प्राचीन भारत में शिक्षा (डॉ. ए.एस. अल्तेकर - गुरुकुल एवं बौद्ध विहार शिक्षण इतिहास)

IV] EDUCATIONAL ORGANISATION AND FINANCE 97
Brahmanas and found a colony of theirs, endowing
villages to meet the expenses of the new settlers.
This was tantamount to founding a new college, for
these Brahmana colonies used to develop into famous
centres of education. Governments used also to grant
lands or pensions to most of the learned Brahmanas
that used to come to their courts. Liberality of kings
like Kanishka, Chandragupta II, Harsha and Bhoja
is well known to history and tradition¹. Scores of
copper-plate grants published so far show that kings
were generally in the habit of giving land grants
to learned and pious Brahmanas. These latter in
their turn used to offer free tuition and thus help the
cause of education. But for royal patronage poets and
authors like Kālidāsa, Bāṇa Bhavabhūti, Vākpati,
Rājaśekhara and Śrīharsha could not have done as
much literary work as they did. The tradition of
giving direct monetary help to learned Brahmanas
promoting the cause of education continued down to
Some of the kings, who had extended patronage to famous
scholars, may be mentioned here:—

1. Aśvaghosha and Charaka were the proteges of Kanishka.
   The Sātavāhanas of the Deccan were famous for their patronage of
   scholarship. Numerous are the stories still current of the liberality
   of Chandragupta Vikramāditya to men of letters. His successors
   Kumāragupta, Tathāgatagupta, Narasimhagupta and Budhagupta
   endowed a number of villages to Nālandā University. Emperor
   Harsha was not only a patron of letters, but himself a good poet and
   dramatist. Bhavabhūti and Vākapati belonged to the entourage of
   king Yaśovarman of Kanauj. King Mahendrapāla and Mahīpāla of the
   same city were the patrons of the famous dramatist Rājaśekhara.
   Kings Muñja, Sindhurāja and Bhoja of the Paramāra dynasty are
   subjects of numerous anecdotes illustrative of their love of learning.
   The last mentioned one was himself a great author. Vikramāditya VI
   of the Chālukya dynasty invited poet Bilhaṇa to his court from
   Kashmir and extended his patronage to Vijñāneśvara, whose
   Mitāksharā is still regarded as authoritative in law courts. Umāpati-
   deva, Dhoi, Govardhana and Jayadeva were living at the court of king
   Lakshmaṇasena of Bengal, Hemachandra at the court of king
   Kumārapāla of Gujarat and Śrīharsha, the author of Naishadha-
   charit, at the court of kings Vijayachandra and Jayachandra of Kanauj.
   7