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August 2, 1872.]
WEBER ON THE RAMAYANA.
251
(Aufrecht, Catal. p. 1216),—the Raghavavilâsabably from the end of the tenth, or it may be of Vi& vanatha,' author of the Sahityadar- from the beginning of the eleventh century: pana (p. 208 ed. Roer two works bearing the Ś ar fi gadhara also (Aufrecht, 125) quotes name Râmavildsa, the one composed by R&ma- it occasionally; and with this, too, accords charan a, (see Aufrecht, 2146); the other (an exactly the venerable tradition (see Wilson, imitation of the Gitagovinda) by Harinatha, Hindu Theatre, II. 372-3), which ascribes (ibid. 132a),-the Raghunathâbhyudaya of Sri the composition of the work to the Monkey Râm a b hadrâmba, see (Verz. der Berl. S. H. Hanumant himself, who first “engraved p. 154),--the Abhiramandmakávya of Sri Ra- or wrote it on the rocks" and then, to please la må nåtha, (ibid. p. 156),-the R makuta- Valmiki, cast it into the sea, lest his Râmâyhala of Govinda, from the middle of the ana should be thrown into the shade; in seventeenth century, (Aufrecht, 1986), finally, Bhoja's time, however, some portions came again the revision of the Setubandha in the Setusarani, to the light, and at his request, were arranged from the beginning of the same century, (see by Miśra-Damodara ; (see further Aufrecht's Verz. der Berl. S. H. p. 154-156.)
notices in the Catalogus, 1425, 151a; TayThe dramatic literature, too, that has a bear- or's Catalogue, I. 146). In Taylor (I. 11) mening on this matter is peculiarly rich. At the tion is made also of a second drama of this head of the list we may name the Prasanna- name, bat as having been composed by “Borághara of Jayadeva, son of Mahadeva ;t 1 dha yanachari" (vide supra, p. 123 note). at the head, because according to Hall (Preface The Champurâ mây a ņa, by Vidarto the Das'arúpa, p. 36), a verse from this bharaja, “otherwise Bhojaraja" in five drama is quoted in Dhanika, and it must a ñkas, also claims (Taylor, I. 175, 455) to therefore be placed before the middle of the date from the time of Bhoja. Similar claims to tenth century. The Mahanataka ascribed to belong to the middle or the end of the tenth Hanumant himself, belongs also to this century are set up by the Balaramayan, period; for, according to Aufrecht, (Catal. a somewhat tasteless drama by Rajase209a), it is quoted by Bhojadeva, the author khara, and by two dramas that are also of the Sarasvatikanthabharana which dates pro- quoted by Dhanika in the scholium to the
see
probabila
*Cf. supra p. 244, the earliest notice of the kind that bears upon the subject from the Harivas'. According to the Sahityadarpana, 5 277 p. 126 the substance of the Rimiyada forms particularly suitable subject for natak.
Aufrecht 1410. It is certainly doubtful whether this Jayadeva is identical with the author of tho Gitagovinda, as Hall believes; see my Abh. iiber Hala's Saptas'ataka, p. 10. According to the account in Bholanath Chandar's Travels of a Hindi, (Lond. 1869) L. 57, the author of the Gitagovinda lived so late as the end of the fourteenth, or rather the beginning of the fifteenth century, and was an adherent of Ramananda. Compare also the account in Wilson, Select Worka, 1.65 ff. Now, considering the strong bias of the Gltagovinda in favour of Krishna worship, we should not Tendily infer that its author belonged to the Rama sect.
Hangmant appears also in the Uttarakanda, XL. 18, as A great grammarian. According to the account of the scholinst Kataka, be was the ninth vyâkeranakarta (see Muir, Sanskrit Teat, IV. 417, 418). It is probable that A grammarian actually bore this name, and that his work was then imputed to the illustrious first bearer of the name (and there is a work ascribed to him, on the ten aataras of Vishnu : see Aufrecht, Catalogus, P. 282a.).-Quite analogously, the name of Ravana is quoted as that of a king of Kashmir (vide supra p. 240 n.); and it is told of the Lanká prince himselt (see Ind. Stud. V, 161. Ind. Streifen, IL. 202), that on one occasion, on the Chitrakata, he wrote upon stone the bhashya of Patanjali, &c., and by that means preserved it from being lost. According to Hall's communications in M. Maller, Rigvedas. vol. III. p. xiii, there are also ascribed to RÅV&na, or at least to some one of that name, a Rigbhashys and a commentary " on one of the 8 alhas of the Yajurveda," both of which are said still to exist Similarly & Ravanabhashys to the Samapeda" (Rost in Ind. Stul. IX. 176). A paris'ishta belonging to the sdmapeda bears the name; Ravanabhair; see Bornell's valuable Catalogue of his Vedic MSS. in Trübner's Record, Jan 1870 p. 651.
In this writing on the rocke" (see also the preceding note) we have evidently a testimony to the existence of the
"rock inscriptions" of Piyadasi, and specially the Brahmanical conception of that fact. Compare with this also the account in the Foc Kon Ki, Chap. 28, regarding the forty-two questions which were addressed by Sakra to Buddha and written with his finger on a rock. As regards moreover the well-known tradition of Hanumant's being prior to Valmiki, is it not probable that we should look for its origin in the fact that the Rama legend was chanted in the dinleets of the people before it was clothed in Sanskrit by Valmiki? As a matter of fact the first account that we have of Rams is in Pali, and even then composed in partially metrical form. The statement too in the Adhyatma Ramayana (vide supra p. 123n.) that Valmiki was "of low caste" may perhaps be considered as pointing in the same direction. Compare as analogous with this the statement that the Brihatkatha was originally composed in Pais'Achs, in the language of the bhūtas (Dandin's Kaoyadars'a, I. 88 see Ind. Streifen, I. 314).
# See Hall, Preface to the Dasarúpa p. 30, 31. The Balardm yana has recently been published in Benares (1869) by Govinda Deva S'atri, first in the Pandit news paper, and afterwards in a separate form. It consists of ten acts (pp. 312), and exhibite a remarkable absence of poetic feeling. There is much that is interesting, however, in the account contained in the opening of the poem regarding Rajas'ekbar. From this it appears that Madhava was quite in error when he described him, in the S'ankaravijaya, as king of Kerals (see Aufrecht Catal 2546 ff., Ind. Streifen, I. 814). According to the account given here, he sprang from a Yåyåvarakula (see the St. Petersburg Lexicon, %. v.), and was the gura, or rather upadhyaya of a king Nirbhays or Mahendra pl, of the Raghu family, who is designated as his pupil. The same verge in landation of the poet which, according to Aufrecht (vide supra p. 2496, n. t), in found in the opening of his drama Prachandapdndana, and which extols him as newly arisen Valmiki, Bhartrimenths and Bhavabhati, turns up again here, beinx pat in the mouth of a Daivajna; and this is immediately followed by another similar laudatory estimate of the poet's talents, which is given as that of
târasofand there is to the this name; to
