Nalopákhyánam : Story of Nala, an episode of the Mahábhárata: the Sanskrit text, with a copious vocabulary and an improved version of Dean Milman's translation, by Monier Williams.

Date:
1879
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Nalopákhyánam : Story of Nala, an episode of the Mahábhárata: the Sanskrit text, with a copious vocabulary and an improved version of Dean Milman's translation, by Monier Williams. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    forgives Pushkara, and enters on a long and happy reign with his consort Damayanti. That this Story of Nala, however comparatively modern the version in the Maha-bh^rata, is of great antiquity, may be proved by internal evidence. The prominence given to the deities Indra, Agni, Varuna, and Yama, and the absence of all allusion to the great Hindu Triad, connect the narrative more with the Vedic than the Epic and Puranic periods b If Nala was of the Solar race, as represented by Kalidasa, he must have been the fourth from the great Kama, son of Dasa-ratha, the genealogy, according to the Eaghu-vansa, running thus :—Eaghu, Aja, Dasa-ratha, Kama, Kusa, Atithi, Nishadha, Nala, Nabhas. But if he belonged to the Lunar dynasty, reigning at Nishadha, when Eituparna of the Solar race reigned at Ayodhya, then we must assign him a much earlier date, and place him fourteen reigns before Kama. The story, no doubt, rests on a foundation of fact, and, on account of its age, is a favourite subject with Hindu poets. It not only appears as an episode to the Maha-bharata, but forms the subject of two other celebrated poems, one called the Nalodaya, attributed to the great Kalidasa, the author of ^akuntala; and the other called the Naishadha, written by Sri Harsha. It is also introduced by Somadeva Bhatta into his collection of stories called Katha-sarit-sagara, and told there with variations. It is, moreover, the subject-matter of a very curious composition, half prose, half verse, called Campu, ^ According to Professor Brockhaus, the personification of Kali as the demon of the fourth Age, and not of the dice, shews that the modern arranger of the story did not understand this old Vedic term, and is another proof of the earlier existence of the Kala. The word Tret4 (which denotes the second Age of the world) is also used for a throw of dice. See the second Act of the Mricchakati. • • b 2