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APRIL, 1896.)
THE CHANDRA-VYAKARANA.
103
THE CHANDRA-VYAKARANA. PROVESSOR KIELHORN has shown that Jayaditya and Vamana, the compilers of the Kifiká Vritti, have used the Granner of the well-known Buddhist author Chandragomin or Chandracharya, the Chandra-Vyakarana, although they never actually mention it. As a full knowledge of this system has thus become desirable for a critical edition of the Kasika, a pupil of Prof. Kielhorn's, Dr. Liebich of Breslan, has examined all the obtainable materials, - the MSS. found in Nepal, Ceylon and Kaśmir, as well as the Tibetan translations contained in the 116th and 132nd volume of the Mdo or Sátra portion of the Tanjur. Hitherto, no remains of Chandra's work have been found in India proper. In the Nachrichten der K. Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, Phil.-Hist. Klasse, 1895, Heft 3, Dr. Liebich gives a résumé of his inquiries, from which it appears that the whole system of Buddhist Sanskrit Grammar has now been recovered. It consists of the following texts, preserved either in the original or in the very faithful Tibetan translation :
1. The Súlra-Pál ha, in six books, corresponding to the Ashțádhyáyi of Paniņi. A complete MS. of it, written in 1356 A. D., has recently been acquired by the Indian Government from Népal and is now in Calcutta. Moreover, there are several fragments in Cambridge and a complete translation in the Tanjur.
2. The Satra-Vritti. This is, no doubt, the most important text of the whole system, corresponding, as it does, in style and treatment of the matter to the Kasika Vritti and con. taining very probably the original explanation of Chandragomin himself. In the colophon, it is called the work of Dharmadasa. If this is to be taken as a proper name, it may be the name of the pupil who wrote down his master's words. Dr. Liebich gives the beginning of this commentary, which shews its similarity to the Katiká and the help it gives for emending the corrupt passages of its printed edition.
The only complete MS. of this commentary, containing the Satras, and written in the character of the XII-XIII. century, is in the library of the Mahârâjd of Nepal ar Kathmanda. Through the kind intervention of Col. Wylie, British Resident in Nepal, Dr. Liebich obtained a copy. The original, according to Prof. Bendall, comprises 159 palm-leaves. The copy numbers 281 large leaves of Nepalese paper. Fragments of the same Vritti, not extending over a third of the whole, are in the Cambridge University Library.
3. The Satra-Paddhati, a gloss by Anandadatta. Copions fragments, belonging to the first and second books of the Sútrapátha, are preserved at Cambridge.
4. Chandra-Alankára, a sileá of the Sutra päļha, by an unknown author. The single existing fragment, referring to the fifth and sixth books, was acquired in Nepal by Prof. Bendall, and is now in his own possession. It is written in a very archaic alphabet, the so-called arrowtop character, similar to the South Indian alphabets and else found in Buddhist votive inscriptions only.
5. Adhikára-Sangraha : a curious little book, containing all the Adhikáras or leading rules of the Chandra-Sátra, with an indication as to how many Sútras they apply. It is found in the Tanjur only. No such treatise, at least in Grammar, has reached us in the original Sanskrit.
6. Dhátr-Patha, the collection of roots according to the Chándra system, differing from Panini's mainly in the arrangement, as it makes the genera verborum the highest principle of division. It was found by Dr. Liebich in two different translations in the Tanjur. With the aid of these, the Sanskrit original, too, was afterwards discovered in the Cambridge collection.
There is a third translation of this work in the Tanjur (No. 3727), with some alterations, having the ad- and tuhoti-classes combined into one, and the last or chur-class worked over
Ante, Vol. XV. pp. 183-3.