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A. K. CHATTERJEE
times in the Kathasaritsagara. Tawney, the well known translator of this famous poem of Somadeva, had wrongly identified this town with Burdwan in Bengal, although Barnett had doubts regarding this identification. 5 From a story of that work, we learn that the Brāhmaṇa youth Śaktideva reached the Vindhya forest after journeying southwards from the city of Vardhamāna---
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evaṁ kṛta-pratijñaḥ san Vardhamānapurāt=tataḥ dakṣiņām diśam=ālambya sa pratasthe tadā dvijaḥ|| krameņa gacchamś ca prāpa so 'tha Vindhya-mahāṭavim][
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This shows that the town of Vardhamāna was to the north of the Vindhya which agrees more with the present position of Vaḍvān in Gujarat than Burdwan of West Bengal.* The same town is also mentioned as the place where Lavaṇaprasāda, king of Gujarat, built a temple of Kumara in the year 1253 A.D."
savidhe Vardhamāna[sya] spardhamānaṁ payodhinā adhaḥkṛta-sudhāsāram yaḥ Kumāram=akārayat!!
The epithet kārtasvar-āpūrṇa-jan-ādhivāsa applied to this town in the Kathakośas of Harişena shows that the city enjoyed a great deal of prosperity during the mediaeval period. In the Harivamsa also Vardhamana gets the adjective vipula-śrī (kalyāṇaiḥ parivardhamāna-vipula-śrī-Vardhamane pure ).
3 See Tawney and Penzer, The Ocean of Story, Vol. II, pp. 171, 188, 189, 223, 224, 237; Vol. III, pp. 218, 229, 230, 282; Vol. IX, pp. 53, 75. [The identification is uncertain.-Ed.]
4 Ibid., Vol. II, p. 171, note 1. (This is 'uncertain', but not 'wrong'. -Ed.]
Jain Education International
5 Loc. cit.
6 Ed. Durgadas and Parab, 25. 5-6.
*[Since Vaḍvan or Vadhvan lies in the Kathiawar region of Gujarat, it is no more to the north of the Vindhyas than Burdwan in West Bengal, 'Vindhya' is the name applied to mountain ranges running from Gujarat to Bengal. There are, however, too many Vardhamanas in North India.-Ed.]
7 Ep. Ind., Vol. I, p. 23.
8 See P. L. Jain's Prastāvanā (in Hindi) in this edition of the Harivamsa, p. 4.
9 66.53.
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