The Kadambari of Bana

[Dark Saint Alaick]

The Kadambari of Bana

by Bana and Bhushanabhatta

Translated, with Occasional Omissions,

And Accompanied by a
Full Abstract of the Continuation of the Romance
by the Author's Son Bhushanabhatta,

By

C. M. RIDDING,

Formerly Scholar of Girton College, Cambridge.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

To

MRS. COWELL,
WHO FIRST TOLD ME
THE STORY OF KADAMBARI,
THIS TRANSLATION
IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED.


'Anenakaranavishkritavatsalyena caritena
kasya na bandhutvam adhyaropayasi.'

[Dark Saint Alaick]

INTRODUCTION


The story of Kadambari is interesting for several reasons. It is a
standard example of classical prose; it has enjoyed a long popularity
as a romance; and it is one of the comparatively few Sanskrit works
which can be assigned to a certain date, and so it can serve as a
landmark in the history of Indian literature and Indian thought.

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THE AUTHOR


Banabhatta, its author, lived in the reign of Harshavardhana of
Thaneçar, the great king mentioned in many inscriptions, [2] who
extended his rule over the whole of Northern India, and from whose
reign (A.D. 606) dates the Harsha era, used in Nepal. Bana, as he
tells us, both in the 'Harsha-Carita' and in the introductory verses
of 'Kadambari,' was a Vatsyayana Brahman. His mother died while he
was yet young, and his father's tender care of him, recorded in the
'Harsha-Carita,' [3] was doubtless in his memory as he recorded the
unselfish love of Vaiçampayana's father in 'Kadambari' (p. 22). In
his youth he travelled much, and for a time 'came into reproach,'
by reason of his unsettled life; but the experience gained in foreign
lands turned his thoughts homewards, and he returned to his kin, and
lived a life of quiet study in their midst. From this he was summoned
to the court of King Harsha, who at first received him coldly, but
afterwards attached him to his service; and Bana in the 'Harsha-Carita'
relates his own life as a prelude to that of his master.

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The other works attributed to him are the 'Candikaçataka,' [4] or
verses in honour of Candika; a drama, 'The Parvatiparinaya'; and
another, called 'Mukutataditaka,' the existence of which is inferred
from Gunavinayagani's commentary on the 'Nalacampu.' Professor
Peterson also mentions that a verse of Bana's ('Subhashitavali,'
1087) is quoted by Kshemendra in his 'Aucityavicaracarca,' with a
statement that it is part of a description of Kadambari's sorrow in
the absence of Candrapida, whence, he adds, 'it would seem that Bana
wrote the story of Kadambari in verse as well as in prose,' and he
gives some verses which may have come from such a work.

Bana himself died, leaving 'Kadambari' unfinished, and his son
Bhushanabhatta took it up in the midst of a speech in which Kadambari's
sorrows are told, and continued the speech without a break, save for
a few introductory verses in honour of his father, and in apology for
his having undertaken the task, 'as its unfinished state was a grief to
the good.' He continued the story on the same plan, and with careful,
and, indeed, exaggerated, imitation of his father's style.

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THE PLOT OF KADAMBARI


The story of 'Kadambari' is a very complex one, dealing as it does
with the lives of two heroes, each of whom is reborn twice on earth.

(1-47) A learned parrot, named Vaiçampayana, was brought by a Candala
maiden to King Çudraka, and told him how it was carried from its
birthplace in the Vindhya Forest to the hermitage of the sage Jabali,
from whom it learnt the story of its former life.

(47-95) Jabali's story was as follows: Tarapida, King of Ujjayini, won
by penance a son, Candrapida, who was brought up with Vaiçampayana,
son of his minister, Çukanasa. In due time Candrapida was anointed
as Crown Prince, and started on an expedition of world-conquest. At
the end of it he reached Kailasa, and, while resting there, was
led one day in a vain chase of a pair of kinnaras to the shores of
the Acchoda Lake. (95-141) There he beheld a young ascetic maiden,
Mahaçveta, who told him how she, being a Gandharva princess, had seen
and loved a young Brahman Pundarika; how he, returning her feeling,
had died from the torments of a love at variance with his vow; how
a divine being had carried his body to the sky, and bidden her not
to die, for she should be reunited with him; and how she awaited
that time in a life of penance. (141-188) But her friend Kadambari,
another Gandharva princess, had vowed not to marry while Mahaçveta
was in sorrow, and Mahaçveta invited the prince to come to help her
in dissuading Kadambari from the rash vow. Love sprang up between
the prince and Kadambari at first sight; but a sudden summons from
his father took him to Ujjayini without farewell, while Kadambari,
thinking herself deserted, almost died of grief.

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(188-195) Meanwhile news came that his friend Vaiçampayana, whom he had left in command of the army, had been strangely affected by the sight
of the Acchoda Lake, and refused to leave it. The prince set out to
find him, but in vain; and proceeding to the hermitage of Mahaçveta,
he found her in despair, because, in invoking on a young Brahman,
who had rashly approached her, a curse to the effect that he should
become a parrot, she learnt that she had slain Vaiçampayana. At her
words the prince fell dead from grief, and at that moment Kadambari
came to the hermitage.

(195-202) Her resolve to follow him in death was broken by the promise
of a voice from the sky that she and Mahaçveta should both be reunited
with their lovers, and she stayed to tend the prince's body, from
which a divine radiance proceeded; while King Tarapida gave up his
kingdom, and lived as a hermit near his son.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

(202 to end) Such was Jabali's tale; and the parrot went on to say how,
hearing it, the memory of its former love for Mahaçveta was reawakened,
and, though bidden to stay in the hermitage, it flew away, only to be
caught and taken to the Candala princess. It was now brought by her to
King Çudraka, but knew no more. The Candala maiden thereupon declared
to Çudraka that she was the goddess Lakshmi, mother of Pundarika or
Vaiçampayana, and announced that the curse for him and Çudraka was
now over. Then Çudraka suddenly remembered his love for Kadambari,
and wasted away in longing for her, while a sudden touch of Kadambari
restored to life the Moon concealed in the body of Candrapida, the
form that he still kept, because in it he had won her love. Now the
Moon, as Candrapida and Çudraka, and Pundarika, in the human and
parrot shape of Vaiçampayana, having both fulfilled the curse of an
unsuccessful love in two births on earth, were at last set free,
and, receiving respectively the hands of Kadambari and Mahaçveta,
lived happily ever afterwards.

The plot is involved, and consists of stories within each other after
the fashion long familiar to Europeans in the 'Arabian Nights'; but
the author's skill in construction is shown by the fact that each
of the minor stories is essential to the development of the plot,
and it is not till quite the end that we see that Çudraka himself,
the hearer of the story, is really the hero, and that his hearing
the story is necessary to reawaken his love for Kadambari, and
so at the same time fulfil the terms of the curse that he should
love in vain during two lives, and bring the second life to an end
by his longing for reunion. It may help to make the plot clear if
the threads of it are disentangled. The author in person tells all
that happens to Çudraka (pp. 3-16 and pp. 205 to end). The parrot's
tale (pp. 16-205) includes that of Jabali (pp. 47-202) concerning
Candrapida, and Vaiçampayana the Brahman, with the story told by
Mahaçveta (pp. 101-136) of her love for Pundarika.

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THE STORY AS TOLD IN THE KATHA-SARIT-SAGARA


The story as told in the Katha-Sarit-Sagara of Somadeva [5] differs
in some respects from this. There a Nishada princess brought to King
Sumanas a learned parrot, which told its life in the forest, ended by
a hunt in which its father was killed, and the story of its past life
narrated by the hermit Agastya. In this story a prince, Somaprabha,
after an early life resembling that of Candrapida, was led in his
pursuit of kinnaras to an ascetic maiden, Manorathaprabha, whose
story is that of Mahaçveta, and she took him, at his own request,
to see the maiden Makarandika, who had vowed not to marry while
her friend was unwed. He was borne through the air by a Vidyadhara,
and beheld Makarandika. They loved each other, and a marriage was
arranged between them. The prince, however, was suddenly recalled
by his father, and Makarandika's wild grief brought on her from
her parents a curse that she should be born as a Nishada. Too late
they repented, and died of grief; and her father became a parrot,
keeping from a former birth as a sage his memory of the Çastras,
while her mother became a sow. Pulastya added that the curse would
be over when the story was told in a king's court.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

The parrot's tale reminded King Sumanas of his former birth, and on
the arrival of the ascetic maiden, sent by Çiva, 'who is merciful
to all his worshippers,' he again became the young hermit she had
loved. Somaprabha, too, at Çiva's bidding, went to the king's court,
and at the sight of him the Nishada regained the shape of Makarandika,
and became his wife; while the parrot 'left the body of a bird, and
went to the home earned by his asceticism.' 'Thus,' the story ends,
'the appointed union of human beings certainly takes place in this
world, though vast spaces intervene.'

The main difference between the stories is in the persons affected
by the curse; and here the artistic superiority of Bana is shown
in his not attaching the degrading forms of birth to Kadambari or
her parents. The horse is given as a present to the hero by Indra,
who sends him a message, saying: 'You are a Vidyadhara, and I give
you the horse in memory of our former friendship. When you mount it
you will be invincible.' The hero's marriage is arranged before his
sudden departure, so that the grief of the heroine is due only to their
separation, and not to the doubts on which Bana dwells so long. It
appears possible that both this story and 'Kadambari' are taken from a
common original now lost, which may be the Brihatkatha of Gunadhya. [6]
In that case the greater refinement of Bana's tale would be the result
of genius giving grace to a story already familiar in a humbler guise.