Studies In Sanskrit Sahitya Shastra

Author(s): V M Kulkarni
Publisher: B L Institute of Indology

Page 47

Sanskrit Sahityaśāstra
35
It may be noted, in passing, that Bhatta Nārāyaṇa's Venisamhāra provides most of the illustrations of Kāku This play-wright is very fond of using kāku in his drama. No other play-wright has used this device so profusely and strikingly.
Although Bharata devotes considerable space to the exposition of kāku, nowhere does he define it. Amara35 defines kāku thus :
käkuh striyām vikāro yaḥ śokabhītyādibhir dhvanehKāku is a modulation of voice owing to sorrow, fear and such other feelings.
Bhoja quotes in his srngäraprakāśa36 the following definition of kāku without mentioning its source :
"Bhinnakanthadhvanir dhiraiḥ kākurityabhidhiyate" "Alteration of the sound in the throat is to be called a köku."
Viśvanātha approves of this definition in his Sāhit yadarpana (II). Jayaratha, the author of the commentary on Alamkāra-sarvasva37 gives the full quotation in the course of his gloss on vakrokti prefacing it with the explanation : : Kākuh dhvanivišeşaḥ He, too, does not mention the source of the definition :
vākyābḥidhe ( ? dhi) yamāne arthe yena anyaḥ prtipadyate. bhinnakanthadhvanir dhiraih sa käkuriti kathyate.
Abhinavagupta who attempts various etymological explanations of kāku in his Locana and Abhinavabhārati. The passage in Abhinavabhārat" is somewhat corrupt but it is possible to restore it with the help of Locana and Hemacandra's Kāyyā. nušāsana :
कक लौल्ये, लौलयं च साकाङ्क्षता इयता स्वरवैचित्र्य लक्ष्यते । ईषद् यतो वाच्यभूमिः संपद्यते सा काकुः, ईषदर्थे कुशब्दस्य कादेशः । काकुर्वा जिह्वा तद्व्यापारसंपाद्यत्वात् काकुः ।
The explanation in Locana39 is more lucid :
कक लौल्ये इत्यस्य धातोः काकुशब्दः । तत्र हि साकाङ्क्षनिराकाङ्क्षादिक्रमेण पठ्यमानोऽसौ शब्दः प्रकृतार्थातिरिक्तमपि वाञ्छतीति लौल्यमस्याभिधीयते । यदि वा ईषदर्थे कुशब्दस्तस्य कादेशः । तेन हृदयस्थवस्तुप्रतीतेरी
Hemacandra's passage giving three possible etymologies of kāku is only a combination of the three etymologies of kāku given by Abhinavagupta in the two passages cited above.
Instead of deriving the word kāku from Wkak some would like to derive it from Nkai to sound. Māņikyacandra,40 for instance, says: Kāyatyarthäntaramiti kākuh.
35 Amarakośa. sabdadi-varga śl. 12 p. 67. (Ed. with com. N. S. Press. 1944). 36 Syngāraprakāśa (ed. by Josyer, Mysore, 1955) Prakāśa VII. p. 240, 37 Alamkārasarvasva with Jayaraiha's Alamkāravimarśni (N. S. Edition, 1939, p. 220). 38 As corrected by Dr. Raghavan in his article, "Mor Corrections and Emendations To the Text of
the Abhinavabhārati." Adyar Library Bulletin, Vol. XXV. pp. 404-405). 39 Locana (on Dhvanyā!oka III.38) pp. 477-478. 40 Kavyaprakāśa-Samketa (Mysore edition p. 52)