A History of Sanskrit Literature c14.s8.6

c14.s8.6

A minister of the princes of Gujarāt, the Vāghelās, Lavaṇaprasāda and Vīradhavala, is responsible for the writing of two panegyrics. The first is the *Kīrtikaumudī*¹ of Someçvaradatta (1179–1262), author of various inscriptions in which verses from his poem occur; the eulogy of Vastupāla, who was clearly a generous man, and very probably an excellent minister of a type well known in Indian history, is of moderate poetic worth, but it throws a good deal of light on various aspects of Indian social and political life. The *Surathotsava*² in fifteen cantos by the same author is on the face of it mythical, but it is possible that it is a political allegory, as it ends with an account of the poet's own history, a phenomenon which is noteworthy in the *Harṣacarita* of Bāṇa and in Bilhaṇa, and it alludes again to Vastupāla. A direct panegyric is the *Sukṛtasaṁkīrtana*³ of Arisiṅha, also of the thirteenth century, in eleven cantos, which is useful historically as affording a check on Someçvaradeva. It is not until a century later that we have in the *Jagaḍūcarita*⁴ of Sarvānanda a panegyric of a pious Jain layman who aided his townsfolk by building new walls and affording them great support in the terrible famine of 1256–8 in Gujarāt. It is interesting to find in this poem of seven cantos the usual miracles and legends told in respect of a simple merchant, but as poetry the work is worthless, and in language and metre alike it is no better than the contemporary Jain verse legends.