Colophon verse

[Ashok Aklujkar]

Both the verse bhagna-p.r.s.tha ... and the verse having yadi ;suddham
a;suddha.m vaa .. as its second half commonly occur in mss. If you look at
ms. catalogues in which the concluding parts of each ms. are reproduced or
at manuscript-based editions in which the concluding parts of mss utilized
by the editor are reproduced, you will find many occurrences of the verses.

The verses are frequently written in a corrupt form (diminishing our
confidence in the scribe or telling us that the scribe was really tired
when he came to that point in the ms.!). They routinely have some variants;
e.g. yatnena for putravat.

In almost all the versions I have seen of the first verse, there is a
disjunction of thought in the first half of the verse and the second, but
that disjunction can easily be overcome on the strength of the context. The
first half describes the hardship involved in copying an exemplar. The
second half appeals to the prospective user to take good care of the
prepared ms. The thought that would have connected the two halves, namely
'because the scribe has gone through such hardship, the prospective user
...' does not find (explicit) expression. That the first line applies to
the scribe and the second to the product of his effort is left for the
reader of the verse to imagine. It is possible that the currently available
version is an instance of loss in ms. transmission. The second half of
bhagna-p.r.s.tha ..and the first half of ka.s.tena likhita.m ... may have
gone missing. Another less likely possibility is that the verse was
originally written by a scribe or copyist whose command of verse
composition in Sanskrit was limited. Leaps of thought are not uncommon in
'vernacular Sanskrit' writings.

If Professor Deshpande has suggested his emendation
(>griivaasthirad.r.s.tir ... read: -asthirad.r.s.tir->} seriously, it
should be typed as ... griivo 'sthira... However, an emendation at this
point is really not necessary. The bahu-vriihi adj sthira-d.r.s.ti is quite
appropriate. It refers to that part of a scribe's hardship which requires
him to look at his exemplar and copy-in-the making in a concentrated way;
it expresses the strain involved in focusing one's sight. The ms. reading
griivasthiira reproduced by Arlo Griffiths is essentially correct. Less
than ideally written mss. quite commonly drop the visarga before
conjunctions such as pr and sth.

bhagna is obviously not to be taken in a very literal sense. Its use in the
verse is similar to the use of 'break' in English expressions such as
'back-breaking work.'

>TULVA/TULII/TULAA< reported by Mr. Jogesh Panda should probably be tuuli
>or tuulii, primarily standing for the painting/drawing/writing brush (=
>our pen) and secondarily for writing instrument in general, perhaps
>including the stylus. tuulikaa occurs in the compositions of Kaalidaasa
>etc. in the sense of a painting brush (unmiilita.m tuulikayeva citram --
>Kumaara-sa.mbhava 1.32).

The commonly attested first half of the second verse is: yaad.r;sa.m
pustaka.m d.r.s.ta.m taad.r;sa.m likhita.m mayaa /

ashok aklujkar