Political History of Northern India

Author(s): Gulabchandra Chaudhary
Publisher: Sohanlal Jain Dharm Pracharak Samiti Amrutsar

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CHAPTER I
CLASSIFICATION AND VALUATION OF THE SOURCES
The jain sources of the political history of our period (7th cent.-13th cent.) can be divided, for the sake of convenience, under two broad heads and several sub-heads. The two main heads may be called Literary and Inscriptional.
A-LITERARY SOURCES:
The Jain literature of this period is very extensive and varied, and numerous references of political value are scattered in it. The material available may be divided under the following sub-heads: (1) Caritas and Prabandhas, (2) Narrative Literature, (3) the Literature on Polity, (4) Miscellaneous Literature, (5) the Paṭṭāvalis, and (6) the Prasastis or the colophons of the books.
(1) The Caritas and Prabandhas: This head also can be divided into three categories: (i) mythological, (ii) biographical and (iii) chronicles. The Caritas are generally of the above three characters, while the Prabandhas are of the character of biographies and chronicles.
(i) Mythological: Like Brahmanas, Jains also have got their mythological personages, whose accounts are given in their Caritas and Puraṇas. These personages are called sixty-three Salākā Puruças (24 Tirthankaras, 12 Cakravartins, 9 Baladevas, 9 Vasudevas and 9 Prativasudevas).
The works wherein the lives of these great men are depicted, are called Puranas and sometimes also Caritas by the Digambaras, while among the Swetambaras they go by the name of Caritas only. Carita is a wider term, while the Puranas signify the lives of the ancient men. Some of the works of this category may be mentioned here, viz., the Padma-Purana, the Harivansa-purana, the Adi-purana, the Trişaşți-salākāpuruşa carita, the Parlvanatha carita, the Mahavira carita and so on. These works do not, however, consist merely of life-stories of celebrated personages and saints and the episodes concerning them, but they also throw a flood of light on contemporary historical and cultural events and movements. For example, the Harivansapuraya of Jinasena of Vardhamanapura in Käthiävāra contains very valuable information of historical importance in the concluding verses. It mentions the names of the contemporary kings of the period (composed in 783 A.D.). It has preserved an unbroken geneology of the Jain teachers from Lord Mahāvīra onwards. It also contains a succinct chronological history of Avanti. It mentions