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Introduction
CLIX
From his copper - plates we learn that two of his Mahāsandhivigrahikas were Şri Gaditya and Srī Chāhila. From the Karnasundarī, we learn that his principal minister whose intelligence and loyalty, the poet describes at some length, was Sampatkara. Sampatkara or Santu continued to mind the affairs of the state even in the time of Jayasimha.
I have referred to the Karņasundari Nātikā of Bilhaņa. This Bilhana was a sojourner in Anahillapura. He was a poet from Kāşmira who stayed for a while in the capital of Gurjardesa when he was out, travelling in India, seeking fortune. He gives a sort of his autobiography in the XVIII canto of his poem Vikaramāņkadevacharita. According to it he was a native of Khoặamukha, a village near Pravarapura (v.71) (according to Dr. Bühler, at a distance of three miles from Pravarapura in Kāşmira. His father's name was Jyeshthakalaşa whom he describes as very learned (Sarasvata-rasa-nidhāna and Sruti-nidhi) and his having composed a commentary on the Mahābhāshya (79). His mother's name was Nāgadevi whom he describes as an in house - management ( 80 ). The poet then describes adept himself as one in whose mouth the goddess of Speech resided from the time he became a student (81). He was a master of the Vedas with their Angas, of the Mahābhāshya of Patanjali, and the beautiful art of Poetry and Poetics was his very life - breath (82).
Before he came to AŅhillapura, he had visited Mathurā, Kanyakubja, etc. He stayed for some time in the court of Karņa of Chedi ( vs. 93) who, as we saw, was a contemporary of Bhīma I. Bilhaņa avoided. Dhārā, probably because there was enmity between
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