Political History of Northern India

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

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POLITICAL HISTORY OF N. INDIA FROM JAIN SOURCES
the Rāsabha family or tribe to which Vikramaditya belonged though it does not refer to Vikramāditya by name. It supplies information about the reigning periods of certain dynasties after the death of Mahāvīra up to the Gupta dynasty and Kalki. It also reveals how the political characteristic of the period was generally of a feudal pattern. The Adi-purāņa describes in fair agreement with the corresponding Brāhmanical rites, the Samskāras, consecrations, which accompany the life of an individual from his conception to his death. Short treatises on town planning, origin of the State, king's consecration, duties and art of governing are found there. Similarly, other works of this type of the period, while narrating the lives of great men, occasionally give out the full picture of the time.
The Trişaști-salākāpuruşa carita varies greatly in extent and interest. It gives a good social picture of the time and, side by side, refers to the political conditions and ideas on the polity of the time. Its Parvan X, entitled Mahāvīra carita, contains the life-story of Mahāvīra, which is important from the historical point of view regarding the king Śreņika Bimbisāra, a contemporary of Mahāvīra and Buddha. In the form of a prophecy by Mahāvīra, Hemacandra also describes in a lengthy passage the ideal reign of his pious pupil, king Kumārapāla, who ascended the throne after 1669 years of the Nirvāņa of Mahāvīra.
Several other Jain Mahākāvyas like Dvisandhāna kāvya of Dhananjaya, the Dharmaśarmābhyudaya of Haricandra, the Neminirvāna kāvya of Vāgbhata,' and others occasionally throw welcome light on the political ideas of the time.
Apart from the isolated references scattered in the vast mythological literature of the Jains, the other two categories of this class, viz., biographies and chronicles directly contribute some definite information to our knowledge of history.
(ii) Biographical: It is fortunate that some Jain writers of our period based their literary works on the lives of their royal patrons. Like the Harsa carita of Bānabhatta, Gaudavaho of Vākpati and Vikramānkadeva of Bilhana, some of the biographical works composed by the Jains, for instance, the Kumārapāla carita or Prakrit Dvyāśraya-kävya of Hemacandra, Hammīramahākāvya of Nayacandrasuri, Sukrta-samkirtana of Arisimha, Sukrtakīrti-kallolini of Udayaprabha, Vasanta-vilāsa of Bālacandra and Vastupāla Tejahpala praśasti of Jayasimha are of this kind. Among other biographical works may be mentioned the Kumārapāla carita of another Jayasimha. Several
1 All the three are published in Kāvyamālā Series, N. S. Press, Bombay.