THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.

354

[DECEMBER, 1873.

The Digambara

zealous about mere ceremonies. The cloisters and entrance to the enclosures round these

Tirthankara is remarkable.

colossal Jain statues are precisely like those in other temples, and there is a pitha for offerings

ly from their fellows of the North, in doctrine,

Jains of Southern India differ, however, entire books, and customs. A. B.

in front of the statue.

The dedication of a temple to a saint not a

PAPERS ON SATRUNJAYA AND THE JAINS. BY THE EDITOR.

V.—Satruñjaya IIill. Like other sects, the Jainas have their

Tirthas or holy places, which they visit for worship at stated periods, in vast pilgrim-bands called Sanghas, numbering many thousands, from Gujarāt, Marwād, Gangetic India, and elsewhere. They enumerate five great tirthas :

–Ša truñjaya,

Sa met Śikhar or Mount Par Švan à tha in Bihār, Arbu da or Abu in Sirohi, G i r n a r in Surāshtra, and Chan

dragiri in the Himälayas. At these places we naturally expect the oldest Jaina remains, and, according to the Tapá Jaina Patávali, Jaina temples were first built in the year 882 Wirāta, or Samvat 412, A.D. 355. At Girn á r we have

probably their oldest existing remains, but none of them approach to this antiquity, and few anywhere date earlier than the eleventh or

leader of this gana (Ganádhipa) had long ago composed a máhātmya of Satruijaya in 100,000 pada ; and that Sudh arm ā, the leader of

Vira's gana, by his master's direction, made an abstract of it in 24,000 verses, from which Dhane švara, “the humiliator of the Bud

dhists, composed the present work.” + It is

a long panegyric in Sailskrit verse, extending to about 8700 lines, put into the mouth of Mahā vira, the last Tirthaikara, who, on his visiting Satru fijaya, is requested by Indra to relate the legend of the mountain sacred to Á din à th at Accordingly he proceeds not only to tell the strictly Jaina legends of the hill,

but interweaves with them long episodes of Brähmanic mythology, such as the history of

Satru iijaya or Satru fiji is a solitary

Rām a, the war of the Kurus and Pâ n da v as, and stories of Krish na, altering them as he pleases.

mountain lying to the south of the town of Pål it ān ā, and rising to nearly 2000 feet

no less than a hundred and eight names, and as

covered

many distinct šikharas or peaks, uniting it

with temples, and, from their extent and cele brity, they are perhaps second in interest to

with the sister-tirthas of Abu and Girna r, L

twelfth century of our era.

above the sea-level.

none elsewhere.

Its summit is

Like other tirthas it has its

māhātmya or legend; and the Šat r n iijaya Māhātmya, in glorification of the hill as a place

According to the Māhātmya, the hill boasts

many of them very low, if not quite invisible. Of its names, the following is a selection – Ša truñjay a-the etymology of which is thus given in the Māhātmya : “ Formerly there

of pilgrimage, claims to be the oldest Jaina document we possess, dating as far back as A.D. 420 according to some, and according to Weber, in A.D. 598.* It professes to have been com

lived in Chan drapura a cruel king named

posed by Dhane švara at Vala bhi, by

exposed in a cave in the forest.

command of Si là ditya, king of Sur à sh

attained the knowledge of his guilt. His gotrader; or family goddess, Ambikä, then appeared to him and advised him to go on pilgrimage to Satruijaya; and on the way he met a

tra.

But the author would have us believe

his authorities were of the remotest antiquity, for he begins by telling that, at the request of R is ha bh an ātha, Pu m darika, the

Kandu. Aroused by a voice from heaven, he went into the forest, and was there overcome by

the cow Sura bhi, bound by a Yaksha, and Thereby he

Mahāmuni, who taught him fully. Through

.*,Of course this date must depend on that of Mahā. vira's death, to which it professes to be 947 years sub.

ł Weber, Catr. Māhāt, p. 15.

sequent, or 477 after the era of Wikramārka,

f There is also a prose version of it.