Express)
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