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After Pargiter Kirfel especially has pushed on the textual criticism of the Purāṇas. He collated carefully the so-called central part of certain Purāṇas (B-H, Bḍ-Vā, Mt-P, Ga, Vi, A, Li, Kū, Vā, Mr). This part may be called the “world's history” of the Vaiṣṇavas, containing the famous “five topics” of every Purāṇa: the creation, the creation in detail, the lines of the first beings, the world's ages, the lines of the heroes. Kirfel discovered that the oldest version of this text is preserved in the nearly identical recensions of H-B, but he did not go on to the end. (1) He could not identify the chapters of his text with the five topics, (2) he did not always follow the readings of H-B (cf. § 8), (3) he did not ask if H or B has the older text, and (4) if the source of H-B is still extant. Reading the story of Kṛṣṇa in the Mbh, H, and B, I gathered some other material useful for this problem, which is of some importance for the history of Indian religion and literature. If we consider that according to Indian tradition H is purely a supplement to the Mbh, then the question arises: Has H borrowed this world's history (vaṁśa) from B, and was this text originally an independent one still preserved in B, or had B taken the text from H ? The main point of this paper is that B has borrowed from H, and that H really is a supplement to and an imitation of the Mbh.
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References
page 248 note 1 Cf. Kirfel, 539,18. He reads yathā instead of purā in H, but the reading purā in H is confirmed by B and Nil.
page 249 note 1 879* = Kirfel, 18, lab. Kirfel, 18, 1cd, is similar to Mbh., ibid., 20cd.
page 249 note 2 H (Kirfel, 161, 48; cf. infra §3) refers in a similar way to Mbh, i, 60, 9. In this case B instead of pūrvam reads asmābhiḥ. Here, too, B depends on, and rectifies, H, and H depends on the Mbh. In Bḍ-Vā this pūrvam may refer to Kirfel, 67, 62.
page 249 note 3 Hopkins, , Epic Mythology (1915), § 139Google Scholar, has compared Rām., iii, 14, with this part of the Ādiparvan.
page 249 note 4 Hopkins, op. cit., pp. 189 sqq.
page 250 note 1 Mbh, i, 70, 8 = Kirfel, 150, 45. B and H have modified its line cd, but A, Bḍ-Vā, Vi, have retained the old reading to be assumed for the original H.
page 250 note 2 Mbh, 18–19 are also missing in some MSS. of the Mbh. The mistake may have been caused by the word pratyūṣa at the beginning of 17c and 19c.
page 251 note 1 It might therefore be reasonable, for instance, in Mbh, 246, to prefer manojava of some valuable Northern MSS. in accordance with H-B and Bḍ-Vā. The archetype of the vaṁśa in the original H is to be restored with the help of Bḍ-Vā, wherever these Purāṇas conform with the Mbh. But because the testimony of the Mbh can only be used very seldom, one has to follow H-B in the main line instead of Bḍ-Vā. According to this material Bḍ-Vā must have come down from H some time before its vaṁśa became deteriorated and became the source of B (cf. § 8).
page 251 note 2 Cf. the similar chapter in H, 220.
page 252 note 1 Either by a later one, or by the original author or compiler of B.
page 253 note 1 Blau, , ZDMG., 62, 1908Google Scholar, 337 sqq.
page 253 note 2 Mārttāṇḍa is Vivasvān according to H-B; Mārttāṇḍa is missing in Mbh, i, 90, 7.
page 254 note 1 As regards the Bhārgavas, cf. Sukthankar, , Epic Studies, VI, Annals of the Bhandarkar ORI, xviii, 1Google Scholar sqq. In H, 53, 74, there occurs the difference between the lines of the Vṛṣṇi, Kuru, and Pañcāla races.
page 256 note 1 The same facts might also be arranged in another lesa probable line of development thus: H may have accepted the duplicate (26, 10 sqq., with the reading of Kirfel, 48a and 2b, 9) not from Bḍ-Vā, but from an unknown source. Just the same may have occurred with regard to the stories of Urvaśī and Soma. Then these versions must be old ones and B must have shortened the text.
page 256 note 2 In this place H-Bḍ-Vā insert six ślokas (Kirfel, 381, 96–101) missing in B (cf. § 10) and praising the greatness of the Brahmins and Bṛhaspati. In the same way the episode of Dhanvantari (Kirfel, 372, 8–22) and of the cursing of Benares (Kirfel, 372, 30–63) may be additions of H-Bḍ-Vā. Kirfel has arranged the ślokas in the line of Bḍ-Vā, but it is better to follow H.