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A History of Sanskrit Literature c22: XV. The later Romances and the Campūs

A History of Sanskrit Literature c22

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English

Contents

XV. The later Romances and the Campūs

1. The Romances

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BĀNA has set a model which it was easy to admire, but infinitely hard to follow with any success, and in fact we have nothing later which can be set for a moment beside him. Criticism¹ of him was not specially intelligent; he was classed with Çīlābhaṭṭārikā, one of the few poetesses of India who used Sanskrit, as a model of the Pāñcāla style, in which sense and sound were of equal importance, an assertion in no sense true. He found an imitator in Dhanapāla, son of Sarvadeva, and brother of Çobhana; he lived under the patronage of Sīyaka and Vākpati of Dhārā, though Merutuṅga² places him also at Bhoja’s court and tells us a tale of his dispute with his family and final reconciliation to his brother. He wrote in A.D. 972–3 the Prākrit lexicon, *Pāiyalacchī*, and, after becoming a Jain, the *Ṛṣabhapañcāçikā* in fifty Prākrit stanzas. His romance is styled *Tilakamañjarī*³ after the heroine, and it has clearly been his aim to seek to draw as many parallel pictures to those of the *Kādambarī* in describing this lady’s love of Samaraketu. He recognizes his debt, and perhaps that is the best that can be said of him.

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¹ Kane, *Kādambarī*, p. xxv.

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² *Prabandhacintāmaṇi*, pp. 60 ff. (trans. Tawney).

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³ Ed. KM. 85, 1903. Cf. Jacobi, GGA. 1905, p. 379.

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Another Jain effort to rival the *Kādambarī* is seen in the *Gadyacintāmaṇi*⁴ of Oḍayadeva, alias Vādībhasiṁha, a lion to the elephants of counter disputants. He was a Digambara Jain, pupil of Puṣpasena, whom he lauds in the usual exaggerated style, and his work deals with the legend of Jīvaka or Jīvandhara, which is also the topic of the *Jīvandharacampū*. His imitation of Bāṇa is flagrant, including an effort to improve on the advice given by the sage Çukanāsa to the young Candrāpīḍa. Other Jain Kathās hardly attempt, and certainly do not reach, the stage of comparison with the true romances.¹

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⁴ Ed. Madras, 1902. Cf. Hultzsch, IA. xxxii. 240; ZDMG. lxviii. 697 f.

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¹ On the fragmentary *Avantisundarī* ascribed to Daṇḍin—wrongly—see S. K. Dé, IHQ. i. 31 ff.; iii. 395 ff.

2. The Campūs

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The romances contain here and there a few stanzas but they are normally and effectively in prose, and the literary compositions styled Campūs, a name of unknown sense, differ vitally from them in that they use prose or verse indifferently for the same purpose. In this Campūs differ from other forms of literature in which verse is mingled with prose; the verses in these cases are either gnomic, or they serve to summarize the context of the story, as do the title verses of the *Pañcatantra*, or occasionally they appear to lend greater effect to some point in the narrative as when a short speech is made in pointed form, or a specially important idea is thus underlined. But it was not surprising that the use of verse freely side by side with prose should occur, especially when works could be written in either indifferently, and we have in the *Jātakamālā*, on the one hand, and in the inscription of Hariṣeṇa on the other, clear cases of something which may be deemed fairly like the Campū, and Oldenberg² has adduced analogous cases in the Jātaka book. But it is only from a late period that we have works written in the full Kāvya style in which the poet shows now his ability in prose and now in verses, without seeking to reserve verses for any special end.

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² GN. 1918, pp. 429 ff.; 1919, pp. 61 ff.

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The oldest extant is probably the *Damayantīkathā*³ or *Nalacampū* of Trivikrama Bhaṭṭa, whom we know as the author of the Nausari inscription of the Rāṣṭrakūṭa king Indra III in a.d. 915, and who is also mentioned as author of the *Madālasācampū*. The tale runs that his father Devāditya, a court Paṇḍit, was absent from his post when a rival came forward to challenge him, with the result that the son aided by Sarasvatī composed the *Nalacampū*, which was left unfinished because his father returned and rendered his son’s action needless. The story is elaborated with the usual defects of long sentences, consisting of epithets heaped on epithets in long compounds, with double meanings, alliterations and jingles complete. The author mentions Bāṇa, and himself is referred to in the *Sarasvatīkaṇṭhābharaṇa*. His verses are no more than mediocre; there is the usual combination of simile with a double meaning in his critique of poets given in anthologies:

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³ Ed. NSP. 1885. He was of the Çāṇḍilya family and son of Nemāditya (EI. ix. 28).

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*apragalbhapadanyāsā jananīrāgahetavaḥ*
*santy eke bahulālāpāḥ kavayo bālakā iva.*

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‘Some poets are like children; their diction is as tottering as their feet, they disgust people (they cause delight to their mothers), they chatter much (they have many endearments).’ This is clearly frigid, and his elaborate stanzas are still less attractive.

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To a Jain of the same century, a contemporary of the Rāṣṭrakūṭa Kṛṣṇa and protégé of his feudatory, a son of the Cālukya Arikesarin II, we owe the much more important work, *Yaçastilaka*,¹ written in 959. Somadeva was a Digambara Jain and he wrote, as did all Jains, with an eye to the salvation of mankind by means of the Jain faith, and in fact the last three sections of his book serve as a manual of lessons for laymen. The tale itself, however, is not at all dull. In the rich Yodheya country there was a city Rājapura ruled by Māridatta, a sensualist, who has decided on the advice of his family priest to offer to the goddess of the family, Caṇḍamāri-devatā, a pair of all living things, including human beings. He is ready to sacrifice when there come before him an ascetic pair, boy and girl, who have been induced to come to the place of sacrifice; at the sight of them the darkness passes away from his mind. At this point the author, with an awkward transition, explains their presence; an ascetic, Sudatta, has just arrived at the outskirts of the town, and rejecting a garden for its excitements to love, and a burning place as needlessly repulsive, has taken up his abode on a small hill. In his train are two young people, the children of Māridatta’s own sister by Yaçomati, son of king Yaçodhara, and the sage, knowing the future, sends them where he knows the royal guards will accost them and take them to the king for sacrifice.

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¹ Ed. KM. 70, 1901–3. Cf. Peterson, *Report*, ii. pp. 33 ff.

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The king, however, treats them with honour, having bethought him that his niece and nephew were reported to have adopted the ascetic life, and questions them as to their history. In Āçvāsa ii the youth, who enjoys like his sister the rare gift of knowledge of past births, tells a curious tale. There was a king of Ujjain, Yaço’rtha,¹ and his wife Candramatī bore him a son, Yaçodhara, whom on the sight of his whitening hair the father placed on the throne, retiring to contemplation. The life of Yaçodhara is described, and the poet displays his knowledge of policy in conversation between the king and a minister, in which are set out with legendary examples the fate of kings who choose bad ministers, and of kings who cast aside their faithful servants. Yaçodhara seems ideally happy, he delights in the Veda of the bow, but one night he finds that his wife leaves his side for a guilty intrigue. He meditates slaying her, but is deterred by the scandal, and his mother, who suspects the truth, seeing his sudden aversion to life, counsels him to perform a sacrifice including the slaughter of all kinds of animals. The king, however, will have nothing to do with sacrifices destructive of life, and there ensues a polemic between him and his mother on the Jain faith, to which she realizes that he is tending. He argues, however, that offerings to the dead are absurd, and that crows are the real recipients of the bounty tendered, while the idea of water as purifying is ridiculed. A vast array of poetical authority is adduced by the king, who quotes almost all the great poets down to Rājaçekhara, and the queen, perhaps wearied by his eloquence, compromises on a cock of flour. The wicked wife, however, sees her chance, insists on cooking the mixture, inserts poison and ends the mother and son alike (iii). In Āçvāsa iv we have the account of the fate of the mother, son, and wife in later births as the result of their crimes, the slaying even of an effigy of a cock being a sin. The wicked wife repeats in these rebirths her evil deed. At last, however, the cycle is complete, and the mother and son are reborn, with knowledge of the past as the twin children of Yaçomatī and the sister of Māridatta. Needless to say, the king is now induced (v) to take instruction from Sudatta, and in the end is converted along with the goddess and his people.

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¹ Hertel (*Pāla und Gopāla*, pp. 81 ff.) summarizes the parallel works of Māṇikya Sūri and Vādirāja Sūri. His Yaçogha (p. 92) may be an error.

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While it can hardly be said that Somadeva complies with the principle laid down in such late works as the *Sāhityadarpaṇa*,¹ that verse should be used for passages where sentiment is to be prominently expressed (*sarasaṁ vastu*), since he often employs it without much impressment, it is certain that he is a poet of taste and good sense. His defence of critics against ignorance of poetry because they are not composers is:

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¹ vi. 336 (332) reading *padyair* with Peterson, *Report*, ii, p. 34. There is a *v. l.* *gadyair* (Nobel, *Indian Poetry*, p. 168, who has overlooked Peterson’s view). The sense is dubious; Peterson’s view is that the definition of Kathā has this work or type in view.

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*avaktāpi svayaṁ lokaḥ kāmaṁ kāvyaparīkṣakaḥ*
*rasapākānabhijño ’pi bhoktā vetti na kiṁ rasam?*

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‘Though people in general cannot express themselves, still they are good judges of poems. Though one has no skill in the art of producing sweet flavours, does not he who partakes of food know them perfectly well?’ The king’s commonsense is clear:

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*saritsarovāridhivāpīkāsu: nimajjanonmajjanamātram eva*
*puṇyāya cet tarhi jalecarāṇāṁ: svargaḥ purā syād itareṣu paçcāt.*

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‘If descent into and emerging from river, lake, sea, or tank, were enough for salvation, then heaven would belong preeminently to those that dwell in the water, and secondarily only to other creatures.’ The king’s joy in the bow is well expressed:

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*yāvanti bhuvi çastrāṇi teṣāṁ çreṣṭhataraṁ dhanuḥ*
*dhanuṣāṁ gocare tāni na teṣāṁ gocare dhanuḥ.*

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‘Of all the weapons on earth the bow hath preeminence; it reacheth all, but none can attain it.’ The folly of human desire is repeatedly derided as in:

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*tvam mandiradraviṇadāratanūdvahādyais: tṛṣṇātamobhir anubandhibhir astabuddhiḥ*
*kliçnāsy aharniçam imaṁ na tu citta vetsi: daṇḍaṁ Yamasya nipatantam akāṇḍa eva.*

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‘O heart, thou dost torment thyself night and day, fettered by the darkness of desire for home, wealth, wife, and child, and dost heed not that the rod of Death is falling even now all unexpected upon thy head.’

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Another Jain Campū known to us is the *Jīvandharacampū*¹ of Haricandra, which is based on the *Uttarapurāṇa* of Guṇabhadra, and cannot be before A.D. 900. Whether this writer is the same as the Haricandra, the Digambara, who wrote the *Dharmaçarmābhyudaya* in twenty-one cantos, must remain uncertain, but that author copied both Māgha and Vākpati, and thus there is no chronological difficulty in the suggestion. Both works are of the type of respectable dullness.

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¹ Ed. Tanjore, 1905. Cf. Hultzsch, IA. xxxv. 268.

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Of Brahmanical Campūs one, the *Rāmāyaṇacampū*,² is ascribed to Bhoja and Lakṣmaṇa Bhaṭṭa; there is a *Bhāratacampū*³ by Ananta, in twelve Stabakas, of uncertain date. More definitely dated is the *Udayasundarīkathā*⁴ of Soḍḍhala, a Vālabha Kāyastha of Lāṭa, who wrote *c.* A.D. 1000 under the patronage of king Mummuṇirāja of the Konkan. The model of the writer was the *Harṣacarita* of Bāṇa, and in imitation of him he gives not merely facts regarding his own lineage, but also some twenty-five stanzas on earlier poets. Of Bāṇa he says:

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² Ed. NSP. 1907. The *Navasāhasāṅkacarita* of Çrīharṣa was a Campū (*Naiṣ.* xxii. 51).

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³ Ed. Madras and Bombay, 1903.

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⁴ Cf. *Kāvyamīmāṁsā* (GOS.), pp. xii f.; ed. *Gaekwad’s Or. Series*, 1920.

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*Bāṇasya Harṣacarite niçitām udīkṣya: çaktiṁ na ke ’tra kavitāstramadaṁ tyajanti?*

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‘Who, seeing the sharp spear of Bāṇa in his *Harṣacarita*, would not lose all delight in the arms of poetry?’ There is, however, little sign of keen insight in his verse, and he merely utters, as a rule, some vague generality as in:

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*babhūvur anye ’pi Kumāradāsa-: Bhāsādayo hanta kavīndavas te*
*yadīyagobhiḥ kṛtināṁ dravanti cetāṁsi candropalanirmalāni.*

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‘Others, too, there were, Kumāradāsa, Bhāsa among them, moons of poetry through whose words the hearts of the makers, pure as the moon stone, are made to melt.’

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Late, but of special interest are the *Svāhāsudhākaracampū*⁵ of Nārāyaṇa written in the seventeenth century, which describes the loves of Agni's wife Svāhā and the Moon in an idyllic manner which has been compared by Pischel with Homer's picture¹ of the loves of Ares and Aphrodite, and the *Çaṅkaracetovilāsacampū*,² written by a poet Çaṅkara in honour of Cetasiṅha, whose name figures prominently in the transactions of Warren Hastings. Of these poems the former is admittedly a product of the art of extempore composition (*āçukavitā*), of which poets were inordinately and most foolishly proud.

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⁵ Ed. KM. iv. 52 ff.; Pischel, *Die Hofdichter des Lakṣmaṇasena*, p. 29.

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¹ *Od.* viii. 266 ff.

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² Aufrecht, *Bodl. Catal.*, i. 121. For other texts cf. *Madras Catal.*, xxi. 8180 ff.

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