Early History of the Vaishnava Faith and Movement in Bengal, from Sanskrit and Bengali Sources c5.s2.33

c5.s2.33

with its commentary *Kāntimālā*, which we have consulted, reads: *iti śrī-puruṣottama-caraṇāravinda-kṛpā-makaranda-bindu-pronmilita-viveka-tairabhukta-paramahaṃsa-sri-viṣṇupurī-grathita-śrībhāgavatāmṛtābdhi-labdha-śrībhaktiratnāvalī-kāntimālā samāptā*. Apparently Puruṣottama was his Guru and not Jayadhvaja. An edition of the text with English translation has been published in the Sacred Books of the Hindus Series, Allahabad 1912. MSS noticed in Aufrecht's *Bodleian Catalogue*, no. 90; Aufrecht's *Florentine Manuscripts*, no. 236; Mitra, *Notices*, I, no. 422, p. 240; Eggeling, *India Office Catalogue*, vi, p. 1272-73. The colophon occurs with slight variations in Mitra's and Eggeling's MSS. Aufrecht (*Florentine Manuscripts*, p. 76) states that the work was composed at Benares in 1634 A.D. The source of his information is not known, but the editor of the Allahabad edition tells us that this date is given in a footnote to the edition of the work published at Calcutta. This date, however, is impossible, for it militates not only against the date 1595 (=Saṃvat 1652) of the copying of the India Office manuscript (Eggeling, *loc. cit.*), but also against the Bengal tradition that Viṣṇu Purī, who is mentioned by Kavikarṇapūra, was much earlier than Caitanya. This would dispose of the story of the meeting of Viṣṇu Purī and Caitanya, mentioned in the Introduction to the Allahabad edition and in Carpenter's *Theism in Mediaeval India* (London 1926, p. 422). On the date of the work see S. K. De in *Indian Culture*, v, 1938-39, pp. 197-99.