Re: [INDOLOGY] Nārāyaṇagarta and Kayyaṭa Kashmiri pandits

[Ashok Aklujkar]

garta is probably a corruption of garga, indicating the family's affiliation with the Garga gotra. "Garge" is still found as a family name in India. 

The table showing the development of the Nagari and Sharada scripts that is given as plate LXXXII or Lipi-patra 82 in Ojha's pracina bharatiya lipimala indicates that at one time in some (probably western) region of India both ga and ta were written like English inverted "V". A miswriting of ga as ta could have occurred at that time. ( (I am not certain about the title and the author of the Hindi book to which I have referred here on the basis of my memory; my specification of the table number is based only on the partial photocopy I have at hand; the copy does not carry any author name or book title.)

Since Kayya.ta was a Kashmiri author, manuscripts of his commentary are very likely to have been written in Kashmir or in the area to the south of Kashmir on the western side of india. 

As the pu.spika of the commentary is written in verse, the author could have used garga for the sake of the meter when he in fact had the gotra epithet gaargya in mind. Therefore, if my emendation is accepted, both naaraaya.na-garga and naaraaya.na-gaargya should be used to gather more information about the author.

a.a.



On 2014-02-06, at 10:27 AM, Alessandro Battistini wrote:
> I am preparing an edition of Ānandavardhana's Devīśataka, with the commentary by Kayyaṭa (978 d.C.). The latter states in the puṣpikā that his teacher was some ekāyanasya acyutatulyamūrter ācāryanārāyaṇagartanamnaḥ. Has anyone ever heard of him or has any hint about names ending in -garta?