• Bālāvabodhana (Instruction of the young)
  බාලාවබොධන

Author:

• Mahākāśyapa, active 12th century

Contributor:

• Princeton University. Library. Manuscript. Indic Manuscript no. 57.

Publisher:

• [Sri Lanka], [between 1800 and 1850]

Extent:

• leaves : palm leaf ; 55 x 380 mm.

Format:

• Manuscript
• Book

Description:

• Ms.
• Layout: 7-8 lines per page.

Binding note:

• Wood covers painted in red, yellow, and black. Leaves stacked in the pothi format.

Subject:

• Sanskrit language—Grammar—Early works to 1800
• Manuscripts, Sanskrit—New Jersey—Princeton
• Wooden boards
• palm-leaf manuscripts

Provenance:

• AM 14627.

Edm rights:

• Copyright Not Evaluated

View in catalog:

• https://catalog.princeton.edu/catalog/99130898956706421

Curator's notes:

• Mahākassapa (=Mahākāśyapa) මහාකාශ්‍යප (floruit 12th century)

  Sanskrit, in Sinhala script
  Sri Lanka, first half 19th century?, palm leaves

  The text shown here is an unadorned palm leaf book, shown for its plainness. It comes from Sri Lanka, probably dates from the first half of the 19th century, and is a handbook for young students to learn Sanskrit, written by a 12th-century Buddhist reform council leader. The script is Sinhala (the Sanskrit and Pāli languages can be written with many different scripts.)

  Gift of Samuel Breckinridge Long, Class of 1904, 1952
  Princeton Indic Manuscripts IM 57

  For further reading

  Ciotti, Giovanni. “Strategies for binding pothi manuscripts.” In Tied and bound: a comparative view on manuscript binding, edited by Alessandro Bausi and Michael Friedrich, 155-190. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2023.

Exhibit category:

• The pothī tradition
• From palm leaves to loose paper bundles