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INTRODUCTION Description and Peculiarities of the two Manuscripts consulted:
The present text of Sūkti-Rat na-Koşa has been edited from the photostat copies of the two Mss, one from patan and another from Khambhat.
The details about the Mss. are as follows: P (9):- This is a palm-leaf Ms stored in the Hemachandra Jñāna Mandir of Patan bearing no. 160. The size of Ms is 134"X1". It contains 66 folios with 3 lines on each page. Folios 20–23 42-46, and 51 are missing. The left portion of first five folios is worn out. The date of copying is the beginning of thirteenth century of Vikram Samvat. The extent of the work as stated in the colophon is 680 verses. In this Ms. the title Suktasamgraha is given.
The work comprises 68 sections as given in this Ms. A few marginal notes on difficult words are found in the folios 1-24. At one place, one whole verse has been quoted in order to clarify a Subhāşita (verse 344). At times it has given deśya words as synonyms e. g. the word 'pralapi is explained by jhank haņa'. Four verses (155-390; 163-543; 164-614; 381-619), of course occurring in different sections are repeated. One peculiarity of this Ms is that it has separated the section of 'Virahi' from that of 'Virahiņi'. This Ms ends with the last section, therefore the autobiographical details about the author are missing.
KH (7):- This Ms is a palm-leaf Ms stored in the Santinātha Bhandara of Khambhāt bearing no 265(1). The size of the Ms is 13"X17". It contains 1-36 folios with 4 to 6 lines on a leaf. The date of copying of this Ms is the first half of the 15th century of Vikram Samvat. The Extent of the work acc. to this Mss is 613 verses.
According to this Ms. the work is divided into 61 sections. The difference between the two Mss. is significant. The section on 'Virahl is included under that on 'Virahin' while no separate heading is given to verses on 'dvika'. They are included in the section on 'Daridri'. The section regarding 'Tapasvin', 'Hamsa', 'Bhțnga' 'Abhisărikā' and 'DutTprefaņa' are not found in the text accordtng to this Ms. Not only that certain sections in this Ms fall short by on one or two verses in comparison to those found in Patan Ms. This Ms has carefully avoided the repetition of the verses. Chronologically, this Ms is of a later date than the Patan Ms. but it is more valuable, as no leaf is missing and it supplies at least some information about the author. The title of the text has been given as $aktiRatna-Koşa,
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