Indological Studies

SR No.: 022756
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: H C Bhayani
Publisher: Parshva Prakashan
Publication Year: 1993
Total Pages: 376
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 25 MB

Page 125

Jain Literarture and Performing Arts
115
From Jain narrative works we get a few references to some of these types, suggesting that they were still in vogue at a particular period. Besides, some tests have preserved a few specimens of songs that were used in these dramatic types 16.
In Uddyotanasūri's Kuraiayainālā, a Kathā-work in Prakrit completed in 779 A.D., the hero Kuvalayacandra is described as visiting a residential school (matha) in the Southern city of Vijayāpurī, where students from the regions of Lāța, Karņāța. Mālava, Kānyakubja, Golla, Mahārāsţra, Saurāstra, Srikaatha and Saimdhava were learning various Sāstras, Vijñānas and Kalās. The long list of subjects taught there included Bhāṇaya, Dombiliyā and Siggada among others17. These three are grouped with painting and music. Now from Abhinavagupta and other dramaturgists we know that Bhāņaka, Dombilikā and Sidgaka were three well-known types of Uparūpakas18. The Kuvalayamālā. reference to them is the earliest19 known so far. It precedes Abhinavagupta by more than two centuries. Similarly another Jain Sanskrit text, viz., Bțhatkathākośa of Harișeņa, completed in 93132 A.D., refers in one of its illustrative tales20 to five types of dance-dramas called Signațaka, Bhāni, Chatra, Rāsaka and Dumbili, expounded by Bharata. All of these except Chatra are wellknown as Uparūpakas. Chatra has been quite unknown so far. But recently I spotted an early reference to it in a Jain Prakrit text, viz., Vasudevahimdi (Madhyama-khanda), written by Dharmasena-gaņi in the seventh or eighth century A.D.21
We get a third reference to some of the Uparūpakas in Jineśvarasūri's Kathākośaprakaraña. It is in Prakrit. The work was completed in 1052 A.D. In the tale of Simhakumāra, in an interesting passage on musicology, it is said that the Agama type of songs (as against the Deśya type) consists of seven types of Siggaļās, seven Bhāņikās, Bhāņakas and Dumbiliyās22. Such varieties of these Uparūpakas are not known from any other source. This reference is of the same period as that of Abhinavagupta. It should be noted that Bhāņaka, Dombika and Sidgaka are common to all the above given references.