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PREFACE
objection to such a view and who, on the ground of some pre-Narasinha Jain works that were within their knowledge, were trying to assign the honour of being the first poet of Old Gujarātī to Vinayaprabha Upādhyāya, who had composed his Gautamasvămirāsa at Khambhāt (Cambay) in 1412 V. S. I too got interested in that controversy and accordingly I began to search carefully for older Gujarāti poetical works, In one of the Bhandars I found a Ms. copied in 1357-58 V, S., the years during which the Hindu rule in Gujarāt was nearing its end and Independent Gujarat was vanishing for ever between the jaws of Time. The Ms. contained a collection of many small works in Sanskrit, Prākrit, Apabhraṁsa and Old Gujarāti. Among these was found a poetical work called Nemināthacatuspadikit of Vinayacandra which appeared to be a charining and typical representative of Old Gujarāti works. There was no doubt about its being some 75 or 100 years older than the Gautama. svāmirāsa and hence I prepared a complete copy of it and sent it to be published in the Paryusaņā special number of the monthly 'Jain Svetāmbar Conference. Herald’of the year 1913. At that time I had no specialized study of that subject so that I could supply an explanatory review, notes eto. on it, but my eagerness to continue my research in that subject and to search for and examine more literary works of that type was increased to a degree and from that point of view I continued my efforts.
.;. It was about that period that I found a Ms. of the Sandesarāsakco in the same Bhandār.* This Pātan Ms. contained the bare text of the poem without any thing like the Sanskrit Avacūri or Țippaņa. On a superficial examination, its language appeared to me to be of a different sort from the language found in other Rāsās and it was not properly intelligible to me, since I knew yet practically nothing of the Apabhraṁsa grammar. But my continuous reading and study of Old Gujarātī works had indirectly acquainted me somewhat with that language and consequently I could grasp the essence of the contents of the Rāsaka. I had read many times the Prthvirāja-Räsau before and I could
„*. It was in this very Bhandar that I discovered Prthvicandacaritra, the ne oldest and earliest extensive prose work in Old Gujarati. .'
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