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Caitya Paripāți and Ahmedabad of Early 17th Century
Prof. R. N. Mehta*
Introduction
In the search of Indian history and archaeology, the nineteenth century scholars like Alexender Cunningham used the Chinese records of Si-ju-ki by Juan Chuvang, a pilgrim to India. These records of Tirthayātrā or Caitya Paripāti were pursued for the study of Buddhist settlements, but scepticism about Indian records of Tirthayātrā was also known to exist.
Fortunately various studies of Tirthayātrā records of Paurānic traditions have proved their value and are being used in the study of settlements. The Tirthas noted in Padmapurāna, in Ahmedabad area proved that their record was factual with the use of old mythological symbols.
Encouraged by this experience of Paurānic record, it was thought to study some Jaina record for the city. Fortunataly a good caitya paripāti written in samvat 1667, Māgha 5th, Sunday was available. Caitya Paripāti
This caitya paripati of Lalitasāgara, a disciple of Gayāsāgara Sūri is preserved in a manuscript in the L. D. Institute of Indology. The attention of the present author was drawn towards it by Laxamanabhai Bhojaka. He helped the author by transcribing the text and even identifying some places. This was a great help in the programme of the study of History of Ahmedabad, undertaken by the Department of History and Culture of Gujarat Vidyapith.
The present paper summarises the salient aspects of the work and some important results. The caitya paripāți of Lalitasāgara begins with salutation to Sarasvati and the teacher and recommends Caitya Vandanā in the Jaina prāsādas of Ahmedabad.
The text begins with the Mahāvira temple near Fatah Mehta Pole near Dhikva. This is the present Mahāvira temple on Gandhi road near Patasā ni Pole. Then different Jaina temples with the number of images are described.
While describing the location of these temples, the author clearly mentions that there were sixty temples in the city and twelve under ground temples. In the
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