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Professor G. Bühler's critical study
NOTES ON VASTUPĀLA'S WARLIKE DEEDS While Arisimha, true to his plan, sings only of the sukritas - the pious. deeds of Vastupāla, Amarapandita endeavours to acquaint posterity also with the heroic deeds of his patron. He evidently knows of only one, the victory of Vastupāla over Samgrāmasimha, the son of Sindhurāja, who seems to have been a petty vassal-prince or village chief in Vațakūpa near Cambay, and over his ally Sankha. He says, I. 44 : “They call him a Jaina ; but the illustrious minister Vastupāla is devoted also to Siva. He washed the master who wears the form of air (i.e., goes naked) with the water of shining fame which he took from Sankha." Further, VIII. 46 : “Thy sword, illustrious Vastupāla, beautiful in rising and brandishing, valiant in deed, defeated in the world that Samgrāmasimha.” And X. 45 : " Thy glory, 0 Vastupāla, which shines by the victory over Sindhurāja, is like the moon in the sky, since the spot in it is certainly the face of Sindhurāja, which was blackened by his deep shame.” .
Vastupāla's feud with Samgrāmasimha and Sankha is related at length by Someśvara in the Kirtikaumudi, iy-V, and Someśvara also is unable to repor any other warlike deed of his friend. Since,. then, we possess two eulogies, which, although otherwise independent of each other, mention only this one exploit, we may conclude that the accounts in the later Prabandhas of the numerous heroic deeds of Vastupāla and Tejahpāla, in the beginning of their career, deserve on great confidence.
In conclusion, it may be mentioned that Amarapandita twice addresses Vastu pāla by the name of Vasanta pāla. This was his poet-name, under which he wrote the Naranārāyanānanda-kävya, which I found in Anhilvād in 1875.1
3 A copy of the work is in the Deccan College Collection of 1875-77 No. 731.
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