Jyotihshastra: Astral and Mathematical Literature c4.s2.46

c4.s2.46

The Saurapakṣa was initiated in about 800 by the unknown author of the “modern” Sūryasiddhānta,⁶¹ who has modified many of the planetary parameters of the Ārdharātrikapakṣa (and thereby of Lāṭadeva’s Sūryasiddhānta) while retaining others along with the midnight epoch, and who has taken over from the Brāhmapakṣa the traditional divisions of both the Kalpa and the Mahāyuga, but delayed the beginning of the motions of the planets by 17,064,000 years so that the rotations of each within the remainder of the Kalpa are divisible by four. Other elements in the SS indicate its author’s knowledge of Brahmagupta’s BSS. The popularity of the work was enormous in all parts of India, but especially in the South and Northeast. Virtually every commentator, however, has rearranged the text, adding and subtracting verses ad libitum; the manuscript traditions of these many recensions, especially the earlier ones, will have to be fully investigated before a clear idea of the exact contents of the original can emerge. The most important of the extant Sanskrit commentators are: Mallikārjuna Sūri,⁶² who wrote a commentary in Telugu before composing his Sanskrit Sūryasiddhāntaṭīkā in 1178; Caṇḍeśvara,⁶³ a Maithila Brāhmaṇa whose Sūryasiddhāntabhāṣya was written in 1185; Madanapāla,⁶⁴ a Mahārājādhirāja of the Ṭāka family, who wrote his Vāsanārṇava between 1375 and 1400; Parameśvara,⁶⁵ who composed his Sūryasiddhāntavivaraṇa in Kerala in 1432; Yallaya, who wrote his Kalpavallī in Āndhrapradeśa in 1472; Rāmakṛṣṇa Ārādhya, whose Subodhinī was also composed in 1472; Bhūdhara,⁶⁶ who wrote his Sūryasiddhāntavivaraṇa at Kāmpilya in 1572; Tamma Yajvan,⁶⁷ who composed his Kāmadogdhrī at Paragīpurī in 1599; Raṅganātha, whose Gūḍhārthaprakāśaka was completed in Kāśī in 1603; Nṛsiṃha,⁶⁸ who wrote his immense Saurabhāṣya in the same city in 1611; Viśvanātha, also of Kāśī, who composed his Gahanārthaprakāśa in about 1628; Kamalākara,⁶⁹ another astronomer of Kāśī, whose Sauravāsanā on SS 1—10 was written after 1658; and Dādābhāī,⁷⁰ a Cittapāvana Brāhmaṇa, who composed his Kiraṇāvalī in 1719. The dates of three other commentators, all of whom lived in South India, are unknown; they are Kāmabhaṭṭa⁷¹ (Sūryasiddhāntaṭīkā), Cola Vipaścit⁷² (Gaṇakopakāriṇī), and Bhūtiviṣṇu⁷³ (Gurukaṭākṣa).