Description
Sivasvamin’s epic poem King Kapphina’s Triumph, composed in Kashmir in the second half of the ninth century, is one of the five extant mahakavyas composed during the first millennium CE. Due to the bad state of the edited text and the unavailability of a commentary it has not received the attention it deserves on account of its superior poetic qualities. The discovery of most of the missing folios of the best and oldest manuscript from Nepal and of a second complete manuscript made it possible to prepare a new edition in which most of the gaps and mistakes of the first edition could be removed. This book contains the first Devanagari version of the improved text.;The content of the poem, based on an old Buddhist legend from the Avadanasataka, is quite unique. King Kapphina’s triumph is in fact a military defeat, because he loses the decisive battle against the Kosala king Prasenajit whose kingdom he had intended to conquer. This happens because Prasenajit is saved by the miraculous power of the Buddha in the very last moment. This impresses King Kapphina and leads to his spiritual awakening and conversion to the doctrine of the Buddha. In the last consequence the Kapphinabhyudaya can be called a pacifistic poem.;Sivasvamin’s command of Sanskrit and his literary techniques are extraordinary.;He refines many of the existing figures of speech and introduces new ones. The bilingual canto xix is unprecedented and without successor, and it will require the united efforts of several generations of scholars until the full range of Sivasvamin’s poetical genius can be duly appreciated.;;The present edition is meant to contribute to this end.;;Michael Hahn (b. 1941) is professor emeritus of Sanskrit and Tibetan of the Philipps University Marburg, Germany. He has edited and translated many works belonging to the poetic and didactic literature of Indian Buddhism, among them Candragomin’s play Lokananda, Haribhatta’s Jatakamala, the anonymous Mahajjataka-mala, Nagarjuna’s Ratnavaai and several minor works. Gopadatta’s Jatakamala and the oldest recension of Harsadeva’s Nagananda are under preparation.;;
