Indological Studies

Author(s): H C Bhayani
Publisher: Parshva Prakashan

Page 23

The Satprajñaka-gāthā and HỊdayavati
were useful for playing games, fos diversion in the Gosthi, for exchanging secret messages and for confounding others (Kāvyalakşana, 3, 97).
Uddyotana's Kuvalayamālā offers us a fair specimen of this kind of Vidagdha-gāthās (see pp. 174-177). As an enlightened pastime, the newly-wed hero and heroine have been depicted in that work as engaging themselves in the literary game of composing and solving verse riddles.11 These are said to be like those usually devised by the chappannayas or vidagdhas for diversion. Uddyotana presents us with the following list of the chief varieties : Prahelikā, Gūdha?, Antimākşara, Bindumati, Astapiţaka, Praśnottara, Prsțārtha, Akşaracyutaka, Mātrācyutaka, Binducyutaka, Gūụhacaturtha-pāda, Bhaạitavya, Hşdaya, Paksman (? PK. Pomha), Samvidhānaka, Gāthārdha, Gāthā-rākşasaka, Prathamāksaraviracita. Most of these13 he has defined and illustrated.
In Jayasimhasūri's Dharmopadeśamālā-vivarana in Prakrit (composed in 858-59 A.D.), in two different tales the hero and heroine are similarly described as engaged in the pleasant pastime of composing varieties of Praśnottara (pp. 42 and 90). These illustrations given by Uddyotana and Jayasimha can be taken as typical of the playful kind of the Vidagdha-gāthās. In the earlier tradition the Kāmasūtra mentions Prahelikā, Bāna knows the use of Akşaracyutaka, Mātrācyutaka, Bindumati, Gūdha-caturthapāda and Prahelikā for diversion and Gūdhacaturtha-goșthi is referred to by Haribhadra.14
The broad characterization of the Vidagdha-gāthās touched upon above finds strong corroboration from the following vivid picture of the Kāvyagoșthi given in Dhanapāla's Tilakamañjari (p. 108, lines-3-11)15 :
यथास्थानमुपविष्ठश्च तैः सह प्रस्तुतविचित्रकथालापस्य चित्रपदभङ्गसूचितानेकसुन्दरोदारार्थी प्रवृत्ता कथञ्चित् तस्य चित्रालङ्कारभूयिष्ठा काव्यगोष्ठी। तत्र च पठ्यमानासु विद्वत्सभालब्धख्यातिषु प्रहेलिकाजातिषु, चिन्त्यमानेषु मन्दमतिजनितनिवेदेषु प्रश्नोत्तरप्रभेदेषु, भाव्यमानासु प्रस-नगम्भीरभावार्थासु षट्रप्रज्ञकगाथास, विमृश्यमानेषु बोधानुपह