________________ 19 mentioned by name in the Nighantus. The commentators have made the confusion worse confounded. The tradition of giving so many names of one herb or tree etc. has not helped us. Now we should determine only one meaning of a parti cular term after having examined and studied all the Nighantus and their commentaries. This will help us much. This will dispell the dark. ness prevailing in the jungle of the Nigantus. Let us study the eleven pames of Bala which is very useful : balayah sita paki syat bhadradanyodanahvaya vati vat yalakah (lika ?) vat ya puspika kharayastika 1/260|| kasthika samarahva ca samanga ca mahodari / The author of the Dhanvantarinighanku bas given pine names of Bala, that of the Rajanighantu ten, and that of the Nigbantusesa eleven'. The name 'samanga found in the Dhanvantarinighantu is changed into 'samanga' by the author of the Nighantusesa. None except the author of the Nighantusesa mentions the name 'mahodari.' We feel that the names like 'sita pak' 'odana paki' 'samarahva' 'mahodari' are meaningless. It is high time that we should retain only one scientific name of Bala. Of course, we should retain the reliable names current in different regions. It is really a matter of great pleasure that the work has been started in this direction. Otherwise, there would not be an end to such meaningless names. Under the prevailing conditions Bala is yet barren though it has eleven chidren. No word comes to its rescue. And in India the term Bala is used to denote different things. Time is ripe for us to come out of such condition. The popular names will be very useful to us. While writing on Bala Bha. Diksita gives its name Baliara popular in his days. On the other hand. the commentator of the Nighantusesa states that its popular name is "bala' (etasya loke 'bala' ity eva prasiddhih) Four-rather five-types of Bala are mentioned in the Nighankus. Some consider Atibala to be identical with Bala. For some Nagabala is nothing but Atibala. The Bala and Ksirabala from which the satapaki and sahasrapaki oils are prepared in Kerala are different from what we call Bala in Gujarat. While some use what we call Kha pata (Atibala) in Gujarat, having consi. dered it to be Bala. Tarkavacaspati Tajanatha Bhattacarya rightly observes : bahucchidram parityajya gunalesajgheksaya / parigthnantu ado vijna rjavo dambhavarjitah // Amara has written only this much: 'bala vatyalakah'. Amara has given very few synonyms.
