Prakritpaingalam

SR No.: 001440
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Bholashankar Vyas, Vasudev S Agarwal, Dalsukh Malvania
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad
Publication Year: 2007
Total Pages: 690
Language: Prakrit, Sanskrit, Hindi, Apbhramsa
Classification: Book_Devnagari & Literature
File Size: 18 MB

Page 13

FOREWORD (Vol. 2) In part 1 of the Präkrita-Paingalam published as Volume 2 of the Prakrit Text Series, the text with a Hindi commentary and three Sanskrit commentaries, viz. “Pradipa" of Lakshminātha Bhatta (1600 A.D.), Pingala-prakāśa" of Vamsidhara (1642 A.D.) and “Pingala-Sära-Vikāśini" of Ravikara, (14th century), was printed. It was then promised that full details of the critical apparatus, of the available commentaries on the P-P, its place in the literature of Old Hindi, a critical appraisal of the linguistic material preserved in it and an extended examination of the Varnika and Mātrika metres dealt with in the text, would be presented in part II Which was projected to be published at no distant date. Happily the Editor Dr. Bhola Shanker Vyas has been able to keep his word and the supplementary volume of the Prākṣita-Paingalam is thus being issued by the Prakrit Text Society.
Dr. Vyas has discussed the period when the Prākṣita-Paingalam would have been compiled, and he seems to be right in dating it sometime after Hammira (1300 A.D.) and near about the first quarter of the fourteenth century A.D. As we pointed out before in the Preface to Part I, the eight verses in the Prākrita-Paingalam about the exploits and bravery of king Hammira of Chittor appear to have been taken from a well-known literary source, viz. the Hammira-Raso which is traditionally ascribed to the poet Sārngadhara and of which the original is no longer preserved. Ravikara was the son of Harihara, as recorded in the concluding verses of the Pingalasāra-vikāśini commentary. In the Prākrita-Paingalam itself we find reference to a poet named Haribamha or Hariharabamha (verses 108 and 115), both of which seems to be later interpolations in the original text. Verse 107 of which verse 108 in an illustration, has been explicitly mentioned to be an interpolation by Vassidhara, author of the Pingala-Prakāśa commentary. It seems that some one else grafted these two verses on the original text of the Prākrita-Paingalam. It may have been the work of Harihara, father of Ravikara, who may be held responsible for retouching the text of the Präkrita-Paingalam. As Harihara was the Dharmadhikäri of Mahārāja Kirtti Simha of Mithila (1390-1400 A.D.), the date of the PräkritaPaingalam may reasonably be pushed back by about fifty years or so. This is also indicated by the fact that Ravikara mentions an earlier commentary on the Präkrita-Paingalam, which gives scope for the elapsing of the above stated period between the date of the original composition and the compiling of Ravikara's commentary. It must, however, be stated that as yet no weighty evidence regarding the author of this important text is forthcoming, and we are therefore left with precarious surmises.
The present edition, has been based on the two printed editions of Bombay and Calcutta in the Kavyamala and Bibliotheca Indica Series respectively, and on five MSS., of which three are new discoveries, viz., C and D from the Jaina Upāśraya, Ramghat, Varanasi, and O from the Oriental Institute, Baroda. The family relationship of the available MSS. has been discussed in detail by the Editor (pp. 37-39). In a study of the nature of the Avahatta language recorded in the Prākrita-Paingalam it has been shown that it represents the Western Old Hindi, and not its Eastern variety, as Jacobi had taken.
Dr. S. N. Ghoshal of Calcutta has also been engaged for some years on a critical text and study of the Prākrita-Paingalam, and according to his paper in the Indian Historical Quarterly (March 1957), he is said to have discovered 7 new MSS., out of which three are new ones and the rest are those used by Shri Chandra Mohan Ghosha in his edition. These have been designated as the Eastern MSS., and we expect that his projected edition of the text will send scholars to a fresh examination of the linguistic material preserved in this very important work. Meanwhile the present edition of the Prakrit Text Society containing the text, Hindi translation, three Sanskrit commentaries out of the six that are available, and an extended investigation of the language and metres of the Prākrita-Paingalam should fulfil a long felt need of students in the Universities and of scholars of middle and New IndoAryan alike. Banaras Hindu University
V. S. AGRAWALA 9-2-62
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