The Doctrine of the Jainas, Described after the Old Sources c5.46

c5.46

§ 7. All history of literature, a building, as it were, has for its ground-floor the bio-bibliographical materials. Jain research would have enjoyed the great luck of having them at its disposal, if KLATT’s Onomasticon had been completed and printed. Eight volumes from his own hand in alphabetical order contain what was within his reach to collect data concerning Jain authors and works. But he fell severely ill and never recovered. The work was estimated to fill some 1,100 pages in print, but no more than 55 pages have been printed as a specimen thanks to WEBER and LEUMANN². The first to become a bibliographer of Jainism was GUÉRINOT by his “Essai de bibliographie jaina” (1906). A modern standard was not reached until 1944, when VELANKAR’s Jinaratnakoṣa appeared, where the Jain works have been catalogued, while a second volume containing their authors is still waiting for being published. A primitive forerunner had been the “Jaina Granthāvali” published by the Jain Śvetāmbara Conference in 1908.