Unknown Pilgrims

SR No.: 007014
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: N Shanta
Publisher: Sri Satguru Publications Delhi
Publication Year: 1997
Total Pages: 820
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 19 MB

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The Unknown Pilgrims
If Śravana Be!goļa was an remains a unique spot where faith and the devotion it kindles are, as it were, condensed, inspiring numerous pilgrims of all ages who have climbed these rocky hills, nevertheless one finds in many other places of this same region traces of this same firm faith.
b) A Queen and certain others. . . -An epigraph of the end of the Xth century relates how Queen Pāmbabbe, who was probably of the royal family of the Gangas, a disciple of Nānabbe-kanti who was herself a disciple of Abhinandi Panditadeva of the Desiyagaña, embraced the path of asceticism and lived a life of severe penance for thirty years.244
-Another epigraph of Manne, in the district of Nelamangala mentions the great departure of Mārabbe-kantiyar, disciple of Devendra Bhaltāraka, in the year about 1000.245
-At Honnūru, in the district of Kolhāpura, an undated inscription mentions the building of a temple constructed by Bammagāvunda, a śrāvaka, disciple of Kanti Rātrimati (Kāntimati?).246
The following inscriptions are in the possession of the Bhattārakas of the Saurāṣtragaña, who had also affiliations in the South.
the contemplative gaze..." Srinivasan, 1975, pp. 177-178; cf. also the magnificent issue of Marg, vol. XXXIII No 3 (Bombay), in homage to Bahubali and Sravana Belgoļa, on the occasion of the mahămastakābhişeka, the great annointing of the head of the statue, February 1981.
244 Cf. Saletore, 1938, p. 157.
245 lbid., p. 257.
246 Cf. Desai, 1957, pp. 119; 166; 169. Desai suggests circa 1110 as a possible date. This āryikā belonged to the Punnāgavřkşamúlagaña, a branch of the Nandisamgha (usually associated with the Yāpaniyas).