Jottings on the Literary- Aspect of the Brahmandapurana (An Old and Rare Book)

Email

Whatsapp

Facebook

Pinterest

Twitter

Copy link

It is regrettable that the significance and value of the Puranas have not yet been critically, systematically and scientifically processed. This enormous magnitude of the realm of letters, often considered an aberration of Indian mind has been uncared for by the litterateur. The number of its connoisseurs is barely sufficient. Scholars like H.H. Wilson, F.E. Pargiter. W. Kierfel, H.P. Shastri, V.R.R. Dikshitar, R.C. Hazra and others have made some unique contribution in bringing out their critical editions. studying and reconstructing them from the viewpoint of their different recensions, highlighting their prime importance as the fountainhead of the socio-political con- dition of ancient India and writing a synthetic history of Indian life and surroundings.

In the history of Sanskrit studies in modern India when we entered the present advanced age of the printing press, one of the first things which attracted the attention of scholars as well as lovers of Sanskrit was naturally the need to have printed editions of great Sanskrit classics. The pride of place in age as well as in achievement has to be given to Edicio Princeps of the greatest book of India and possibly the whole world-the Sanskrit Mahabharata, which was brought out by the scholars under the auspices of the Asiatic Society of Calcutta during 1834 to 1839. The Italian scholar Gaspare Gorressio brought out the first edition which may be described as fairly critical of the Ramayana from Paris with an Italian translation during the years 1843 to 1850. Then we have that Magnum Opus of German Sanskrit scholarship when Friedrich Maxmueller from Germany. who had settled in England, edited and published for the first time the oldest book of India and the Indo-European world, the Rgvedasamhita with the commentary of Sayana in six volumes (1849-1870).