________________
INTRODUOTION
59
and the other two* are unknown; but the name before Bhartrhari's in the text is that of Jfānānanda, followed by a variant of 470, and five others that are not found in any Bharthari Ms. Quite clearly, the compiler did not know any version of Bhartrhari familiar to us, he had heard the poet's name independently of his stanzas. Much the same phenomenon is observed in the well-known Bengali Sanskrit anthology Saduktikarnāmsta [A. D. 1205]. This assigns to Bhartshari many stanzas found in theśāntiśataka which generally passes for the work of Silhaņa or Silhaņamisra, who himself seems to have written in Bengal; conversely the SDK, ascribes quite genuine Bharthari ślokas to others.
Wherever Bhartrhari versions have root, the MSS are generally the commonest secular find. The paucity of MSS north of Rajasthān would by itself be surprising, while the rest of the evidence justifies the conclusion that Bhartrhari reached the north-east and the north-west at a very late period,
The actual mechanism of transmission may also be considered for a moment. The fact that so many copies exist but none is reported any. where earlier than the 15th century shows that Bhartphari has been in increasing demand for the last four hundred years, copies being read to pieces. The demand for the parallel and undoubtedly later Amaruśataka, for example, cannot have been as great because much older MSS of that work are still to be had. Even the oldest dated MS used for my collations our F. [ dated 1547, though may be 135 years later if the saka era was usod for samvat] is obviously a compilation involving general use of two different copies, while lacunae in the exemplar before the scribe are indicated by a string of dashes, as in many other old MSS of Bhartphari. Copies were (as shown by colophons) often made by dictation. This has certainly given many false readings. Finally, the work is small enough to be transported either in memory or as a written copy by an itinerant scholar, no matter how light he travelled, so that centres like Benares would certainly give opportunities for comparison (as seen by a second set of variant numbers for slokas in SVP 159), inflation, emendation, and contamination. All of these would also result from the general use of Bhartrhari as a school text in the period considered, for the scribe or the reader who had not crammed a few stanzas at least in boyhood would be ignorant indeed. The comparative scarcity of paper, and memory transmission, are perhaps responsible for the many extra stanzas indicated on margins, cover folios, or inserted bodily into the text of MSS belonging to well-marked versions-quite apart from the changing of individual readings. Copies to everyone's taste were not forthcoming very easily. As the (rather careless) scribe of Benares 59-10 says: waggafat Tuettu UE I fea Rafes
* कामं शीर्णपलाशसंहतिकृतां कथां वसानो वने कुर्यामम्बुभिरप्ययाचितसुखैः प्राणावबन्धस्थितिम् । साङ्गग्लानि सवेपितं सचकितं सान्तर्निदाघज्वर वक्तुं न बहमुत्सहेय कृपणं देहीत्यवचं वचः ॥३॥
--SRB, p. 74. 47. शिशुत्वं तारुण्यं तदनु च दधानाः परिणती: सभाः पांशुक्रीडां विषयपरिपाटीनुपगमन् । लपन्तोऽके मातुः कुवलयदृशां पुण्यसरितां पिबन्ति स्वच्छन्दंदमधरमम्भः सुकृतिनः ॥५॥
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
