Indian Antiquary Vol 59

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Charles E A W Oldham, S Krishnaswami Aiyangar, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarka
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 164

150
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
* ( August, 1930
origin, the aspiration (dh) being of secondary nature, and thus a form pencari or pindari would be the original one. And for this form we really find suitable connection in Sanskrit' and Pråkpit. In the Kaučiliya, ed. Jolly, p. 76, 1, we find a word piuddraka, which probably means buffalo-herd.' Hemacandra, Anekúrthasamgraha, iii, 571 (ed. Zacharia), tells us as follows:
..... pindaro bhikṣuke drume
mahişipálake kipepe..... i.e., ' pindára means a beggar, a certain tree (probably Flacourtia sapida, Roxb.), a buffaloherd,' and an opprobrious denomination.'10 The second meaning (a certain tree), of course, has got nothing to do with the others ; and though it is quite possible, it may be doubtful whether they have all been drawn from a common source. But there is scarcely any cloubt that the most important meaning of the word, and the one upon which we have to fix our attention is that of 'buffalo-herd.' For the same Homacandra in his Desinamamála, 6, 58, bas preservod the gloss: pe duro gopal 1 pen láro mahigipala iti Devarajah il i.e., 'pendara means cowherd; p. means buffalo-herd according to Devaraja.' This Devaraja is mentioned by Hemacandra as an authority on lexicography also in 6, 72 and 8, 17, and according to Bhuvanapala he is the author of certain stanzas in Hala's Saptasati 11 As a matter of fact our word occurs also in a verse preserved in one of the numerous versions of that anthology and bearing the number 731.12
uvaharidi samaam pindáre na kaham kunanlammi navavahua i sarosam
savva ccia vacchad mukka II "Look! when the buffalo-herd13 starts talking with the maid, the young mistress of the house out of jealousy lets loose all the calves.'
The commentary here seems to prefer the reading pendara to the pildara of the text, which certainly makes no great difference.
Considering there passages from different authors there can be no doubt at all that there exists a Pråkrit word pindara, pendara-which, like innumerable others, has found its way also into Sanskrit works with the sense of buffalo-herd.' In this connection it is certainly important to notice that the present-day Pindaris, of which there seem to exist some 10,000 in all, are professionally 'herdsmen and tenders of buffaloes,'14 For it cannot well be doubted that in the pilara, pe udára, testified to by various lexicographers--of whom Devaraja must be previous to Hemacandra, i.e., at least belong to the tenth or eleventh century-by Vauțilya and by a stanza in the Saptaśati, must be the source of the name Pindari' which during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries won for itself such a sinister celebrity,
Such seconda y aspiration does not seem to be altogether uncommon in Marathi, judging from mate. rials which I have gathered quite at random from Professor Jules Bloch's excellent work La formation de la langue Marathe. Thus, e.g., khápar: Skt. karpara. (the explanation given by Professor Bloch, p. 319, seems to me not quite oorreot); khuja: Skt. kubja-; khenkad : Skt. karkata cadhnen: Pkt. cadai; nidhal, besides nidal; babhny, besides babal, etc. (Bloch, 1.c., p. 375) : bhar (<b()afra); Skt, badara. ; phophal, begides pophal (op. Orientalist. Lit. Zeit. 1930, 'col. 176; ramdhd besides rumda, etc., and above all pendhi,
& bundle of grass, a shoof of corn,' besides per da, 'the refuse of soods or nute from which the oil has been extracted, oil cake, etc., peyda 'a load of fresh loppings or green grass, rice straw ; lumps of moist cow dung,' etc. All these derived from Skt. pinda- (cp. also penda = pixda., Hemacandra, i, 85).
9 On this the commentator (Mahendra) remarks: mahişfdohanaidaigdhyam pindáre na tu pişdite! which is not quite clear to me.
10 Tho Modinikosa and tho Hårdvati (which are unfortunately inaccessible to inc horu), also give Whikzu and mah ixipala as mounings of pindura (cp. the Petersburg Wb., 3.V.).
II Cp. Pischel, Grammatik der Prakritsprachen, pp. 10, 36, 39. 11 Cp. Wobor, Das Saptasatakam des Hala, p. 393 f.
13 Weber, upon the authority of the Medinikosa, translates 'cowherd', following the Anekarthasa graha and Devaraja I venture to prefer buffalo-herd.'
14 Op. Russell, Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces, iv, 389.