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JONE, 1907.)
NAVASAHASANKACHARITA OF PADMAGUPTA.
149
ON THE NAVASAHASANKACHARITA OF PADMAGUPTA OR PARIMALA. BY THE LATE PROFESSOR G. BÜBLER, C.I.E., LL.D., AND DR. TH. ZACHARIAS.
(Translated from the German by May S. Burge88.)
I. - The Manuscript.1 THE following short account of a hitherto unknown Mahkkávya is based on one manuscript only.
1 This manuscript belongs to the little-known collection of James Tod, preserved in the Lábrary of the Royal Asiatic Society in London, and is numbered 113. It consists of 185 ( written, and a number of blank) palm-leaves, with two to four lines on the page, in old Nagari writing. The two first, with the two last leaves, have been completed by a later hand, apparently because the M$. had been injured at the beginning and end. The date of the MS., if it ever was given, has not been copied by the writer of the 185 pages. It may be presumed, however, that the MS. is of great age, from the fact that the numbering of the single leaves is carried ont on the right side by means of the usual figures, and on the left by letters: compare Kielhorn, Report on the Search for Sanskrit MSS. (Bombay, 1881 ), p. viii, ff. Besides, manuscripts, such as the one under consideration, have been so often described, e. g., by Kielhorn in the report just quoted - that further description would be superfluons.
The manuscript is, on the whole, very well preserved. Only on a few pages is the writing blurred and indistinct. Leaf 82 is broken and part lost. Corrections on the margins of the leaves, As also completions of verses or parts of verses, are often carried out in Sârada writing.
If the manuscript shows errors and defects - the text is not as a whole quite so correct as one pould wish, - it is at least complete, and in this respect, in the meantime, unique. It is, indeed, still possible, that in India complete manuscripts of the Narasa hasánkacharita may be found. Still, with cach year that becomes less probable. Manuscripts which have become known up till now are incomplete. This is also true of the two manuscripts, whicb, according to Burnell (4 Classified Index to the Sanskrit MSS. in the palace at Tanjore, p. 163 a), are found in Tanjor. While the work of Padmagapta (Parimala) consists of 18 sargas, these manuscripts only contain 17 sargas. Besides, as one of them is notivked, and the other written about 1650 ), imperfect and much injured, it may be taken for granted that the manuscript material at Tanjor would not be sufficient for an
alysis or even for an edition of the work ; - for the rest, the title of the Kavya is, according to Burnell, Sahasdakacharita, and the name of the author, Parimala Kalidasa (!).
Also the manuscript, which the publishers of the Subdshitdeali, Messrs. Peterson and Durgaprasada, have brought out, was imperfect. The "fragment" includes " several sargas" and extends at least to the sixth sarga, as may be gathered from the account of the scholars just mentioned. The beginning of the work, however, is assuredly not preserved in this fragment, otherwise Peterson and Durgaprasada would doubtless have drawn up a more exact chronology of Padamagupta than that given in the words: "In his Narasd hasánkacharita Parimala or Padmagupta refers to Kalidasa, somewhere between whom and Kshemendra he is therefore to be put. His Kávya is in praise of a king of Avanti" (Subhashitdvali, Introd. p. 53). Further, it is shown below that the date of Padmagupta may be fixed as precisely as possible in the literary history of India,
1 This paper appeared in the Bitrageberichte of the Wien. Imp. Akademie of Sciences for 1888, in the Phil.-hist. Class (Bd. CXVI, Hft.i, S. 583--630). The first 20 pages of the German are by Dr. Zachariae, and the last 27 by Dr. Bühler.
Cont. Subhashitovali of Vallabhadeva (Bombay, 1886 ), Introd., p. 57 ff. Hore also in Peterson's small pamphlet, the Auchityölankdra of Kshemendra (Bombay, 1885), p. 25 1., is found oollected all that is known ponoerning the poet Padmagupta and his works,
