Akhyanakmanikosha

Author(s): Nemichandrasuri, Punyavijay, Dalsukh Malvania, Vasudev S Agarwal
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

Page 71

Royal palace in AMKV.
dhavalaharamāla (p. 326. 1-2). Mansion of the rich was also called isaragiha (isaragiha. p. 244.2; 123. 3-4; 42.137), bhavana or mandira ( 144.138). Sometimes the rich merchants had big palatial buildings like the saptabhumipräsäda of Salibhadra (31. v. 35). A beautiful description of this palace of Salibhadra is given (31. 35 ff). Shining like the celestial vimana, it had various mattavaranas of gems, around it in the compound (parisaradhara) was a forest-grove (vanasandam), a big step-well in which water was controlled by mechanical contrivance of dolls (jalajantavahayaputtaliyavilasiram pavaravivim 31.37). This step well used for jala-andolaya-kila (jala-Andola-krida) of Salibhadra and his wives. Kings also had similar kriḍāvapis in their gardens (254.293).
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A big palace erected by Abhaya resembled a celestial vimāna, it had beautiful ceilings or canopies with strands of pearls hanging from them, mirrors, jingling bells, beautiful salahanjiyās (śalabhanjikās), and mattavaranas of gems, etc.
Mattavarana in palaces and mansions is referred to on several occasions-cf. gihabhittimattavāraṇapavapena saceyano jão (100.43); dhanävahasetthidhavala päsäуabhittibhāyammi tabbhavanamattavaranapariṭṭhiya......dittha (62. 20-22). Rohini, the wife of Dhanavaha śresthi was seen, by king Nanda, (standing or) sitting in the mattavāraṇa of her dhavalaprāsāda. King Nanda got enamoured of her charms. Rohini alerted at this goes elsewhere (into her prāsāda) from this mattavärana (62.26). Madanasena, queen of Makaradhvaja of Tilakapura, sits in the mattavarana (of her palace) with her husband and dresses the hair of the king (200.244). Another queen goes stealthily at night into mattavarana under which her paramour, the king's keeper of elephants (mintha) is waiting with the elephant. The elephant is tied to a post below the mattavarana. The elephant, goaded by the mintha, raises its trunk and brings down the queen. After enjoyement, the queen is placed safely into her place (mattavarana) again through the trunk of the elephant. It is, therefore, quite clear that mattavarana is a balcony-like projection in front of a palace or a mansion, in which queens or ladies of high families sat (and was probably not far from ladies' apartments ). It was high enough from the ground, so that an elephant could stand underneath and could bring down a person from it with its raised trunk. The pillar below mattaväraṇa, mentioned in p. 190. v. 71, is noteworthy. Was this balcony supported by pillars on the ground? Not necessarily, for the pillar in above reference could have been any other pillar of the palace, under the overhanging mattavarana. Hitherto the exact sense of mattavarana in palaces was not clear, so far as we know. The AMKV. makes the sense more clear, and mattavarana may now he taken as a kind of balcony of a palace. The Deśināmamālā (Chp. 6. v. 123) gives and quotes a gatha which reminds one of the AMKV. account of the queen and the keeper of elephants. In his Abhidhāna- Cintamani, Hemacandra gives मत्तालम्ब= अपाश्रय = प्रग्रीव = मत्तवारण.
1.
Cf. नीओ य वहुमाणं नियधवलहरे तओ सेट्ठी (p. 145, v. 159 ).
2. Cf. - जाव निहुयं निरिक्खड़ ता पेच्छइ मत्तवारणतलम्मि । खंभम्मि मत्तवारणमागलियं मिठपरिकलियं ॥ ७१ ॥
रयणीए अंधयारे हत्थी मिठेण चोइओ संतो । उड्ढ काऊण करं उत्तारइ रायवरपत्ती ॥ ७२ ॥ मेलाइ करिकराओ सहाणे ॥ ७५ ॥ AMKV, p. 190.
3. Roth & Bothlingk in Sanskrit Worterbuch refer to Vasavadattă for this word. Monier-Williams does the same, and takes and explains it as "a turret, pinnacle, pavilion." It is also explained as "a peg or bracket projecting from a wall." is also explained as "a fence or a hedge round the house of a rich man." MonierWilliams, Skt.-Eng. Dictionery, (Oxford, 1956 ed.), p. 777.
CI. - कमलमरंदगोरि मत्ताने इमं ण ज रमसि । मम्मणियाउत्तर
4.
महवरमिच्ता वरं भमितं ॥
5. Abhidhana-Cintamani, 4 kända, v. 77. Hemacandra in his own gloss writes-:fèfèrizqyà qu अपाश्रीयतेऽपाश्रयः ॥ २॥ प्रसृता प्रीवाऽत्र प्रग्रीवः ॥३॥ मत्तान् वारयति मत्तवारणस्तत्र ||४|| This gloss would show that as an architectural part has nothing to do with an elephant in rut.