A History of Indian Literature v3.c35.s8.160

v3.c35.s8.160

To the most famous love lyrics of India belongs the Caurisuratapañcāśikā, "The Fifty Stanzas on Secret Amorous Sport"³ of the Kashmirian poet Bilhaṇa. These are fifty stanzas, each of which begins with the words *adyāpi* "even to-day." The poet describes in them, with a glowing erotic the amorous pleasures that he enjoyed with a princess and presents the sensuous pictures. It is said that the poet was in secret love with the daughter of a king, and when this fact became public, he was ordered to be put to death. At the place fixed for his execution, with death facing him, he composed the 50 stanzas that pleased and impressed the king so much so that he set him free and gave him his daughter as a wife. That this tale¹ does not have any historical basis is mainly suggested by the fact that in his autobiography (see above p. 94) he does not say a word about having a princess as his wife. This view gets further support from the fact that in several versions of the tale, the story narrated is not that of Bilhaṇa, but of some other personages. The verses themselves just say that they have been composed about a princess², but thence we can deduce neither this that it deals with secret love nor this that the theme relates to the decision of the poet’s being put to death³. The Kashmirian recension has two introductory stanzas, of which the second one appears to be the poet's words of farewell to his life in which he says that he will never return back when he will have once fallen in the net of coquettish glances of the wives of gods¹.