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THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
[NOVEMBER, 1898.
retreat, and making his way to a neighbouring grove, performed intense devotion to the god of fire, who, it is said, appeared to him under the semblance of a Brahman and conveyed him to his own lodgings. Meanwhile the Gandharva was inconsolable at his loss, having no idea that her behaviour to the Brahman would have such a termination. She expressed her grief by dashing her head on the ground and rolling on the floor, and by various other deeds which shewed the poignancy of her affliction. A male Gandharva, in the interim, took the form of the Brahman, came to her, and passing himself off for Pravaråkhya, enjoyed with her. She discovered the trick when too late, but resolved to be revenged. She became pregnant, and was in due time delivered, and the child waxed great, and became Svårôchisha-Manu, the sovereign of Jambudvipa.
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In the introduction to the poem, Peddana takes an opportunity of expatiating on the valour of Krishnaraya and describing his victories over his enemies, and chiefly over those of the Muslim faith. The poet must have survived the king pobably by about five years and breathed his last about 1535 A. D. at his own residence at Doranala. The severe misfortune he experienced in the loss of his royal patron found a poetic expression in the very pathetic elegy he wrote on the occasion, in strains the more touching as they were really felt. The sorrow that he expressed was unfeigned on his part, as the munificence of his royal master, on many an occasion, created in the poet sentiments of the most fervent gratitude. The heir and successor of Krishnarâya, Râmaraya, shewed great kindness to the poet, who commanded a world of reverence and love from the king, and would utter verses only when he willed, and not at the royal command. His works are disseminated in every province where the Telugu language is spoken and understood, and there are few poets who gained more popularity during their lifetime and have been more esteemed by posterity than Allasani Peddana, Tikkana (the writer of the later fifteen parvans of the Mahabharata in Telugu) excepted.
One day, when the court was full of poets of all descriptions, Peddana poured forth an impromptu verse at the request of the sovereign and displayed his equal knowledge of Telugu and Sanskrit languages and received marks of distinction from the king to the entire satisfaction of the people assembled, poets included. The poets had previously been contented with translations from the Sanskrit and had never tried their hands at original Telugu compositions. As Peddana was the pioneer of that movement, he was called "the grandsire of Telugu Bards." He gathered materials from a scrap of the Márkandeya Purana, and wrote an original poem, the first of its kind, the Svárochisha Manucharitra, and from his time to that of Ramarajabhûshana, the writer of the Vasucharitra, the poets one and all followed his footsteps.
He was treated more or less as a sort of feudatory prince, and was presented with a good many agraháras, the chief of which was Kokata. Though by birth a Smarta, he was a latitudinarian in religion. This is borne testimony to by the following inscription found in Col. Mackenzie's Manuscript Collections: "Allasani Peddana, a Brahman, a Nandavarika, the son of Chokkarajah. The village of Kôkata conferred on him by king Krishna Deva Roya, was given over by the poet to a certain number of Vaishnavas. The new appellation which the village received was Satagôpapura. In S. S. 1440, on the 15th day of the white fortnight of Vaisakha (i. e., full-moon day) of the year Bahudhanya, the poet raised a stone inscription in Sarvakâlêsvara Swami temple of the place, that he gave over land yielding two putties for purposes of daily oblations. The next year on the twelfth day (dvddasi) of the white fortnight of Karttika, he gave land yielding four putties and a half to Channakesava Swami and raised an inscription to that effect 1. After the time of Krishna Deva Roya, i. e., during the time of Sadasiva Roya and Krishna Roya, and Mallu Ananta Roya of Nandyal, this Kokata Agrahara became the exclusive property of Brahmans."
It is said that Peddana has written a poem entitled Harikathására, but we know of it only from fragments that have come down to us of the work in the Rangaráṭchhandas and other treatises on Rhetoric. He was the first to introduce a large influx of Muhammadan and other words of foreign origin into serious composition in Telugu, and more or less thoroughly
