Universal Values of Prakrit Texts

SR No.: 006701
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Prem Suman Jain
Publisher: Bahubali Prakrit Vidyapeeth and Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan
Publication Year: 2011
Total Pages: 368
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 19 MB

Page 81

This manuscript page, numbered 45, has a painting in the right corner of the recto side. The scene features three ladies in a river where fish and a rather monstrous animal are shown swimming. The photograph is now available online on the website of the Museum (http://collectionsonline.org search for “Yashodhara"). The text around is cropped except for two lines, but the page is available in full in Pal 1993: pp. 104-105, catalogue No. 19, shelfmark “M. 90.86.1”. The verso side, which is not illustrated, does not figure in the catalogue or on the website.
The text along with the depicted scene makes a general identification easy: this page belongs to a manuscript of one of the Apabhramba versions of Yasodhara story. Comparing the text with that of Pușpadanta, the only Apabhramsa version of the story that is available in print, one can see that the text on the Los Angeles folio is close to it but not identical with it. Raidhū's Jasaharacariu being the only other Apabhramśa version which seems to have been spread reasonably, his indebtedness to Pușpadanta's text being clear, and the literary style shown here being in tune with the rest of the work as we know it, it now becomes possible to state beyond doubt that the Los Angeles folio is a page of this work – which I supposed twenty years ago but could not confirm for lack of sufficient elements of information.
The episode is that of the third group of parallel rebirths of Yasodhara and his mother Candramati, when the former was a fish, and the latter, who was previously a snake, the animal known as Gangetic porpoise (Skt. śiśumāra). Both lived in the river Siprā. Their inimical relationship continues from birth to birth. The aquatic animal wants to catch the fish:
Sippā-nai-vane mīnahim gabbhahim thappiyau 119... tā tahim jaņaņi sappau uppaņņau sumsumāra-jammami pavaạnau. teņa dimmhu haum jali lolantau khāhum pavamchai danta phurantau.
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