Shatkhandagama Pustak 02

Author(s): Pushpadant, Bhutbali, Hiralal Jain, Fulchandra Jain Shastri, Devkinandan, A N Upadhye
Publisher: Jain Sahityoddharak Fund Karyalay Amravati

Page 12

INTRODUCTION
1. Age of the palm-leaf manuscript of Dhavala
at Mudbidri.
In the introduction to Vol. 1 we had conjectured that the palm-leaf manuscript of Dhavalá deposited at Mudbidri was at least five or six hundred years old. We are now in a position to throw some more light on the subject of tho manuscript tradition. At the end of Satprarupaņā after the colophon we find some text which when reconstructed, yields three verses in Kenarese in praise of Padmanandi, Kulabhushana and Kulacandra respectively. The relation between these three notabilities has not been mentioned here, but there is no doubt that they are identical with the teachers of the same names mentioned in the Sravana Belgola inscription No. 40 (64) as succes. sively related to each other in a spiritual geneological order. There is similarity in the adjectives used for them at both the places. The inscription also tells us that the teachers belonged to the brilliant line of Desigana, a branch of the Nandigana of Mulasamgha which had owned, amongst others, Kundakunda, Umāsvāti, Samantabhadra, Pujyapāda and Akalamka. One of the pupils of Padmanandi was Prabhācandra who is said to have been the author of a celebrated work on Logic. He, thus, appears to be identical with the author of Prameyakamala-mārtanda and Nyāya-kumuda-candrodaya. This inscription is noi dated, but the line extends upto the third generation beyond Kulacandra, and there we find Devakirti Muni who, according to inscription No. 39 (03), attained heaven in 1163 A. D. The immediate successor of Kulacandra Muni was Māghanandi whose lay disciple Nimbadeva Samanta has also found mention in the Sukrabara Basti inscription of Kolhapur as a feudatory of the Silāhāra king Gandarādityadeva for whom there are mentions from 1108 to 1136 A. D. Taking all these factors into consideration we may safely conclude that the persons mentioned in the Satprarupaņā Prasasti flourished probably during the eleventh century A. D. The Kanarese verses being obviously the interpolations of the scribe who may have been the pupil of the last teacher, we might infer that a copy of the Dhavala was made about this period.
The Prasasti found at the end of the Dhavala Ms throws atill mora light on the subject. The text of this long Prasasti is partly in Kanarese and partly in Sanskrit, and the Kanarese portion is very corrupt. But the fact that emerges from it promi. nently is that the Ms. of Dhavala was presented to the famous teacher Subhacandra Siddhantadeva of the Banniyakere temple on the occasion of the completion of her Srutapancami vow by Demiyakka who was the aunt of Bhujabalaganga Permadideva of Mandali Nadu. Subhacandradeva is said to have belonged to the Desigana. His line begins from Kundakunda, and the other names of teachers mentioned are Griddhapiccha, Balakapiccha, Gunanandi, Devendra, Vasunandi, Ravicandra, Dāmanandi, Viranandi, Sridharadeva, Maladhārideva, Candrakirti, Divākaranandi and, lastly, Subhacandradeva. On scrutinizing these facts in the light of epigraphic references that