A History of South India from Prehistoric Times to the Fall of Vijayanagar c19.s3.21

c19.s3.21

Popular songs in ragaḷe metre by dāsas (mendicant singers) was another form of Vaishnava literature in Kannada in this period. These singers got their inspiration from Madhvācārya and Vyāsa-rāya, and the visit of Chaitanya to the South in 1510 did much to stimulate the growth of this popular type of song. Purandara Dāsa was ‘the earliest, most prolific and most famous’ of these singers; he visited Vijayanagar in the reign of Achyuta Rāya and died at Pandarpur in 1564; all his songs bear the imprint Purandara Viṭṭhala. Kanakadāsa of Kāginele in the Dharwar district was a contemporary of Purandara, who, like him, owed his adoption of a religious life to Vyāsarāya, head of the Madhva maṭha at Sosile, himself a composer of lyrics in praise of Krishna. Besides songs in praise of Vishnu, Kanakadāsa wrote Mōhana Taraṅgiṇi (‘River of Delight’) narrating stories of Krishna in saṅgatya, and two works in shaṭpadi—Nala-carita and Hari-bhakti-sāra, the latter being a popular book of morals for children.