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A CRITICAL NOTICE OF THE MANUSCRIPTS.
The present edition of Kuttanimatam is based upon transcripts of two very old manuscripts and one paper manuscript and the incomplete edition published in the Kâvyamâlâ Series. The readings of various manuscripts are marked as follows:
The only complete manuscript is that whose readings are marked here. It is a copy of an ancient Nepalese paper manuscript written in Nevari characters brought by M. M. Haraprasád Shastri, C. I. E. from Nepal and now in the Library of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Calcutta. It is very beautifully copied in Devanagari characters and belongs to Bábu Govind Das, Durgakunda, Benares City, who is well-known as a collector of rare manuscripts and who has laid the Indian public under great obligation by freely placing his manuscripts at the disposal of publishers, thus enabling them to bring to light the valuable store of our Sanskrit literature. It has 144 pages and is numbered VII 46.
The same copy has some various readings, noted above the particular places, from some other manuscript and they are marked in the present edition. Many readings of this agree with and some with the q manuscript.
The second transcript is a good and careful copy made from an ancient palm-leaf manuscript in the Sanghavinâ Pâdâno Bhândâra at Pâtana (in Gujarata). It was kindly placed at my disposal by my late lamented friend Mr. Chimanlal D. Dalal M. A. whose services in bringing to light the contents of the many Bhândârs at Pâtana and Jesalmere and initiating the Gáekwád Oriental Series will never be forgotten.
It is a nearly complete manuscript, only one page containing the four last verses and the colophon being missing. It has in many places supplied very good Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
www.umaragyanbhandar.com
