History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v1.c6.s59.8

v1.c6.s59.8

The name Halāyudha (an epithet of Balarāma, the brother of Kṛṣṇa) was a common one in India. It seems to have been borne by several eminent writers and this fact has created a great deal of confusion. There is one Halāyudha who was the author of the Abhidhānaratnamālā (edited by Aufrecht), the Kavirahasya (edited by Sourindra Mohan Tagore in 1879 and by Heller in 1900) and probably the Mṛtasañjīvanī, a commentary on the Chandaḥ-sūtra of Piṅgala. In the Kavirahasya he gives the various forms of roots in the several conjugations and connects all verses with Kṛṣṇa, the emperor of the Deccan (Dakṣiṇāpatha).⁶⁶⁶ This Kṛṣṇarāja was most probably the Rāṣṭrakūṭa emperor Kṛṣṇa whose dates range from 940 A. D. to 959 A. D. (*vide* JBBRAS, vol. 18, page 239; Bom. Gazetteer I., part 2, p. 210; I. A. vol. 11, p. 109 and Bhandarkar's Report, 1883-84, pp. 8-9.). In the colophon to the Mṛtasañjīvanī the author is described simply as bhaṭṭa-Halāyudha. In that commentary verses are quoted as illustrations wherein Muñja alias Vākpatirāja is highly extolled.⁶⁶⁷ Muñja was slain by Tailapa between 994-997 A. D. Hence Halāyudha, the author of the commentary on Piṅgala, must not have flourished much earlier than the latter half of the 10 century. It is not unlikely that Halāyudha after being at the court of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas migrated to Avanti when the star of Muñja, who was himself a scholar, rose on the horizon of central India and when the fortunes of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas waned. But this Halāyudha who hailed from the Deccan cannot be the first Halāyudha who appears to have flourished in Mithilā or Bengal.