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The Political Poetic of the Sena Court

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 March 2010

Jesse Ross Knutson
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Abstract

Through a study of the corpus of contemporary literary depictions of the early medieval/medieval king of Bengal, Lakṣmaṇasena, in the works of the royal literary salon, this essay defines a cluster of poetic elements inseparable from the monarch. It suggests that this official poetic projects its proximity to the contemporary Turkish invasion (ca. 1205 ce), and the attendant crisis and restructuring of the Sena state. Some idiosyncratic poems, however, evince a historical dynamic that is both distinct and inseparable from the official poetic: the proud assertion of a Sanskrit literary provincialism in the context of a shrinking and threatened state. By correlating a pattern of poetic representation with a discrete period and locality, the present inquiry brings into focus the mutually constitutive relationship between literary interpretation and political historical interpretation for the study of early South Asia. And by tracing what was relatively peculiar and singular to this literary world, it strives to erode established scholarly visions of the endless uniformity of premodern literary-political life.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 69 , Issue 2 , May 2010 , pp. 371 - 401
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2010

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References

List of References

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Jayadeva, . 1899. Gītagovindkāvyam (with the Rasikapriyā of Kumbhakarṇa and the Rasamañjarī of Śaṅkaramiśra). Ed. Telang, and Panshikar, . Bombay: Nirnayasagara Press.Google Scholar
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Kalhaṇa, . [1892] 1988. Rājataraṅgiṇī. Vol. 3. Ed. Stein, Aurel. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar
Majumdar, Nani Gopal, ed. and trans. 1929. Inscriptions of Bengal. Vol. 3. Rajshahi: Varendra Research Society.Google Scholar
Quellet, Henri. 1978. Le Gītagovinda de Jayadeva: Texte, Concordance, et Index. Hildesheim: Georges Olms Verlag.Google Scholar
Śārṅgadhara, . 1987. Śārṅgadharapaddhatiḥ. Ed. Peterson, Peter. Introduction by Satkari Mukhopadhyaya. Delhi: Chaukhamba Sanskrit Pratishtan.Google Scholar
Sircar, Sinesh Chandra. 1966. Indian Epigraphical Glossary. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar
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Chakrabarti, Kunal. 2001. Religious Process: The Purāṇas and the Making of a Regional Tradition. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Chattopadhyaya, Brajadulal. 1994. The Making of Early Medieval India. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Chattopadhyaya, Brajadulal. 1998. Representing the Other: Sanskrit Sources and the Muslims (Eighth to Fourteenth Century). New Delhi: Manohar.Google Scholar
Chowdury, Abdul Momin. 1967. Dynastic History of Bengal c. 750–1200 a.d. Dacca: Asiatic Society of Pakistan.Google Scholar
Eaton, Richard M. 1993. The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Ginzberg, Carlo. 1993. “Microhistory: Two or Three Things That I Know about It.” Trans. John, and Tedeschi, Anne C.. Critical Inquiry 20 (1): 10–35.Google Scholar
Gupta, Parameshwari Lal. 1976. “On the Date of the Horseman Type Coin of Muhammad Bin Sam.” Journal of the Numismatic Society of India 38:81–87.Google Scholar
Ingalls, Daniel H. H. 1954. “A Sanskrit Poetry of Village and Field: Yogeśvara and His Fellow Poets.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 74 (3): 119–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, Peter. 1999. The Delhi Sultanate: A Political and Military History. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jameson, Fredric. 1981. The Political Unconscious: Narrative as a Socially Symbolic Act. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Kosambi, Damodar Dharmanand. 2002. Combined Methods in Indology and Other Writings. Ed. Chattopadhyaya, Brajadulal. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Knutson, Jesse Ross. 2006. “Embedded Poets: The Birth of the Anthology and the Social Life of Sanskrit Kāvya.” Biblio: A Review of Books 11 (3–4): 23–23.Google Scholar
Majumdar, R. C. 1971. History of Ancient Bengal. Calcutta: Bharadwaj and Co.Google Scholar
Zedong, Mao. 1968. On Contradiction. Peking, Foreign Language Press.Google Scholar
Marx, Karl. 1964. Pre-Capitalist Economic Formations. Trans. Cohen, Jack, ed. Hobsbawm, Eric J., New York: International Publishers.Google Scholar
Minhāj, . 1970. Tabakāt-I Nāṣirī: A General History of the Muhammadan Dynasties of Asia Including Hindustan from A.H. 194 (810 a.d.) to A.H. 658 (1260 a.d.). Trans. Raverty, Major H. G.. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal.Google Scholar
Morrison, Barrie N. 1970. Political Centers and Cultural Regions in Early Bengal. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 1993. “Deep Orientalism? Notes on Sanskrit and Power Beyond the Raj.” In Orientalism and the Postcolonial Predicament: Perspectives on South Asia, ed. Breckenridge, Carol A and Van der Veer, Peter, 76–133. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 1998. “India in the Vernacular Millennium: Literary Culture and Polity, 1000–1500.” Daedalus 127 (3): 41–74.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 2000. “Cosmopolitan and Vernacular in History.” Public Culture 12 (3): 591–625.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 2001. “The Death of Sanskrit.” Comparative Studies in History and Society 43 (2): 392–426.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. ed. 2003. Literary Cultures in History: Reconstructions from South Asia. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 2006. The Language of the Gods in the World of Men: Sanskrit, Culture, and Power in Premodern India. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Salomon, Richard. 1998. Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Sharma, Ram Sharan. 1959. Aspects of Political Ideas and Institutions in Ancient India. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas.Google Scholar
Sharma, Ram Sharan. 1965. Indian Feudalism. Calcutta: University of Calcutta Press.Google Scholar
Talbot, Cynthia. 2001. Precolonial India in Practice: Society, Region, and Identity in Medieval Andhra. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Trautmann, Thomas R. 2006. “Civilizing the East: Analyzing the Case against Ancient Indian History.” Biblio: A Review of Books 11 (3–4): 18–21.Google Scholar
Tripathi, Ram Shankar. 1964. History of Kanauj to the Muslim Conquest. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas.Google Scholar
Vološinov, V. N. 1976. “Discourse in Life and Discourse in Art (Concerning Sociological Poetics).” In Freudianism: A Marxist Critique, trans. Titunik, I. R., ed. in collaboration Bruss, Neal H., 93–116. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Allahabad Posthumous Stone Pillar Inscription of Samudragupta. 1963. In Inscriptions of the Early Gupta Kings and their Successors, Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum Vol. III, ed. Faithful Fleet, John. Repr., Varanasi: Indological Book House.Google Scholar
Apte, Vaman Shivaram. 1998. The Practical Sanskrit–English Dictionary. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar
Bāṇa, . 1997. Harṣacarita. Ed. Kane, P. V.. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar
Bhavabhūti, . 2003. Uttararāmacarita. Ed. Kale, M. R.. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar
Dhoyī [or Dhoyika]. 1906. Pavanadūtam. Ed. Chakravarti, Chintaharan. Calcutta: Sanskrit Sahitya Parisat.Google Scholar
Dhoyī [or Dhoyika]. 1938. Pavanadūtam. Ed. and trans. Chandra Sharma, Umesh and Chandra Sharma, Girish. Aligarh: Aligarh Muslim University.Google Scholar
Govardhana, . 1972. Āryāsaptaśatī o Gauḍabaṅga [Sanskrit text with Bengali translation]. Trans. Kumar Chakrabarty, Shri Jahnavi. Kolkata: Shirabindranath Sanyal.Google Scholar
Govardhana, . 1988. Āryāsaptaśatī. Ed. Pandit Durgaprasad, Kasinath Pandurang Parab, and Vasudev Laxman Sastri Pansikar. Commentary by AnantaDelhi: Nag Publishers.Google Scholar
Halāyudhamiśra, . 1963. Sekaśubhodayā. Ed. and trans. Sen, Sukumar. Kolkata: Asiatic Society.Google Scholar
Jagannātha, . 1888. The Rasagaṅgādhara. Ed. Durgaprasad, Pandit and Parab, Kashinath. Commentary by Nāgeśa Bhaṭṭa. Bombay: Nirnayasagara Press.Google Scholar
Jagannātha, . 1925. Gaṅgālaharī. Ed. Sharma, Vasudeva. Bombay: Nirnayasagara Press.Google Scholar
Jagannātha, . 1935. Bhāminīvilāsa. Ed. and trans. Dutt Sharma, Har. Pune: Oriental Book House.Google Scholar
Jayadeva, . 1899. Gītagovindkāvyam (with the Rasikapriyā of Kumbhakarṇa and the Rasamañjarī of Śaṅkaramiśra). Ed. Telang, and Panshikar, . Bombay: Nirnayasagara Press.Google Scholar
Jayadeva, . 1965. Gītagovinda (with King Mānāṅka's Commentary). Ed. Kulkarni, V. M.. Ahmedabad: Bharatiya Sanskriti Vidyamandira.Google Scholar
Jayadeva, . 1977. Love Song of the Dark Lord: Jayadeva's Gītagovinda (with Sanskrit text). Ed. and trans. Stoler Miller, Barbara. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Kalhaṇa, . [1892] 1988. Rājataraṅgiṇī. Vol. 3. Ed. Stein, Aurel. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar
Majumdar, Nani Gopal, ed. and trans. 1929. Inscriptions of Bengal. Vol. 3. Rajshahi: Varendra Research Society.Google Scholar
Quellet, Henri. 1978. Le Gītagovinda de Jayadeva: Texte, Concordance, et Index. Hildesheim: Georges Olms Verlag.Google Scholar
Śārṅgadhara, . 1987. Śārṅgadharapaddhatiḥ. Ed. Peterson, Peter. Introduction by Satkari Mukhopadhyaya. Delhi: Chaukhamba Sanskrit Pratishtan.Google Scholar
Sircar, Sinesh Chandra. 1966. Indian Epigraphical Glossary. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar
Śrīdharadāsa, . 1965. Saduktikarṇāmṛta. Ed. Chandra Banerji, Suresh. Calcutta: Firma K.L. Mukhopadhyay.Google Scholar
Vidyākara, . 1957. Subhāṣitaratnakoṣa. Ed. Kosambi, D. D. and Gokhale, V. V.. Introduction by D. D. Kosambi. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Viśveśvara, Pārvatīya Śrī Paṇḍit. 1924–25. Āryāsaptaśatī (with commentary by the author). Benares: Chaukhamba Sanskrit Series.Google Scholar
Ali, Daud. 2000. “Royal Eulogy as World History: Rethinking Copper-Plate Inscriptions in Cola India.” In Querying the Medieval: Texts and the History of Practices in South Asia, by Inden, Ronald, Walters, Jonathan, and Ali, Daud, 165–229. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Ali, Daud. 2004. Courtly Culture and Political life in Early Medieval India. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Althusser, Louis. 1965. Pour Marx. Paris: Maspero.Google Scholar
Bloch, Marc. [1939] 1989. La société féodale I. Paris: Albin Michel.Google Scholar
Bronner, Yigal, and Shulman, David. 2006. “‘A Cloud Turned Goose’: Sanskrit in the Vernacular Millennium.” Indian Economic and Social History Review 43 (1): 1–30.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chakrabarti, Kunal. 2001. Religious Process: The Purāṇas and the Making of a Regional Tradition. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Chattopadhyaya, Brajadulal. 1994. The Making of Early Medieval India. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Chattopadhyaya, Brajadulal. 1998. Representing the Other: Sanskrit Sources and the Muslims (Eighth to Fourteenth Century). New Delhi: Manohar.Google Scholar
Chowdury, Abdul Momin. 1967. Dynastic History of Bengal c. 750–1200 a.d. Dacca: Asiatic Society of Pakistan.Google Scholar
Eaton, Richard M. 1993. The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Ginzberg, Carlo. 1993. “Microhistory: Two or Three Things That I Know about It.” Trans. John, and Tedeschi, Anne C.. Critical Inquiry 20 (1): 10–35.Google Scholar
Gupta, Parameshwari Lal. 1976. “On the Date of the Horseman Type Coin of Muhammad Bin Sam.” Journal of the Numismatic Society of India 38:81–87.Google Scholar
Ingalls, Daniel H. H. 1954. “A Sanskrit Poetry of Village and Field: Yogeśvara and His Fellow Poets.” Journal of the American Oriental Society 74 (3): 119–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, Peter. 1999. The Delhi Sultanate: A Political and Military History. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jameson, Fredric. 1981. The Political Unconscious: Narrative as a Socially Symbolic Act. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Kosambi, Damodar Dharmanand. 2002. Combined Methods in Indology and Other Writings. Ed. Chattopadhyaya, Brajadulal. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Knutson, Jesse Ross. 2006. “Embedded Poets: The Birth of the Anthology and the Social Life of Sanskrit Kāvya.” Biblio: A Review of Books 11 (3–4): 23–23.Google Scholar
Majumdar, R. C. 1971. History of Ancient Bengal. Calcutta: Bharadwaj and Co.Google Scholar
Zedong, Mao. 1968. On Contradiction. Peking, Foreign Language Press.Google Scholar
Marx, Karl. 1964. Pre-Capitalist Economic Formations. Trans. Cohen, Jack, ed. Hobsbawm, Eric J., New York: International Publishers.Google Scholar
Minhāj, . 1970. Tabakāt-I Nāṣirī: A General History of the Muhammadan Dynasties of Asia Including Hindustan from A.H. 194 (810 a.d.) to A.H. 658 (1260 a.d.). Trans. Raverty, Major H. G.. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal.Google Scholar
Morrison, Barrie N. 1970. Political Centers and Cultural Regions in Early Bengal. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 1993. “Deep Orientalism? Notes on Sanskrit and Power Beyond the Raj.” In Orientalism and the Postcolonial Predicament: Perspectives on South Asia, ed. Breckenridge, Carol A and Van der Veer, Peter, 76–133. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 1998. “India in the Vernacular Millennium: Literary Culture and Polity, 1000–1500.” Daedalus 127 (3): 41–74.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 2000. “Cosmopolitan and Vernacular in History.” Public Culture 12 (3): 591–625.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 2001. “The Death of Sanskrit.” Comparative Studies in History and Society 43 (2): 392–426.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. ed. 2003. Literary Cultures in History: Reconstructions from South Asia. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Pollock, Sheldon. 2006. The Language of the Gods in the World of Men: Sanskrit, Culture, and Power in Premodern India. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, Berkeley.Google Scholar
Salomon, Richard. 1998. Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Sharma, Ram Sharan. 1959. Aspects of Political Ideas and Institutions in Ancient India. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas.Google Scholar
Sharma, Ram Sharan. 1965. Indian Feudalism. Calcutta: University of Calcutta Press.Google Scholar
Talbot, Cynthia. 2001. Precolonial India in Practice: Society, Region, and Identity in Medieval Andhra. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Trautmann, Thomas R. 2006. “Civilizing the East: Analyzing the Case against Ancient Indian History.” Biblio: A Review of Books 11 (3–4): 18–21.Google Scholar
Tripathi, Ram Shankar. 1964. History of Kanauj to the Muslim Conquest. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas.Google Scholar
Vološinov, V. N. 1976. “Discourse in Life and Discourse in Art (Concerning Sociological Poetics).” In Freudianism: A Marxist Critique, trans. Titunik, I. R., ed. in collaboration Bruss, Neal H., 93–116. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar