Kathakoca or Treasury of Stories

Author(s): C H Tawney
Publisher: Oriental Books Reprint Corporation New Delhi

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Benfey and Rhys Davids, that Indian Buddhist stories actually travelled through Persia to Europe. Indeed, it is no longer denied that numerous medieval stories came to Europe from India, though it may reasonably be doubted whether these stories originated in India. Mr. Andrew Lang, who has discussed this question very exhaustively, is of opinion that the borrowing theory is excellent if it is sufficiently limited. Mährchen certainly did set out from mediæval India, and reached medieval Europe and Asia in abundance. Not to speak of oral communications in the great movements, missions and migrations, Tartar, crusading, commercial and Buddhistic, in all of which there must have been "swopping of stories," it is certain that Western literature was actually invaded by the contes, which had won a way into the literature of India.'* This statement is, I think, as great a concession as any rational advocate of the borrowing theory' ought to expect.t
But it may reasonably be asked how these Jain stories came to be carried to far distant countries, in view of the fact that Jainism has been almost entirely limited to India. The true explanation probably is that these stories were carried abroad, not by the Jains, but by the Buddhists, for both Jains and Buddhists used the folklore of Eastern India for the purpose of religious edification. An instance will perhaps make my meaning clear, and furnish support to my theory, or, rather, the theory which I have adopted.
Professor Jacobi, in his introduction to the 'Pariçishta Parvan,' a well-known Jain work, relates the following incident with regard to a queen who had deserted in succession two husbands:
Myth, Ritual and Religion,' vol. ii., p. 313. The Migration of Symbols,' treated of by Sir George Birdwood and Count Goblet d'Alviella, is, of course, free from the linguistic difficulty to which the 'borrowing theory' is exposed in the case of tales.
† It seems probable that the Indians borrowed some fables from the Greeks, as they were admittedly their pupils in numismatics and astronomy, and possibly, also, to a certain extent in sculpture, architecture, and the dramatic art. The resemblance between Greek and Indian novels has been pointed out by me in the notes to my translation of the Katha Sarit Ságara.'