Kahakosu

Author(s): Shreechandmuni
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

Page 8

General Editorial
The text of tbe Kathakośal (in Apabhramsa) by Sricandra is edited here, for the first time, by Professor Dr. H. L. Jain from a single Ms., the only one known to us so far. It is a paper Ms. measuring 37 by 14.5 cms, and containing 173 folios written on both the sides, the frist page of the first folio being blank. There are some 15 lines on a page
d each line contains about 55 to 60 letters. It is written in uniform Devanāgari hand with black ink. The number of Kadava kas on a few opening pages are rubbed with ink cbalk. The paper has fatally absorbed the ink, and the written portion of most of the folios (excepting the last 40 or so which are intact) is brittle and broken too here and there Dr. H. L. JAIN has now got this Ms. duly repaired with transparent cloth pasted on both sides of the folios in the National Archives, Delhi. Prior to this repair, the MS. had to be very carefully us its folios might crumble, while they were being handled.
Aecording to the concluding lekhaka-prasasti in prose, this Ms. was copied at Surat in Saṁvat 1783 (=A.D. 1726). It was prepared at the instance of Devendrakirti, the successor of Dharmacandradeva, the Bhattă. raka of Karanja (Kāryaramjaka-pura-vāsi-bhattāraka), of Kundakundānvaya Balātkāragana, Sarasvati-gaccha and Mūlasamgha. The cost of tran. scription was defrayed indirectly by the nun Pāsamati (āryika-jri-Påsamatidatta-vittena). It is interesting to note that the Bhattārakas of Karanja called themselves Malayakheda-simhāsanādbīśvara indicating thereby that they had some connection with the line of monks at Māoykheța, modern Malakheda,a near Gulbarga, Mysore State.
This Ms. came in the hand of Dr. H. L. JAIN as early as 1923, through the kindness of Sri Virasena Bhattāraka of Karanja, while he was engaged, during that summer vacation, in preparing a catalogue of Sanskrit and Prākrit Mss. in the collections at Karanja (Dt. Akola, Maharashtra). Details about it were published in the Catalogue of San skrit and Prakrit Manuscripts in the Central Provinces and Berar, by R.B. HIRALAL, Nagpur 1926. The entry (p.630) stands thus : 'No. 7063. Kathākosa. Author.-Srichandra. Subject.-Dharma. A collection of moral stories in Apabhraíša language. Owner.- Balātkār gas Jain mapdir at Karanja (Akolā district)'. In the Introduction (pp 49-51), some observations on its contents, some extracts illustrating the author's use of Bamśastha, Samānikā and Dubadaü metres and the geneology of the author (based on his prasasti extracted on pp. 726-27) were given. Sricandra having been a contemporary of Mülarāja, and there being two kings of this name, it was conjectured that he lived at the time of one of these, 'very probably of the first' who reigned from A.D. 941-996.