Adhy ātma Rāmāya a

[Rosane Rocher]

Wonderful!  We have now established that the distinguished Gosain Anand 
Ghan (with name garbled in the colonial record and probably secondarily 
misread) was one of the first slate of pandits named professors at 
Banaras Sanskrit College.  Could we also track the achievements of some 
of his colleagues?  In addition to the first principal, Kashinath, who 
had been Charles Wilkins's pandit in Banaras, and who, in spite of what 
I once stated, was not Kashmiri, but Bengali, we have the following cast 
in Nicholls' list:

1. *Bireshur Sheth *Professor or Teacher of the large Vyakarana of 
Paniniand of the Bhasya of the Rigveda.

2. *Ram Chandr Tara *Professor or Teacher of the Veda and Vedanta.

3. *Ramprashad Tarka Panchanan *Professor of the Nyaya Shastra.

4. *Soolepa Shastri *Professor of the Mimansa

5. *Gosain Anand Gir*Professor of the Purans and Cabe Shastra.

6. *Luchmiput Joshi * Professor of the Jotish Shastra.

7. *Gangaram Bhat *Professor of the Vaya Shastra.

8. *Shyamanand Bhattacharji*, Professor or Teacher of Dharma Shastra.

son of Cashinath.

Rosane Rocher
Professor Emerita of South Asia Studies
University of Pennsylvania

On 2/15/11 6:07 PM, Jason Neelis wrote:
> A search of Google Books leads to a reference to a translation of the
> Matsya Puraan.a into Persian by "the braahman.a Gosain Anandghan of
> Delhi, resident of Benares" in Heinrich von Stietencron, et al. Epic and
> Puraan.ic Bibliography (up to 1985)... Harrasowitz, Wiesbaden: 1992, pp.
> 87-88, entry no. 480 (A. Bausani, "Notizia di una tradizione persiana
> inedita del Matsyapuraan.a della fine del secolo 18," RSO 31 [1956],
> 169-177):
> http://books.google.ca/books?id=kgpLBpUCufwC&lpg=PA87&ots=oFK7KZGb2r&dq=anandghan%20banaras&pg=PA87#v=onepage&q&f=false
>
> Jason Neelis
> Religion and Culture
> Wilfrid Laurier University
>
>>>> Robert Goldman<rpg at CALMAIL.BERKELEY.EDU>  15/02/2011 5:48 pm>>>
> Dear Dr. D'Onofrio,
>
> Thank you for this reference. This would indeed very likely be the
> author in question. I should perhaps have noted that in his preface to
>
> the translation he describes himself as having come from "Dehly" but
> has having spent much time in Vāvan.
>
> Dr. R. P.  Goldman
> Professor of Sanskrit
> Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies
> MC # 2540
> The University of California at Berkeley
> Berkeley, CA 94720-2540
> Tel: 510-642-4089
> Fax: 510-642-2409
>
>
>
>
> On Feb 15, 2011, at 2:09 PM, Svevo D'Onofrio wrote:
>
>> Dear colleague,
>>
>> Anandaghan "Khwush" was  a poet who hailed from "among the
>> intellectuals of Brindaban" (quoted by Rajeev Kinra, Infantilizing
>> Baba Dara, "Journal of Persianate Studies" 2 (2009), p. 174).
>> He was the author of several Persian works, many of which are
>> mentioned in Hermann Ethé's Catalogue of Persian Manuscripts in the
>> Library of the India Office, London 1903-37 (nos. 1725, 1959, 1962,
>> 2905, 2906, 2926). These (possibly) include Persian translations of
>> the Gayamahatmya, Bhagavadgita, Kashikhanda and Ramayana.
>>
>> Best,
>>
>> Svevo D'Onofrio
>>
>> PhD, Research Fellow
>> Ruhr-Universität Bochum
>> Käte Hamburger Kolleg
>> "Dynamics in the History of Religions between Asia and Europe"
>> SH 1/176
>> Universitätsstraße 150
>> 44801 Bochum (Germany)
>> Tel. +49 234 32-22955
>>
>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Il giorno 15/feb/2011, alle ore 21.36, Robert Goldman ha scritto:
>>>
>>>> Dear Colleagues, (I hope that this comes through better than y
>>>> past posting.)
>>>>
>>>> A local gentleman, a California winemaker by profession, visited
>>>> me today to ask me about a book in his possession that had
>>>> belonged to his late grandfather.  Upon inspection I found it to
>>>> be a two volume set consisting of a handwritten English
>>>> translation of the Adhyātma Rāmāyaa with an introduction by
>>>> one Anand Ghan who describes himself  as "A Member of the College
>>>> of Brahmins at Benares" and who claims that he translated the text
>>>> from "Sanscrit into Persian" and "Again translated from the
>>>> Persian into English".  It is dated 1804 and appears to have been
>>>> purchased in India, perhaps by the grandfather for Rs. 8.
>>>>
>>>> The book is in quite good condition. The handwriting is quite
>>>> clear and the English excellent.
>>>>
>>>> The owner was reluctant to leave the book with me but  I was able
>>>> to take  two images from it that I snapped with my mobile phone.
>>>> One is of the title page of the first volume and one is from a
>>>> randomly opened page to show what the text itself looks like.
>>>>
>>>> I would be interested to know if any of you know anything about
>>>> Pt. Ghan or the history of his double translation.
>>>> Dr. R. P.  Goldman
>>>> Professor of Sanskrit
>>>> Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies
>>>> MC # 2540
>>>> The University of California at Berkeley
>>>> Berkeley, CA 94720-2540
>>>> Tel: 510-642-4089
>>>> Fax: 510-642-2409
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> <Adhyatma Ramayana.jpg><Adhyatma 2.jpg>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
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