A History of Sanskrit Literature c20.s1.16

c20.s1.16

Interesting is the *Çukasaptati*,² seventy tales of a parrot, of which we have two recensions, both of uncertain date, but which was certainly known in some form to the Jain Hemacandra³ and doubtless existed long before it was finally reduced to the form in which we have it. The two recensions best known are the *ornatior* and *simplicior* of Schmidt. The latter is not the earlier; it is clearly an abbreviated version of a text something like the Ornatior, as is shown by the fact that it not rarely leaves us in the dark as to the precise point of the stories. The form of the original must probably have been simple prose, interspersed with gnomic verses and with some narrative verses at the beginning and end of each of the tales. The framework is amusing. Haradatta, a merchant, has a foolish son Madanasena who spends his whole time in love-passages with his young wife. His father is induced to give him the present of a parrot and a crow, wise birds, embodiments of Gandharvas, whose wise talk converts the son to virtue’s ways, so that when going on a journey he entrusts his young wife to them. She regrets his loss but is ready to find another to console her, and the advice of the crow merely meets with a threat to wring his neck. The wiser parrot approves her deed, provided she is smart enough if she finds herself in a hole to get out of it as cleverly as Guṇaçālinī did. The curiosity of the lady is aroused, and by telling her tales and asking her how one should act at the critical moment the bird maintains her virtue until her husband returns. The tales are hardly edifying; about half of them deal with breaches of the marriage bond, while the rest exhibit other instances of the cunning usually of hetairai or clever decisions of arbitrators, as when Mūladeva appears as asked to decide which of two hideous wives of demons is the better-looking. Two famous incidents contained in the collection are the judgement of Solomon and the parallel to the fabricated ordeal in Tristan and Isolde. As usual, religion plays its part in helping immorality; religious processions, temples, pilgrimages, marriages, sacrifices, all are convenient occasions for assignations, the fleeing lover is declared by the ingenious wife to be the ghost of the paternal ancestor, and so forth.