Makaranda Madhukar Anand Mahendale Festshrift

Author(s): M A Dhaky, Jitendra B Shah
Publisher: Shardaben Chimanbhai Educational Research Centre

Page 234

Valāhassajātaka and Telapattajātaka
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spouse, and Vijaya, crowned king and ruling the whole of Ceylon, weds a second time. There is a magnificent wedding feast, and his bridge and future queen is now no longer a yaksini but a real princess from South India.
As we see, the yaksa-city here, as in the Valāhassajātaka, again bears the name Sirīsavatthu, and the witch is a yaksinī who, at the suitable moment, takes on the appearance of a young and captivating girl.
Annotations :
* This article has originally been published in German and forms part of S.
Lienhard, Die Abenteuer des Kaufmanns Simhala. Eine nepālische Bilderrolle aus der Sammlung des Museums für Indische Kunst Berlin, Berlin 1985 (S. 16 - 20). The English translation presented here is by Philip Pierce, Nepal Research
Centre, Kathmandu. 1. Jātakatthavannanā no. 196. Text edition by V. Fausbll 1879 (reprint 1963), II,
pp. 127ff. - Translations in E. B. Cowell 1895, pp. 89ff.; (the same translation) in H. T. Francis and E. J. Thomas 1916, pp. 164ff., J. Dutoit 1908, pp. 149ff.; E. luders 1961, pp. 26ff. : Die Kaufleute und das Flügelross; and H. Mode 1981, pp.
14ff. : Die Erzählung von dem Flugelross. 2. The term applies in Pāli is yakhini (Skt. yakșini) and not rāksasī (as in the
Sanskrit texts). 3. The noun valahassa, 'cloud horse', as in the designation of a mythical steed is
documented also in the Samyuttanikāya (III, 145). Instead of valāhassa, the forms valāhaka or, in Sanskrit and Newārī texts, bălāha(ka) also occurs. It is worth noting that a horse of the breed of Valāhassarāja, 'king of the cloud horses', is numbered among the seven precious objects (sattaratana) belonging to the throne of a universal monarch, namely the sovereign's wheel (cakka), state elephant (hatthi), state steed(assa, valāhaka), wish-granting jewel (mani). consort (itthi), treasurer (gahapati) and field marshal or king's advisor (parināyaka or senāpati). Thus in the “Mahāsudassanasuttanta", Dighanikāya II, p. 174 (PTS) the assaratana, i. e. 'the jewel horse', is not only designated valāhaka, but also, exactly like the steed Valāha in the Valähassajātaka, as sabbaseto kākasīso muñjakeso iddhimā vehāsaṁgamo, i. e. as completely white, crow-headed, having a mane like muñja- grass, possessing supernatural powers
.