User:Abecedare/Kannada literature

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[edit] Pre-classical period

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The earliest full length Kannada inscription is the Halmidi inscription, which is a Kadamba royal edict usually dated to the 5th century.^[1] The poetic Tamatekallu inscription has been identified by some scholars to be from the 5th century^[2][3] and the Siragunda inscription from 500 CE.^[4] However, according to a scholar, the earliest Kannada inscriptions date to no earlier than the late 6th century or the early 7th century.^[5] The Kappe Arabhatta record of the 7th century is the earliest surviving record that is considered an example of Kannada poetry by some scholars.^[6][7] The earliest surviving literary work, the Kavirajamarga ("Royal Path for Poets") is dated to 850 CE; references are made in it to earlier writers such as Vimalachandra (c. 777), Udaya and Nagarjuna, and to poets including Kavisvara, Ravi Kirti (634) and Lokapala.^{[2][8][9][10]} The Sanskritist and Indologist, Sheldon Pollock, has asserted that these authors may have been contemporaneous writers,^[11] and that the identification of some, like Durvinita and Nagarjuna, with earlier authors, is insupportable.^[12] Kavirajamarga also discusses earlier composition forms peculiar to Kannada, the gadyakatha, a mixture of prose and poetry, the chattana and the bedande, poems of several stanzas that were meant to be sung with the optional use of a musical instrument.^[13][14][15] Regarding earlier poems in Kannada, the author of Kavirajamarga states that old Kannada is appropriate in ancient poems but insipid in contemporaneous works.^[16]

Other writers, whose works not extant now but titles of which are known from independent references^[17] are Syamakundacharya (650), who authored the Prabhrita, and Srivaradhadeva (also called Tumubuluracharya, 650 or earlier), who wrote the Chudamani ("Crest Jewel"), a lengthy commentary on logic.^{[18][19][20][21]} The Karnatheshwara Katha, a eulogy of the Chalukya King Pulakesi II, is ascribed to the 7th or 8th century.^[22] The Gajashtaka, a lost ashtaka (eight line verse) composition, was authored by King Shivamara II in 800. The composition served as the basis for two popular folk songs, ovanige and onakevadu, which were sung either while pounding corn or to entice wild elephants into a pit (ovam).^[23][24]

Srivijaya, a court poet of Amoghavarsha I, wrote the Chandraprabha Purana in the 9th century.^[25] During the same period, the Digambara Jain poet Asaga (or Asoka) authored, among other writings, Karnata Kumarasambhava Kavya and Varadamana Charitra. His works have been praised by later poets, although none of his works are available today.^[26] Gunagankiyam, the earliest known prosody in Kannada, was referenced in a Tamil work dated to 10th century or earlier (Yapparungalakkarigai by Amritasagara). Gunanandi, an expert in logic, Kannada grammar and prose flourished in the 9th century.^[27][28] Around 900, Gunavarma I wrote Sudraka and Harivamsa (also known as Neminatha Purana). In Sudraka he compared his patron, Ganga king Ereganga Neetimarga II, to a noted king called Sudraka.^[24][29]

[edit] Notes