पृष्ठम्:Birds in Sanskrit literature.djvu/९

xiv ( ) times when hovering." Now we also have the name (sporting, playful, or dancing) as a name for a bird of prey in erg p. 327, verse 90 so that a Kestrel should be the with which the of the Rgveda has been replaced by the sporting with ff as its call in the TS. Finally, it is interesting to quote both S. Baker on Bird Nos. 1516-17, and Salim Ali on the Roller or Blue Jay: The Kashmir Rollers "spend much of their time performing acrobatic feats in the air, first twisting one way, then the other and often making a complete turn...accompanied by much harsh creaking and shrieking..." (S. Baker); "Has a variety of loud raucous creaks and chuckles. Indulges in a spectacular courtship display, somer- saulting and nosediving in the air to the accompaniment of harsh grating screams" (Salim Ali). We thus see the correctness of the derivation of the name or epithet, fefefe for the and both 'partridge' and 'blue wood- pecker have nothing to do with it. The अमरकोश, अभिधानचिन्तामणि of हेमचन्द्र and af treat and feffer as synonyms, and the last named lexicon also stresses the auspicious nature of the bird with the epithet of gre in its सिंहादिवर्ग, v. 157. In the Vedic Index gore 'sitting on the lotus' is the name of an animal at the horse sacrifice in TS, MS, and VS and the authors do not accept Zimmer's rendering of it as a 'snake' but are inclined to accept either the suggestion of Roth as a 'bird', or of the commentator as a "bee' (TS 5.5.14.1). It is, however, the name of the bird, the Indian Whiskereds Tern which places its nest on top of tangled floating water-plants and also upon leaves of the totus as is clearly stated by S. Baker in Vo: VI, p. 112, of his Fauna-Birds: The Whiskered Terms make their nests "of reeds and rushes which are built partly or wholly supported by lily leaves and other water plants-in large colonies". The female is gcnfis' in grafem and with great in the g as a water-bird, the following verse presents a beautiful picture of the females nesting in a colony amongst the lotuses under the diminutive name of gfe-in contrast with their larger cousins, the River Terns which make no nest and always lay their eggs in deep hollows scratched in sand (Bird No. 2080, in S. Baker), a fact which brings out the full significance of the epithet or name, gene (T)- or ge-enfast, who are gathering back with their wings their half-fledged younglings sprawling away from their beds on the lotus leaves: अर्द्धाभ्युद्गतपत्रकं परिलुठन् पत्रेषु परुहाम् प्रायः पोतकजातक कुररिका: पक्षः समूहन्त्यमूः ।। Thus the guess of Roth was correct, and not the 'bee' of the commen- tator, nor the 'snake' of Zimmer. The short notes on a few bird-names from the Vedic Index given above should make it clear that if one wants to know with a fair degree of cer- tainty the particular kind of bird meant in a given context, one cannot always go by the dictionary meanings of the names, or by the published commentaries or translations, but must try to examine the overall context xv ) in each case with reference to the period of the composition of a work (Vedic, Epic or Classical), the geographical setting, the picture an author wants to present, and the object he has in view. This however, is easier said than done, for many an example in the Puranas would be found to be extremely vague, and it is perhaps true to say that the authors have striven in their compositions more after general effect and word sympathy than faithfulness to Nature. At the same time it cannot be denied that there is a considerable volume of hight class poetry which is quite as close to Nature as poetry can be. Turning to the commentaries, we must note that they are generally of a much later date than the original texts and cannot always be accepted as correct, for the commentators themselves are not quite sure of their own. renderings of many a name of wild birds or animals, as is evident from the advice given by 3rt in his note on VS XXIV. 20, which mentions six different birds dedicated as symbolical victims to the six Vedic seasons of the year: "When the victims cannot be identified one should seek help from etymology, commentary of gre on fire grammar, frger lexicons, and from the people of the forests." The same advice is also given by Acarya Mahidhara, the second commentrator of VS, as a preliminary to his notes on the formulae 21-40. The fat and fear divide the birds empirically into four groups: पदः (the peckers), विष्क्रिय (the scratchers), प्लबा: (the water-birds), and प्रसहा- (the birds of prey), but I have tried in this book to follow the scientific classification of Indian birds and to identify their names in Sanskrit; I have tried to do my best by a comparative study of their names in Prakrit, Pali, Hindi, Punjabi, Bengali, and at times even in South Indian languages. I may well have gone wrong with a number of both obscure and possibly corrupt terms for lack of sufficient material, and otherwise too, a situation not uncommon even with the best of scholars who have dealt with ancient culture and literature. III The probable usefulness of this book on birds for students of Sanskrit has been anticipated by my friend, Prof. Dr. V. M. Apte, in the following rather highly colourful words: "It will be a study-the fascination of which will be matched only by its utility. Scholars intellectually constituted with a purely theoretical bias and studying Nature not in the open but through books, have not a leg to stand on in this field and we will feel highly in- debted to a scholar who introduces the ancient (and also modern, because surviving still) Birds in Vedic and Classical Sanskrit Literature to us in such a way as to make us feel that we can actually admire their colourful plumage and appreciate the effusions of their vocal chords". IV I owe a great debt of gratitude to my friend, the late Dr. Raghuvira who encouraged me in my work and also lent me some important books.