A catalogue of the Telugu books in the library of the British Museum, completed by L. D. Barnett. Printed by order of the Trustees

1912·16.1 MB·English

by  British Museum. Dept. of Oriental Printed Books and Manuscripts

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CATALOGUE
A
OF THE
TELUGU BOOKS
IN THE
LIBEAKY
OF THE
MUSEUM
BEITISH
COMPILED BY
L. 1). BARNETT, M.A., Litt.D.
KEEPER OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ORIENTAL PRINTED BOOKS AND MSS.
PRINTED BY OBDER OF THE TRUSTEES
UoiiDon
SOLD AT THE BRITISH MUSEUM;
AND BY
Messrs. LONGMANS & CO., 39, Paternoster Kow Mr. liKRXAKD QUARITCH, 11, (Jrafton Street,
;
Nbw ?.onu Street, \V. Mes.srs. ASHER & CO., 14, JJedford Street, Covent Garden: and
;
3Ir. henry FROWDE, Oxford University Press Warehouse, Amen Corner.
1912
[All rights reserved.]
LONDilN
:
PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWKi AND SONS, LIMITED,
BUKR STUEKT, STAMFORDSTREET, S.E., AND OIIKAT WINDMILL STREET,
J,
PEEFACE.
Ix the great family of Dravidiau languages, the mother-tougues of some fifty-seven
millions of men, covering the whole of Southern India and Northern Ceylon, northwards
appearing in smaller scattered areas, and lastly represented after an interval of hundreds
of mUes on the west by the isolated Brahui of Baluchistan, numerically the most important
is the Andhra or Telugu, spoken by about twenty millions.
The origin of the word telugu or tenugu is rather obscure, and both forms seem
ancient. The most reasonable derivation, however, is from ten, " south," so that tenugu
would mean " southern "; and this may well have become corrupted into telugu, especially
as a popular etymology from teli, " bright," was ready to hand.*
" The Telugu country is bounded towards the east by the Bay of Bengal from about
Barwa in the Ganjam District in the north to near Madras in the south. From Barwa
the frontier line goes westwards through Ganjam to the Eastern Ghats, and then south-
westwards, crosses the Sabari on the border of the Sunkam and Bijji Talukas in the
Bastar State, and thence runs along the range of the Bela Dila to the Indravati. It
follows that river to its confluence with the Godavari, and then runs through Chanda,
cutting off the southern part of that district, and farther eastwards, including the southern
border of the district of Wun. It then turns southwards to the Godavari, at its confluence
with the Manjira, and thence farther south, towards Bidar, where Telugu meets with
Kanarese. The frontier line between the two forms of speech then runs almost due south
• The pandits' derivations from Sanskrit Trilihija ("land of the Three Liiigas") or Telugu tine (honey)
also deserve mention.
PREFACE.
ly
through the dominions of the Nizam. The Telugu country further occupies the north-
eastern edge of Bellary, the greater, eastern, part of Anantapur, and the eastern corner
of Mysore. Through North Arcot and Chingleput the border line thence runs back to
*
the sea."
The extant Telugu literature may be said to begin with Nannaya Bhattu,f a Vaidika
brahman of the Mudgala-gotra, who was a poet at the court of the Chalukya Raja-narendra
or Vishnu-vardhana, son of Vimaladitya. Raja-narendra was king of the Vengi-nadu, the
old Telugu country,! and reigned in Rajahmundry. Under his patronage, early in the
eleventh century, Nannaya, with the aid of a certain Narayana Bhattu, composed a poetical
Telugu version of the first three books of the Sanskrit Maha-bharata, which was supple-
mented some two centuries later by Tikkana Soma-yoji, who added a version of the greater
part of the remaining books. This "Andhra-bharata " of Nannaya and Tikkana remains
to the present day the chief classic of Telugu literature ; and in the same way Nannaya's
Andhra-sabda-chintiimani has been the basis of all subsequent works on Telugu grammar
and stylistic.
Nannaya's successors have left numerous works behind them. Among the poets
of the earlier period (circa 1000-1450 a.d.) whose poems are catalogued in the following
pages are Tikkana, Erra Pregada, Rauga-nathudu, Bhaskarudu, Ketana, and indeed nearly
all the most brilliant writers who have survived. An Augustan age may be said to begin
in the middle of the 15th century, under the patronage of Krishna-deva Raya of Vijaya-
nagar. From that date the number of poets and writers on various subjects began to
increase, and is still increasing, with notable rapidity.§
• LinguisHc Survey of India, vol. iv., p. 577.
f Naturally Nannaya was not the first finished poet in Andhra speech. But until recently no earlier
poems seem to have been generally known to exist. In 1909, however, M. Rfima-krishria Kavi has published
as no. 2 of the "Forgotten Poets" Series a Kumara-sambhavamu purporting to be by Nanne Choda-deva
Tehkanaditya, son of Choda-balli, king of Oravfiru (Trichinopoly) and the editor on his English title-page
;
gives the year of his death as A.D. 940, while in his preface he states that he fell in battle against the
We.stern Chalukyas in Saka 940.
t This region covers about 8,000 square miles, and is bounded on the east by the Bay of Bengal, on
the north by the river Godavarl, and on the south by the Krishna (Kistna). The ruins of its ancient capital,
Veugi, exist some eight miles north of Ellore.
§ It is interesting now to contrast present conditions with the words of the late Mr. C. P. Brown on
p. 25 of hLs privately printed "Literary Life" (1872). He writes: "When I began these tasks, Telugu
literature was dying out, the flame was just glimmering in the socket. The Madras College founded in
1813 preserved a little spark, but the pandits expressed to me their grief, that tlie ruling powers regarded
them as useless pensioners. The ancient Telugu classics were in a deplorable state; like that of Greek and
Latin authors before the invention of printing; but a revision made in my house, grounded on a collation
of manuscripte, has successfully reproduced the leading Telugu poems in a pure and complete state."
PREFACE.
le following is the scheme of transliteration which has been adopted :—-
es a z> ^ f/ia, «/ 6 ta ccsb .'/«
e (7 i 6 ^ cA/ia, .«/(a f t/ia « >Yi
^ m
£? i ati 2) ja, za & da ca
•^i I o in {Sv jha, zha 4S dha o /a
A U s h af va (^ na r /"
at U r ka Ao 1." s pa s fa
wco »v' 4^ klia «• tha ? plia r sa
axxy ri «" (ja fi da ?o ha Si filia
oi <? 1" (jha <^ dha *' l>h,i ?5 sa
a e" 25 na n n<i ;&. ma si' ha
S3 rtJ
Lastly I have to express my sincere thanks to Messrs. T. H. Darlow and H. F. Moule,
who kindly aided me in the article " Bible " by lending me an advance-sheet from their
monumental " Historical Catalogue of the Printed Editions of Holy Scripture in the
Library of the British and Foreign Bible Society."
L. D. BARNETT.
British Museum,
January 29, 1912.
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