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TULSI-PRAJNĀ
of Sarvadeva and grandson of Devarşi and a junior colleague of Halayudha at Dhara. Born at Visala (Ujjain) into a Brahmin family of Kasyapa gotra that had immigrated from samkasya in Madhyadeśa, he later moved to the capital of Malva, where he won the favour of the king through his poetry and was ultimately made a convert to Jainism by his younger brother Sobhana.1 He was a versatile scholar of letters who, wrote poems, hymns, tales, tracts and scholia with equal fluency in Sanskrit and Prākṛt.2
122
The author tells at the end of the work that he composed it in VS 1029 i.e. 973 A.D. and mentions a famous incident which occured in that year. The town of Manyakheta was attacked and looted by the king of Malva. The author himself lived in Dhara and wrote the Koga for his sister Sundari. He also indirectly gives his name in a line by the simple device of listing words the end-syllables of which make up his name Dhanavala. He writes:
Vikkamakalassa gae aupattisuttare Sahassammi / (vikramakalasya gate ekonatrimśaduttare sahasre) / Malava nerindadhaḍie ludie mannakheḍammi // (malava narendradhätyä lunthite mannakheḍe) // Dharanayarie Paritthiena magge thiãe aņavajje / (Dharanagaryāḥ Paritiṣthena märge sthitaya anavadye) / Kajje kapitṭha vaḥinie "sundari' namadhijjae // (karye kanisthabhaginyaḥ sundari namadheyāyaḥ) // Kaiņo andha jana kiva kusala tti Payanamamtima vaņṇa / (Kavayaḥ andha jana kṛpa kušala iti Padanamantima varṇaḥ //
namammi jassa kamaso teṇesa viraiya desi // (nāmni yasya kramaśaḥ tenaisam viracita deśn) // Kavvesu je rasaḍdha sadda bahuso kaihi bajjhanti /
(Kävyesu ye rasadhyaḥ śabdah bahuśaḥ Kavibhirvadhyante) / te ittha mae raia ramantu hiae sahiayanam //
(te atra maya racita ramantăm hrdaye sahṛdayanam) //
It may be noted here that "A comprehensive and critical Dictionary of the Prakrt languages with special reference to Jain literature" edited by Prof. A.M. Ghatage records the date of Dhanapala as VS 1329, however Dhanapala himself records the date as VS 1029.
Dhanapala's principal contribution to lexicography, available to us, is the Paiyalacchi namamala or Prakṛt lakṣmi, a synonymic dictionary of 279 gāthās (āryā stanza) and deals with about one thousand words in Prakrt and the oldest extant prakṛt work of its kind. It purports to be a "garland of nouns" (namamala) and manual of provincialism (degi);5 nevertheless it includes, adverbs, verbal forms, particles, and affixes as well as Tatsamas and Tatbhavas i.e. terms
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