मुद्राराक्षसम्/परिचयः
kshasa, the Sarasvatikaņņțhabharana contains two,* The first is the stanza at p. 98 infra,which runs as follows in the very useful edition of the Sarasvatîîkanthâbharana recently published by Mr. A. Borooah. (See p. 165 ). It is, however, to be noted that this is not here mentioned as being taken from the Mudrârâkshasa, nor is the second passage referred to further on.
उपरि घनं घनपटलं दूरे दयिता किमेतदापतितम्। हिमवति दिव्यौषधयः कोपाविष्टः फणी शिरसि ॥ The second is the second stanza at p. 167 infra in which is quoted at p. 292 of the Sarasvatîkanthâbharana. It is not necessary to do more than indicate the various readings which our MSS. do not contain, viz, जृम्भणैः for जृम्भितैः and अतिताम्रा for अभिताम्रा.Now it is remarkable, that in all the cases here noted, the readings which occur in the Daśarûpa and the Sarasvatikaņțhâbharaņa should not be found in any one of our MSS. And the circumstance is not only a remarkable one, it is calculated to create an uneasy suspicion in one’s mind that we have not before us materials quite satisfactory for settling our text. On the other hand, however, we have to remember, that some of the discrepancies which we meet with may be due merely to mistakes or defects in the copies of the Dasśarûpa and Sarasvatikaņțhâbharaņa themselves. It is also to be borne in mind, that these discrepancies are of no great moment in themselves, as they do not affect the meaning, although, of course, in one sense every variation, however unimportant in itself, is of importance upon the question: -what was the text as it left the hands of the author. It may be further pointed out that even as regards other works, which are quoted in the Dasśarûpa and Sarasvatîkanņțhabharaņa, we meet occasionally with various readings in the passages quoted, of which we find no trace in many of the manuscripts available to us. A few references to such passages are given in the note.#
- See Introduction infra on these passages. * We have also to take account of the fact that, in all probability, some at least of these quotations were
verified before they were written down by the authors of the Das'arûpa and the Sarasvatikaņțhâbharana, but were merely written down from memory. See our remarks on this subject below ( P. 23 } and also the next note. + Cf. Dasakumâracharita, p. 1, with Sarasvatikaņțhâbharaņa, p.114; Malatimadhava, pp.166, 307,365, with Sarasvatîkaņțhâbharaņa pp. 115,311,340 respectively, and pp. 49, We now proceed to enumerate the copies of the Mudrérakshasa which have been used for this edition. The first is that marked A. it is complete, and includes the text and the commentary of Dhundhirâja here published. It is thoroughly legible and correct. It belongs to Mr. Âpâ Shâstrî Khâdilkar , and was very kindly lent to me by that venerable scholar. From the concluding sentences, it appears that the text and commentary were originally copied in the Vis'vesvaranagarî, or Banâres in the Śaka year 1653, in the month of Âśvin, by उपाध्यायभुकदेव. It is the copy which generally speaking, has been exclusively relied upon for the text of the commentary. and its text of the play itself is that which the commentator had before him, and which has also been mainly adopted in this edition.* There is one circumstance which deserves to be noted here in connection with this MS. It consists of two distinct parts, apparently copied by two different hands. The first of these two parts goes down to नागयूथेश्वराणाम् । द्र (sic.). and then there is a considerable space left blank on that page and on the next page of the same leaf. The words quoted will be found at p. 168 infra, The second part of the MS. does not start from that point. It begins with अपि च आस्वादितद्विरदशोणितशोणशोभमिति पूर्वोक्तं पठति, and then goes on to the end of the work. The words last quoted will be found at p. 99 infra. The two fragments of the play now described are, it may be added, written on paper of different sizes, and the date above given, ---viz. Sáka 1653,-is, ofcourse, found at the end of the second fragment. (See further, p. 11 infra). The second MS. used for the purposes of this edition is that marked P. This MS. forms part of a volume bound in the European style, and containing two plays in MS, the Mudrârâkshasa and the Malatimadhava. This volume, I am informed, is one of a series of volumes containing manuscript copies of various works made several years ago at Jejurî, and now in the possession of Mr. Âpârâo Vaidya of Poona. It was procured for me by my friend
165, with Daśarûpa, pp. 95, 149 respectively. Note that the passage cited from the Malatimdhava . 113 of the Sarasvatîkaņthâbharaņa is again cited at at p. 292 with a variation in one word, and that the same passage is cited at Daśarûpa, p. 149, with a variation in another word.
- I regret that owing to inadvertence the readings of this group of MSS. have
sometimes got into the foot-notes instead of being taken as the text. Râo Bahâdur Gajânan Krishna Bhâțavađekar, now in the service of the Baroda State. The MS. is by no means accurately, though it is most clearly and legibly, written. There are sundry mistakes to be met with from time to time, but they are nearly always easy of correction. · The MS., for instance, often writes इ for यि. The Sanskrit equivalent of the Prâkŗit passages is given in considerable portions of the play, but not throughout, and it follows the Prâkŗit passages themselves in the middle of the text. In the latter portion of the play, viz. from the fifth Act onwards, the Prâkŗŗit mostly remains without the Sanskrit translation. The original from which the copy was made, in all probability, contained both the text and commentary, as before the final stanza, and after the words तथापि इदमस्तु, we read इत्थमत्रातिगम्भीरशुभोदर्कचाणक्यनयसंविधानेन चन्द्रगुप्तसाचिव्यपदलाभपरितुष्टो सहामात्यो राक्षस इत्याशास्ते ॥ भरतवाक्यम्॥ and then follows वाराहीम् and so forth, as in our text. The words set out here are not to be found in our copies of the commentary. They may, perhaps, belong, and probably do belong, to some other commentator than Dhuņdhirâja; but they are plainly no part of Vis'âkhadatta's text, and they must very likely have got into the text in the copy now under description from the copy from which it was prepared. The MS. bears no date, but is comparatively very modern-looking, probably not even so much as fifty years old. It states at the end the ग्रन्थसंख्या as 1350, which is, no doubt, a note of the copyist made for calculating his own remuneration. (See further, p. 11 infra.). The next copy to be mentioned is a MS. written on palmyra leaves which is denoted by the letter M. It was a MS. procured for me by my friend, Mr. V. N. Narasimiengar of Bangalore, who has always been most useful both to Professor Bhâņđârkar and myself, in procuring for us copies of Sanskrit texts from Southern India. This MS. and the next are both written in the Telugu characters, which I am unable to read, and I had therefore to resort to the services of readers to help me in the matter. The MS. appears to be, on the whole, very correctly written. It contains no double letters, apparently such letters being denoted by the corresponding single letters with a dot over the previous letter in many cases. (Cf. Burnell's Indian Palæography, p. 13; Pandit's Mâlavikâgnimitra, pp., IX., X.). The confusion of थ and ध seems to be a pretty common phenomenon in these southern MSS., and in the two I have used there seems to have been some confusion also between क and श. The MS. bears no date.
The next MS. consulted is the one marked R. It was kindly sent to me from the India Office Library through Dr. F. Kielhorn by Dr. R. Rost, when he heard that I was preparing this edition for the Bombay Sanskrit Series. The same remarks apply to this MS. as to the last one here described. There is also, apparently, some confusion in this MS. in the last scene, where the speeches are in some disorder. As a general rule, these southern MSS. are always worthy of careful attention, and the MSS. I have used for this edition belong to the same group as the copy from which the commentator took his text. I cannot say how old R and M are.
The next MS. is one marked K. It comes from the collection of MSS. belonging to the Government of Bombay and deposited in Elphinstone College. This MS., however, is only a copy recently made for Government, and contains the text only down to the end of the first Act. The rest of the MS. contains a copy merely of the commentary of Dhuņđhirâja.
So much for the group of MSS. on which the text adopted in this edition is mainly based. The next group contains one printed copy, B., namely, the edition of this play published at Calcutta with a commentary, by Professor Târânâth Tarkavâchaspati. That edition has been assumed to be a fair representative of the Bengal text of our play. It contains now and then some various readings, but in sundry places the text of the play as there given, is very unsatisfactory. Two other editions have been printed at Calcutta, one was published many years ago without either various readings or exegetical notes, and another with some various readings and the commentary of Dhundhirâja. This last, however, was never completed, as far as I have been able to ascertain, and the portion printed goes down to a little beyond the middle of the second Act. I have not deemed it necessary to compare the readings of those editions with the text here adopted, save to a very small extent indeed.
The next copy in this group is the one marked E. It belongs to the collection of MSS. deposited in the Library of Deccan College, Poona. It is a very indifferently written MS. It contains numerous mistakes, as may be seen even on an examination
of the readings from it, which are contained in our foot-notes. It is bound up in one volume with a MS. of the Uttararâmacharita.On the last page of the Mudrārakshasa we read संवत १७०४ समये (?)नामकुअरसुदी सप्तमी॥ संपूर्णः----which would make the date of the MS. to be 1648 A. C., if the Vikrama era is to be understood to be the era intended. The MS., it is believed, comes from Guzerâth.
The next copy is N. This is a MS. belonging to a Shâstri of Nagpur, in the Central Provinces. I was not able to see it my- self, but my very obliging friend, Mr. Hari Mâdhava Pandit, was so kind as to undertake the arduous work of collating the MS. for me, and it was thus, I obtained the various readings which are mentioned in the foot-notes. The MS. bears no date on the face of it, but Mr. Pandit thinks that it may be about a hundred years old. Mr. Pandit also compared another MS, which belonged to the Library of the Râjâ of Nagpur. But after he had compared the first few pages, he found that MS, to be so hopelessly incorrect that he had to abandon the work of collation as a thing which could not lead to any useful result. Wherever any readings of both these MSS. are given, they are distinguished thus, the Shâstri's MS, is called N. S.; and the Râjâ's N, R., Mr. Pandit informs me that both these MSS. are believed to have been copied at Benares. The last MS. to be mentioned is the one described in the foot- notes as G. It is a MS. coming from the Province of Guzerâth and was lent to me by Râo Bahâdur Shankar Pândurang Pandit to whom it belongs. It is unfortunately incomplete, pages being wanting both at the beginning and at the end, and it is also very incorrectly written. It extends from Siddharthaka's speech सहर्पम् &c, in the first Act at P. 88 to Chânakya's speech in the last Act at p. 315,भद्र &c. The MS. is, however, pretty old-its age being between two and three hundred years. It will be perceived from the above description of the materials used for this edition, that those materials are drawn from nearly all the different Provinces of India. We have Bengal, Southern India, the Central Provinces, Guzeråth, Mahârâshtra, and Benares all represented in the collection of copies which have been consul- ted for this edition. Since the Text was sent to the Press, I have had a MS. lent to me by my friend, Mr. Kâshinâth Pândurang Parab, which seems to be traceable to Tryambakes'var, near Nâsık. It is a copy recently made. The date सीमाधाविमिते गतेव्दनिकरक्षज्यारुहस्थायिनो भैमीनायकवत्सरे शुचिदले मासे नभ्यस्यस्य च (?)is probably that of the original MS. from which this was copied. It has not been collated throughout for the purposes of the present edition, but on a comparison of a sufficient number of pages and passages, it appears to agree very nearly with our MS, P. And it is worthy of note that the two agree even in that interpolation from the com- mentary which has been noticed in the description of P. I have also recently examined another MS., one in that collection of volumes which has been referred to by Prof. Bhânđârkar in his Mâlati- mâdhava (Preface, p. ii.), that bears no date (see Mâlatîmâdhava, 1. c.), and agrees also generally with our MS. P., including the in- terpolation referred to. The last MS. to be named here is one be- longing to Alvar,* which I have not been able to examine myself. Prof. Peterson, however, has been good enough to compare about thirty pages of my text with that MS., and he tells me that he did not find any variants worthy of note, while he found the MS. agreeing generally with our MS. A. Dr. Buhler was kind enough to draw my attention to the MS. of the play existing in the Jesalmîr Bhândâr. But at the date of writing this notice, I have not been able to obtain either the copy itself or any collations from it.
In order to avoid the appearance of too many figures above the lines of the text, the various readings on each line have been generally grouped together under one figure in the foot-notes, and as they are printed in due order, it is hoped that there will not be much difficulty in assigning each variant to its proper original in the text. A semi-colon generally separates variants not connected with one another. Aº before a letter indicates that the foregoing portion of the word has been omitted to save space. Variants even when purely the result of error, are mentioned in the foot- notes, but generally only in those cases where there were other real variants appearing in other copies; so that the erroneous Variant would show which of the two genuine variants was in- tended to be written.
(THIRD EDITION)
This edition is merely a reprint of the first edition. Changes in orthography, punctuation and type have, however, been made according to the system followed up in the Nirnaya-sagara publications. K. P. P.
{{* But see P. 35 infra. I have collated considerable portions of the Commentary.}}
( FIRST EDITION.)
The Mudranakshasa is in sundry respects, a very unique work in Sanskrit literature. Its plot is not a pure invention, but on the other hand, it is not derived from the usual store-house of legends on which Sanskrit authors have generally drawn for their materials. It has no female among its prominent dramatis personae, and the business of the play, accordingly, is diplomacy and politics to the entire exclusion of love. There is, in truth, but one female character, with one little child, introduced into the play, and these are Chandanadâsa's wife and son, who come in at the beginning of the last Act. But even their appearance introduces no passages suggestive of tenderness or the purely domestic virtues, but only of sacrifice. —a, stern sense of duty. The style is appropriate to the nature of the subject; it does not lay much claim to Sweetness or beauty, but is always business-like and often vigorous. In the delineation of character, likewise, the virtues and vices which are depicted are more those of the sterner sort, not so much those con: nected with the tender affections. Thus, to take first the most prominent character in the play, Chanakya is represented as a clear-headed, self-confident, intriguing, hard politician, with the ultimate end of his ambition thoroughly well-determined, and .directing all his clear-headedness and intrigue to the accomplishment of that end. Rakshasa, on the other hand, is represented as a brave soldier, but a, blundering and somewhat soft-natured politician, whose faithfulness to his original masters prompts him to Wreak vengeance for their destruction on Chandragupta and Chénakya who were their destroyers, but who has ultimately to abandon the self imposed task, being foiled by the arts of his adversary. The proximate motive of the abandonment, however, is the duty of repaying favours received by him when he was engaged in his attempts at vengeance as above stated. Thus the two rivals are both placed before us, so to say, almost exclusively in their official chara-
* Cf. pp. 75, 6 with pp. 119-21; pp. 85-6, 108 with pp. 123 (where the snakes are mentioned, though Virâdhagupta is brought in for his Subhashita, p.121 ),188, 204-5, 243-6; pp102-3with pp. 141, 260; and see Act VI. passim + p, 292 et seq