tArakAmaya (another)

[DEVARAKONDA VENKATA NARAYANA SARMA]

It is getting "curiouser and curiouser" (Alice in Wonderland).

We have another tArakAmaya in harivamza purANA. It has nothing to do
with either tArA or tAraka. (Because it talks about viSNu as KriSNa
it is perhaps a latter addition.) In this war candra fights for the devAs
instead of against them. The only justifications I could find for calling
the battle tArakAmaya are (Gita Press, Gorakhpur Edition)

        EtasminnantarE mEghA nirvANAGgAravarSiNah
        sArkacandragrahagaNam chAdayantO nabhasthalam (1.42.13)

which can be thought as a tArakA+Amaya. Stars are effectively covered to
prevent them from shining.

The other is

        tamRkSayOgAnugatam zizirAmzum dvijEsvaram
        jagacchAyAGkitatanum naizasya tamasah kSayam (1.44.25)

candra is followed by stars into the battle. So the interpretation is
tArakA+mayah i.e., full of stars.

Though the passage most probably may be an interpolation, we can here
perhaps see interpretation of tArakAmayA as "full of stars".

As I do not have critical edition of harivamza purANA I do not know
whether this portion is treated as prakSipta or not.

regards,

sarma.