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A History of Sanskrit Literature c12.s4: 4. Māgha

A History of Sanskrit Literature c12.s4

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4. Māgha

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All that Māgha tells us of himself is the fact that his father was Dattaka Sarvāçraya, and his grandfather, Suprabhadeva, was the minister of a king whose name is variously read by the manuscripts as Varmalākhya, Varmalāta, &c. Now an inscription¹ exists of a certain king Varmalāta of A.D. 625, and it is plausible to hold that thus we can date Māgha somewhere in the later part of the seventh century. This accords satisfactorily with the fact that he is clearly later than Bhāravi, who in a sense was his model, than Bhaṭṭi, whose *mumuhur muhuḥ* he trumps with his *kim u muhur mumuhur gatabhartṛkāḥ*, 'ever and again they fainted, their spouses gone', and probably than Kumāradāsa. Nor is there really any doubt that Māgha knew the *Kāçikā Vṛtti*. What is more important is that in ii. 112 the only natural interpretation of the verse is that we have a reference to the Nyāsakāra, a commentator on the *Kāçikā*, Jinendrabuddhi, whose date must be *c.* A.D. 700. It is much wiser to accept this date, and to place Māgha about that time than to endeavour to explain the passage away, and there is no reason whatever to think the date too late. He certainly knew the *Nāgānanda* of Harṣa, and the effort to prove that he was used by Subandhu, though very ingenious, is unconvincing. It is simplest to recognize that the similarities between the two writers, if not due to their working in the same field with similar models, is due to Māgha's knowledge of the romance of *Vāsavadattā*.²

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¹ Kielhorn, GN. 1906, pp. 143 f.; JRAS. 1908, p. 499. Cf. Jacobi, WZKM. iv. 236 ff.; Bhandarkar, EI. ix. 187 ff.; Hultzsch, ZDMG. lxxii. 147; Walter, *Indica*, iii. 32 (Māgha, xx. 47, *Jānakīharaṇa*, i. 4).

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² The text is ed. NSP. 1923. Trans. up to xi. 25 by C. Schütz, Bielefeld, 1843; extracts Cappeller, *Bālamāgha* (1915), and as a whole by Hultzsch, *Asia Major*, ii.

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Māgha's theme is borrowed like that of Bhāravi from the *Mahābhārata*,³ but, while Bhāravi magnifies Çiva, Māgha's favourite god is Viṣṇu; the contrast is doubtless deliberate, just as in Cantos iv and xix he sets himself out to vie with Cantos iv and xv of the *Kirātārjunīya* as studies in variety of metre and curiosities of form respectively. The epic tale is simple; Kṛṣṇa encourages Yudhiṣṭhira to perform his royal consecration. The rite proceeds, and Bhīṣma's counsel results in the award to Kṛṣṇa of the present of honour. Çiçupāla, king of Cedi, is wroth and leaves the hall; Yudhiṣṭhira would follow him and appease him, but Bhīṣma extols Kṛṣṇa and restrains him. Çiçupāla stirs up revolt and seeks to destroy the sacrifice. Yudhiṣṭhira seeks Bhīṣma's counsel as usual; he is advised to trust Kṛṣṇa and defy the king. The latter insults Bhīṣma who retorts by a denunciation of him, and explains that Kṛṣṇa has been under a promise to the king's mother to endure a hundred deeds of evil of her son. Çiçupāla then transfers his vituperation to Kṛṣṇa, who replies, evoking a fresh onslaught of words, including a reproach for Kṛṣṇa's theft of his affianced bride. Kṛṣṇa replies that he has now fulfilled his pledge, and with his discus severs the head of his foe. Māgha shows decided originality in touching up this theme; in Canto i we have a new *motif*;

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the sage Nārada appears in the house of Vasudeva where Kṛṣṇa lives, and in the name of Indra bids the hero dispose of the Cedi king whose hostility menaces men and gods. This affords Māgha the opportunity of displaying his skill in politics; Kṛṣṇa takes counsel with Balarāma and Uddhava; the former advises immediate war, the latter acceptance of the invitation to Yudhiṣṭhira's consecration. Then, imitating Bhāravi in Cantos iv–xi, he leaves his original entirely and proceeds to exhibit his skill in a longer series of descriptions. Kṛṣṇa leaves Dvārakā for Indraprastha, not without a fine picture of his capital (iii). Mount Raivataka is reached, and Dāruka, his charioteer, expatiates to Kṛṣṇa on its loveliness (iv). The army encamps, enabling Māgha to air his knowledge of campaigns as they should be conducted in poetry (v); needless to say the women are not forgotten: the queens accompany the host in litters, their ladies ride on horses or the humble ass, the hetairai swarm and make their toilets for their masters; soldiers, elephants, and women alike must enjoy the bath. Kṛṣṇa himself must have pleasure; so the six seasons as fair maidens appear to give one more opportunity of picturing love (vi). No wonder that the Yādavas imitate him; with fair ladies they wander in the woods (vii), and share the bath (viii). The sun, charmed by the appearance of these heroes, desires to imitate them and bathe in the waters of the western ocean;

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thus we have a very elaborate and often happy picture of the sunset and the rising of the moon, which waken again love in the hearts of the women, who send their eyes and their invitations to their lovers (ix). They are only too eager to accept them, and after drinking together they indulge in the joys of love (x). Day dawns (xi), the army awakens to its duties, and the Yamunā is crossed (xii), Kṛṣṇa enters Indraprastha and is welcomed by Yudhiṣṭhira; the poet remembers to vie with Açvaghoṣa and Kālidāsa in describing the feelings of the women who crowd to see him enter. We now return to the narrative of the epic, but in more polished form. The ceremony is performed, Kṛṣṇa receives the gift of honour (xiv). Çiçupāla protests, Bhīṣma challenges him, he leaves the hall and prepares his army for battle (xv). A *tour de force* follows; Çiçupāla’s envoy brings a message of set ambiguity, either a defiance or a submission; Sātyaki answers it, and the envoy replies haughtily (xvi). The two armies move forward to battle (xvii); their contest is described at length, not without ability, though, like nearly every Sanskrit writer, he gives the impression of painting his picture from books, not life and death. In the end the two rivals meet, fight with their arrows, then with supernatural weapons, until Kṛṣṇa slays his foe, whose power passes over to the victor.

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³ ii. 33-45.

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The changes made in the epic narrative are not inconsiderable. One great improvement is the shortening of the rival speeches, though even so they remain long. The picture of the sacrifice replaces the single line given to it in the epic, and the preliminaries of the contest are carried on not by the the rivals but by envoys. More important is the imitation of Bhāravi’s procedure in making a struggle between rival armies precede the duel.

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Admitting that these stories taken over from the epic gave little scope for the highest qualities of poetry, and that, as in Bhāravi, plot and characterization are of no great account, Māgha unquestionably has no mean poetical merits, though we need not accept the eulogies of later critics who claimed that he united the merits of his greatest rivals. If he lacks the conciseness, the calm serenity and dignity of Bhāravi at his best, he possesses much luxuriance of expression and imagination, and in the many love passages of his epic sweetness and prettinesses abound. He admits directly his indebtedness to the *Kāmasūtra* and exhibits intimate knowledge of its details in a manner which western taste finds tedious, while Indian opinion—*homo sum, humani nil a me alienum puto*—accepts it with admiration. The worst of his sins is his deplorable exhibition in xix of his power of twisting language. He actually compares the array of the army to the appearance of a Mahākāvya when verses are put in the form of the figures Sarvatobhadra, Cakra, Gomūtrikā, &c., and such figures he illustrates in his poem. No doubt we hear in the Alexandrian age, as in later Roman poetry,¹ of such things as Sotadean verses to be read backwards, of Simmias making poems, *technopaignia*, in the form of an axe, or a nightingale's egg, of Dosiadas's similar feat with an altar, and so on. It may be that these tricks arose from the practice of writing inscriptions on swords or leaves, but in any case Māgha shows himself devoid of taste; so also in the construction of such a stanza as xix. 3 where the first line has no consonant but *j*, the second only *t*, the third *bh*, and the last *r* with a final Visarga. More clever is the speech of the envoy in xv which begins:

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¹ Cf. Martial, ii. 86. 9 f.: *turpe est difficiles habere nugas*

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*abhidhāya tadā tad apriyaṁ: Çiçupālo 'nuçayaṁ paraṁ gataḥ*
*bhavato 'bhimānaḥ samīhate: saruṣaḥ kartuṁ upetya mānanam.*

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'Çiçupāla, having merited your displeasure, in deep regret (in high anger) seeks eagerly (fearlessly) to come before you and pay due homage (slay you).' These *double entendres* are beloved in India, and Bhāravi has a fair number, but it is impossible, while admitting their cleverness, to cultivate a real taste for such tricks. Moreover they have a fatal effect on language; if a double sense is to be expressed, it is impossible for the best of poets to avoid straining meanings, constructions, and word order. The effort leads to constant ransacking of the poetical lexicons extant and turns the pursuit of poetry into an intellectual exercise of no high value to the utter ruin of emotion and thought.

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Happily there is much in Māgha to make up for his demerits.

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*et stultus labor est ineptiarum.*

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He can imitate the good sense and simplicity of Bhāravi's moral sentiments:

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*nālambate daiṣṭikatāṁ na niṣīdati pauruṣe*
*çabdārthau satkavir iva dvayaṁ vidvān apekṣate.*

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‘He relies not on fate, he depends not on human power alone; as a good poet has regard to sound and sense alike, so he cultivates both.’ Or again:

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*saṁpadā susthirammanyo bhavati svalpayāpi yaḥ*
*kṛtakṛtyo vidhir manye na vardhayati tasya tām.*

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‘If a man think himself established securely by a slight success, then, I ween, Fate, having accomplished all he seeks, affords him no further blessing.’ In more elaborate style, with a distinct aim at suiting sense and sound, he vies with Bhaṭṭi¹ and echoes perhaps a phrase of Kumāradāsa:²

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¹ xii. 59; Māgha, i. 47.

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² xi. 45.

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*saṭāchaṭābhinnaghanena bibhratā: nṛsiṁha saiṁhīm atanuṁ tanuṁ tvayā*
*sa mugdhakāntastnasaṅgabhaṅguraiḥ: urovidāraṁ praticaskare nakhaiḥ.*

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‘O man-lion, when thou didst assume that mighty lion form and cleft with thy tawny mane the clouds, thou didst tear him to pieces, rending asunder his breast with those nails which bend so gently on a loving maiden's bosom.’ There is a martial tone in:

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*āyāntīnām aviratarayaṁ rājakānīkinīnām*
*itthaṁ sainyaiḥ samam alaghubhiḥ çrīpater ūrmimadbhiḥ*
*āsīd oghair muhur iva mahad vāridher āpagānām*
*dolāyuddhaṁ kṛtagurutaradhvānaṁ auddhatyabhājām.*

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‘As the hosts of the king with unbroken flow, with unceasing clamour in their proud onslaught, advanced against the vast armies of Kṛṣṇa, there arose a battle swaying to and fro as when the waters of the streams mingle with the foaming waves of ocean.’ More commonplace but neatly phrased is:

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*sajalāmbudharāravānukārī: dhvanir āpūritadiṅmukho rathasya*
*praguṇīkṛtakekam ūrdhvakaṇṭhaiḥ: çitikaṇṭhair upakarṇayāmbabhūva.*

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‘The roar of the chariot, matching the thunder of the rain-cloud and filling the air, was eagerly echoed by the peacocks, who stretched out their necks and redoubled their loud calls.’ There is real strength in this vignette of the battle:

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*tūryārāvair āhitottālatālair: gāyantībhiḥ kāhalaṁ kāhalābhiḥ*
*nṛtte cakṣuḥçūnyahastaprayogaṁ: kāye kūjan kambur uccair jahāsa.*

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‘Over a corpse that danced blindly moving its hands midst the loud roll of the drums and the trumpet’s clangour, the conch rang shrill as it laughed aloud.’

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Extremely characteristic is the plan of blending the emotion of love with war; we have two strange pictures of a stricken field, wholly Indian in spirit:

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*kaçcin mūrchām etya gāḍhaprahāraḥ: siktaḥ çītaiḥ çīkarair vāraṇasya*
*ucchaçvāsa prasthitā taṁ jighṛkṣur: vyarthākūtā nākanārī mumūrcha.*

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‘One, sore smitten, fainted; then drenched with cool water from his elephant’s trunk breathed again, and the heavenly nymph, who had started to seize him, her purpose foiled, fell back fainting.’

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*tyaktaprāṇaṁ saṁyuge hastinīsthā: vīkṣya premṇā tat-kṣaṇād udgatāsuḥ*
*prāpyākhaṇḍaṁ devabhūyaṁ satītvād: āçiçleṣa svaiva kaṁ-cit puraṁdhrī.*

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‘One lady who seated on an elephant had seen her beloved slain in the battle and on the spot died from grief, winning by her faith complete divinity, embraced once more in heaven her husband.’ Māgha, however, is capable of very effective strength and simplicity, especially in the speeches of his heroes, as in Çiçupāla’s dignified protest against the honour paid by Yudhiṣṭhira to Kṛṣṇa:

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*yad apūpujas tvam iha Pārtha: Murajitam apūjitaṁ satāṁ*
*prema vilasati mahad tad aho: dayitaṁ janaḥ khalu guṇīti manyate.*

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*anṛtāṁ giraṁ na gadasīti : jagati paṭahair vighuṣyase*
*nindyam atha ca Harim arcayatas : tava karmaṇaiva vikasanty asatyatā.*

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‘That thou hast honoured, o king, the slayer of Mura, unhonoured by the good, doth prove thy partiality; one, forsooth, deemeth virtuous him whom he loveth. “Thou sayst no word of falsehood”, so art thou proclaimed with beat of drum throughout the world; yet by having honour paid to the worthless Hari, thou dost blazon abroad thy falsity.’ We prefer this eloquence to the ingenuity which won him the sobriquet of bell-Māgha, because of his cleverness¹ in comparing a mountain, on one side of which the sun set, while on the other the moon rose, to an elephant from whose back two bells hung, one on either side. His use of figures is free and often, as may be seen above, happy; his alliterations usually have point and effect.

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¹ iv. 20; Peterson, OC. VI, III. ii. 339.

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Māgha is an adept in language and affords abundant exemplification of grammatical rules,² very possibly under Bhaṭṭi’s influence. His periphrastic perfects passive such as *bibharāmbabhūve* are frequent; rare uses are *madhyesamudram* and *pārejalam*; *vairāyitāras* is from the denominative *vairāyate*; *aghaṭate*, *niṣedivān*, and *nyadhāyiṣātām* are recondite forms; purely borrowed from Pāṇini are the unique use in i. 51 of the imperative to express repeated action, and of the future in lieu of the imperfect after a verb of remembering.

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² Cappeller, *Bālamāgha*, pp. 187 f.

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As regards metre Māgha’s chief feat is his accomplishment in Canto iv when he manages to use twenty-two as opposed to the mere sixteen of Bhāravi’s corresponding *tour de force*. The Çloka is the most common, being the basis of Cantos ii and xix; Upajāti of Vaṅçasthā type prevails in i and xii; the Indravajrā type³ in iii; the Udgatā in xv; the Aupacchandasika in xx; the Drutavilambita in vi; the Puṣpitāgrā in vii; the Pramitākṣarā in ix; the Praharṣiṇī in viii; the Mañjubhāṣiṇī in xiii; the Mālinī in xi; the Rathoddhatā in xiv, and the Rucirā, Vasantatilaka,³

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³ In these metres occasionally *a* and *c* end in ◡, a licence as a rule permissible only in the even lines; cf. Vāmana, v. 1. 2 f.; *Sāhityadarpaṇa* 575. He uses a short final thrice in the first, once in the second Vipulā; Bhāravi never permits this, and Kālidāsa only once, doubtfully, has ◡ in the first Vipulā.

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Vaitālīya, and Çālinī in xvii, v, xvi, and xviii respectively, an enumeration which shows how proud was Māgha of his skill in varying the metre of the cantos. The Svāgatā in x was doubtless borrowed from Bhāravi, and Bilhaṇa in his turn freely uses this rare form. The Gīti form of Āryā occurs twice, while there is but one stanza each of the Utsara, Kalahaṅsa, Citralekhā, Jaladharamālā, Jaloddhatagati, Toṭaka, Dodhaka, Dhṛtaçrī, Pṛthvī, Prabhā, Pramadā, Bhramaravilasita, Mañjarī, Mahāmālikā, Vaṅçapattrapatita, Vaiçvadevī, Çikhariṇī, Sragdharā, Sragviṇī, and Hariṇī. The Mattamayūra, Mandākrāntā, and Çārdūlavikrīḍita have two, three, and four stanzas apiece.

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In his use of the Çloka Māgha has out of 464 half-stanzas 125 cases of Vipulā forms, 47 of the first, 44 of the second, and 34 of the third, no case of the fourth being allowed.¹ This frequency of use is in striking contrast to that of Kālidāsa and Bhāravi, for he has one Vipulā in every three or four verses while in the others the proportions range from one to twelve or fourteen. Kālidāsa again prefers the third to the second Vipulā, while Bhāravi hardly has the third, and Māgha treats them equally. Māgha is not quite so polished a writer as Bhāravi, for he allows the weak caesura in *manāg abhyāvṛttyā vā*, and in xi. 18 and 22 omits this caesura entirely, without the excuse of recondite forms of xix. 52 and 108. A further sign of decline in feeling is the almost equal use in the case of the first Vipulā of the form ⏑ – ⏑ – for the first foot as opposed to ⏑ ⏑ – –, the figures being twenty-one to twenty-six; Māgha evidently did not appreciate the desirability of differentiating between the treatment of the first and second Vipulās. From his frequent employment of Vipulās Jacobi² suggests a western origin for the poet, having regard to the similar fact in the case of Hemacandra, and the poet’s knowledge of the Vindhya, but this conclusion must be deemed uncertain.

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¹ In SIFI. viii. ii. 55 the figures are given as 45, 45, 33, and 3, different readings being followed.

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² IS. xvii. 444. His style, however, is Gauḍa, not Vaidarbha. Tradition makes him a native of Çrīmāla, and this place may have been under Varmalāta's rule.

Cites (8)