Proceedings of the Seminar on Prakrit Studies 1973

Author(s): K R Chandra, Dalsukh Malvania, Nagin J Shah
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 160

199
(c. 1600 A.D.):28 Moreover, Samayasāra, Tribhuvanakośa, Karmaprakşti, Yo. gasāra, Paramāgamasāra etc. are the other Kannada translations of Prakrit works of the same names.
Then the numerous Kannada Purānas, Caritas29 and Kathās like the Jaina Kathäsangraba, Dharma Kathāsangraha and Vrata Kathāsangrabado could hardly escape the influence, direct or indirect, of the concerned Pra. krit literary works. Really this is an interesting field for such a kind of study.
At this stage I may just refer to an instance of the fact that a very bigh value of Prakrit religious literature weighed on the mind of the Jaina community in Karnatak which is seen in the unparalelled careful way the great Şațkbandagama works have been preserved in Kannada script and protected, till today, in the Bhandara of the Jalpa matha in Müdabidri.
Now considering the secular literature, the Kannada Līlāvaty of Nemi. candra (c. 1170 A.D.), a romance, is influenced in respect of its Māyabh. ujanga Episode by the Karpüramañjarī Sattaka of Rajasekhara. We have already seen above that the Ragale' metre in Kannada literature in general is a lovely gift from Apabbraṁsa in which the great works like the Mahapurāņa of Puşpadanta were composed in the Kannada region itself.
Lastly coming to the folk-songs82 it may just be said that Hālas Gābāsattasai or other Prakrit lyrical songs must have influenced the early Kannada folk-songs which have come down to us from tongue to tongue. It is, of course, very difficult to trace such in. fluence in the Kannada folk-songs of today for some of the basic human feelings and aspirations are more or less the same in different periods and places and "a folk-song theo is always grafting the new on to the old.""88 Yet some of the Kannada folk-songs available today can curiously be compared with those in the Gabāsattasas: The folk-songs māvana magale' etc. and 'geneyanna kalakodu' etc. collected by Dr. B. S. Gaddigimath, 34 very well copmpare in spirit with gabā Nos. 161 and 56 respectively. 35
28 Kavicarite II, App. I p. 604. 29 Most of which are still in manuscript form. 30 Noted from Pt. Bhujabali Shastri's Suci, 31 Vide this author's paper: Rājasekbara and Nemicandra, Journal of Karnatak Uni
versity (Hum)., Vol. VI. 32 Kannada is also rich in folk literature of varied forms from early times. Nrpatunga
proudly tells us that the illiterate Kannada people too possessed skilled poetic
talent. 33 Encyclopaedia Britannica, Vol. IX, 14th edition, p. 448. 34 In Kannada Janapada Gītagaļu, Karnatak University, Dharwar, 1963. 35 Nirnaya Sāgara edition.