Sanskrit Manuscripts : Vidvadbālānurañjinī

Sarasvatitīrtha

Sanskrit Manuscripts

<p style='text-align: justify;'>A 19th-century manuscript, in the <i>tripāṭha</i> format, of Sarasvatītīrtha's <i>Vidvadbālānurañjinī</i>, an unpublished commentary on the celebrated <i>Meghadūta</i> by Kālidāsa. The author of the <i>Vidvadbālānurañjinī</i> "appears to be identical with the Āndhra scholiast Narahari Sarasvatītīrtha, who wrote a commentary on the <i>Kumārasambhava</i>, as well as one on the <i>Kāvyaprakāśa</i> entitled <i>Bālacittānurañjinī</i>. This last commentary gives us the information that he was born in Saṃvat 1298 (=ca. 1242 A.D.) in Tribhuvanagiri in the Andhra country. He traces his own genealogy from Rāmeśvara of Vatsagotra, and describes himself as the son of Mallinātha and Nāgammā and grandson of Narasiṃha, son of Rāmeśvara. When he became an ascetic, he took the name of Sarasvatītīrtha and composed his commentaries at Kāśī. He also refers to two works, <i>Smṛtidarpaṇa</i> and <i>Tarkaratna</i> (with its <i>Dīpikā</i> commentary), written by himself. The colophon describes Sarasvatītīrtha as Paramahaṃsa Parivrājakācārya. Sarasvatītīrtha's commentary on the <i>Meghadūta</i> is indeed remarkable for its acuteness of exposition, which drew the encomium of K.B. Pathak; but since it admits 12 spurious stanzas (giving a total of 123 stanzas [actually 122, in the present manuscript, with verse 123 added as an annotation by a second hand]), its text-tradition cannot in this respect be taken as very reliable, nor do its readings always seem authentic. It appears to accept the conflated West Indian text, which differs from that of the Kashmirian and Malabar commentators [...]. (De 1955: 18)"</p>