DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.44481#0015
PREFACE.
xvii
Further, the abbreviations, which I have been compelled to
introduce, have been duly explained at the end of the book. The
figures following them usually refer in the case of dramas and
Kavyas to the Anka or Sarga and the verse, except when the
first figure is preceded by p. Of works like the Kavyaprakasa,
the pages and lines are quoted, except in a few cases, where Roman
figures have been used to denote the chapters.
The sign of interrogation [ ? J has been employed to indicate
doubtful words or passages, which it was not in my power to
restore with certainty. In some cases I have preferred printing
what I found in the MSS. instead of forcing upon the reader
unconvincing conjectures.
Additions of my own to what Mahendra gives, are generally
placed between brackets, or may be recognized by the letter c.
(compare).
As regards the spelling of words, I have generally followed
the Petersburg Dictionary. The orthography of my best MS. has,
however, sometimes been adhered to, especially in the case of
names of plants.
In the Various Readings at the end of the volume, I have
taken into account chiefly the MS. A, upon which the edition is
based. Of B, I have considered it sufficient to give only the more
important variations. A few conjectures and corrections, the
results of a thorough comparison of the printed text with the
MSS. have been added.
So long ago as 1881, the MS. A was transmitted to me from
India, and I at once resolved to edit it. But it turned out to
be insufficient, and no publisher or learned body could be found
to undertake the publication. Some of the results, however, which
I gathered from the perusal of the commentary, I published, as
opportunity offered, in several papers and reviews, and especially
in my Beitrage zur Indischen Lexicographie, Berlin 1883. For
general information I would refer to the latter book. At last, after
a second MS. had been discovered by Professor Peterson, I set to
work again towards the close of 1888 and finished the edition
early in 1891. The possibility of its publication was given when
the Imperial Academy of Vienna generously offered to defray the
xvii
Further, the abbreviations, which I have been compelled to
introduce, have been duly explained at the end of the book. The
figures following them usually refer in the case of dramas and
Kavyas to the Anka or Sarga and the verse, except when the
first figure is preceded by p. Of works like the Kavyaprakasa,
the pages and lines are quoted, except in a few cases, where Roman
figures have been used to denote the chapters.
The sign of interrogation [ ? J has been employed to indicate
doubtful words or passages, which it was not in my power to
restore with certainty. In some cases I have preferred printing
what I found in the MSS. instead of forcing upon the reader
unconvincing conjectures.
Additions of my own to what Mahendra gives, are generally
placed between brackets, or may be recognized by the letter c.
(compare).
As regards the spelling of words, I have generally followed
the Petersburg Dictionary. The orthography of my best MS. has,
however, sometimes been adhered to, especially in the case of
names of plants.
In the Various Readings at the end of the volume, I have
taken into account chiefly the MS. A, upon which the edition is
based. Of B, I have considered it sufficient to give only the more
important variations. A few conjectures and corrections, the
results of a thorough comparison of the printed text with the
MSS. have been added.
So long ago as 1881, the MS. A was transmitted to me from
India, and I at once resolved to edit it. But it turned out to
be insufficient, and no publisher or learned body could be found
to undertake the publication. Some of the results, however, which
I gathered from the perusal of the commentary, I published, as
opportunity offered, in several papers and reviews, and especially
in my Beitrage zur Indischen Lexicographie, Berlin 1883. For
general information I would refer to the latter book. At last, after
a second MS. had been discovered by Professor Peterson, I set to
work again towards the close of 1888 and finished the edition
early in 1891. The possibility of its publication was given when
the Imperial Academy of Vienna generously offered to defray the