वासवदत्ता (महाकवि सुबन्धु - श्लेष-प्रधान शास्त्रीय गद्यकाव्य सान्वय सटीक)

INTRODUCTION 39
substitution or omission, to avoid many difficulties of word,
phrase, or allusion which the 'northern' text boldly retains.
Manuscripts and Editions of the Romance. For the manu-
scripts of the Vāsavadattā and its commentators reference may
be made to the catalogues of Sanskrit manuscripts enumerated
by Aufrecht (Catalogus Catalogorum, 1. 566, 726; 2. 133–134,
224; 3. 120, Leipzig, 1891–1903). The principal commentators
on the Vāsavadattā have been discussed by Hall (Introd.,
pp. 44–48), and I myself have written on 'Śivarāma's Com-
mentary on the Vāsavadattā' (in JAOS. 24. 57–63), so that the
problems there treated need not be repeated in this place.
Although the editions of Subandhu's romance will be duly
listed in the bibliography (see below, pp. 197–198), a more detailed
discussion seems appropriate here. These editions are seven in
number. The first and best-known, which represents the
'northern' recension, is that of Fitzedward Hall (Calcutta, 1859),
based on eight manuscripts and accompanied by the gloss of
Śivarāma Tripāṭhin, who flourished early in the eighteenth
century. The introduction to this edition has become a classic
among Sanskritists, and the learning which it evinces on every
page renders it amply deserving of this honour. Hall's text, how-
ever, represents a form really older than any of his manuscripts,
being that of Śivarāma, in whose favour the editor repeatedly
discarded the united authority of all his manuscripts, a method of
textual criticism which may perhaps be considered open to objec-
tion. The text of Hall has been reprinted verbatim by Jīvānanda
Vidyāsāgara (Calcutta, 1874; 3d ed., 1907). The remaining five
editions belong to the 'southern' recension. Of these the earliest
is one in Telugu script (Madras, 1861), which was reprinted, with
a correction of misprints, in Telugu (Madras, 1862) and Grantha
script (Madras, 1870). The second of these, duly collated with
the India Office copies of the other two, which Mr. F. W. Thomas,
librarian of the India Office, London, most kindly placed at my
disposal, is transcribed below (pp. 145–195). The text of this
'southern' recension is evidently later than the 'northern', since
it abounds in interpolations, especially in the lengthened ślēṣas and