Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v1.c43.3

v1.c43.3

This gives us the same broad limits to his date as to that of Vidyādhara; and other considerations make it probable that he was contemporaneous with the latter. The *Pratāparudra-yaśo-bhūṣaṇa* of Vidyānātha was written, like the *Ekāvalī*, with the obvious object of panegyrising the king whose name it bears on its title. All the illustrative verses in the work eulogise the same king (also called Vīrarudra or Rudra), who is described as the son of Mahādeva and Munmuḍi or Mummaḍambā (pp. 12, 13, 16, 17, 133); and a short drama, named *Pratāpa-kalyāṇa*² after him, is introduced in the third chapter to illustrate the characteristics of a drama, discussed in the work itself. He is described as a *kākatiya* king¹ whose capital was Ekaśilā-nagara in the Triliṅga or Andhra country, and who is said to have vanquished, among other kings, the princes of the Yādava family. All these and other details have led Trivedi to identify Vidyānātha's patron with Pratāparudra, the seventh *kākatiya* king of Ekaśilā or Orangal, whose inscriptions date between 1298 and 1317 A.D.², and who is placed by Sewell between 1295 and 1323 A.D., and by Śeṣagiri Śāstrī between 1268 and 1319 A.D.³ The Yādava king referred to, therefore, seems to be Rāmacandra, sixth ruler of the Yādavas of Devagiri, whose dates are 1271 to 1309 A.D.⁴ We may, therefore, assign Vidyānātha approximately towards the end of the 13th and the beginning of the 14th century.