Panchatantra
The
Panchatantra (IAST:
Pañcatantra, Sanskrit:
पञ्चतन्त्र, "Five Treatises") is an ancient Indian
collection of interrelated animal
fables in Sanskrit verse and prose, arranged within a frame
story.[2] The surviving work is dated to roughly 200 BCE, based on
older oral tradition.[3][4] The text's author is unknown, but has been attributed to Vishnusharma in some recensions and Vasubhaga in others, both of which may be pen names.[3] It is classical literature in a Hindu
text,[3][5] and based on older oral traditions with "animal fables
that are as old as we are able to imagine".[6]
It
is "certainly the most frequently translated literary product of
India",[7]
and these stories are among the most widely known in the world.[8] It goes by many names in many cultures. There is a version
of Panchatantra in nearly every major language of India, and in addition
there are 200 versions of the text in more than 50 languages around the world.[9] One version reached Europe in the 11th century.[2] To quote Edgerton
(1924):[10]
...before
1600 it existed in Greek,
Latin, Spanish, Italian, German, English, Old Slavonic, Czech, and perhaps other Slavonic
languages. Its range has extended from Java
to Iceland... [In India,] it has been worked over and over again, expanded,
abstracted, turned into verse, retold in prose, translated into medieval and
modern vernaculars, and retranslated into Sanskrit. And most of the stories
contained in it have "gone down" into the folklore of the
story-loving Hindus, whence they reappear in the collections of oral tales
gathered by modern students of folk-stories.
The
earliest known translation into a non-Indian language is in Middle
Persian (Pahlavi, 550 CE) by Burzoe.[2][9] This became the basis for a Syriac translation as Kalilag and Damnag[11]
and a translation into Arabic in 750 CE by Persian scholar Abdullah
Ibn al-Muqaffa as Kalīlah wa Dimnah.[12] A New
Persian version by Rudaki in the 12th century became known as Kalīleh o Demneh[13]
and this was the basis of Kashefi's 15th-century Anvār-i Suhaylī (The
Lights of Canopus),[14] which in turn was translated into Humayun-namah in
Turkish.[2] The book is also known as The Fables of Bidpai (or Pilpai
in various European languages, Vidyapati in Sanskrit) or The Morall
Philosophie of Doni (English, 1570).[15][16][2] Most European versions of the text are derivative works of
the 12th-century Hebrew version of Panchatantra by Rabbi Joel.[2] In Germany, its translation in 1480 by Anton von Pforr
has been widely read.[17] Several versions of the text are also found in Indonesia,
where it is titled as Tantri Kamandaka, Tantravakya or Candapingala
and consists of 360 fables.[2][18] In Laos, a version is called Nandaka-prakarana,
while in Thailand it has been referred to as Nang Tantrai.[18][19][20]
Author and chronology
The
prelude section of the Panchatantra identifies an octogenarian Brahmin named Vishnusharma (IAST: Viṣṇuśarman) as its author.[3][17] He is stated to be teaching the principles of good
government to three princes of Amarasakti. It is unclear, states Patrick
Olivelle, a professor of Sanskrit and Indian
religions, if Vishnusharma was a real person or himself a literary invention.
Some South Indian recensions of the text, as well as Southeast Asian versions
of Panchatantra attribute the text to Vasubhaga, states Olivelle.[3] Based on the content and mention of the same name in other
texts dated to ancient and medieval era centuries, most scholars agree that
Vishnusharma is a fictitious name. Olivelle and other scholars state that
regardless of who the author was, it is likely "the author was a Hindu,
and not a Buddhist, nor Jain", but it is unlikely that the author was a
devotee of Hindu god Vishnu
because the text neither expresses any sentiments against other Hindu deities
such as Shiva, Indra
and others, nor does it avoid invoking them with reverence.[21][22]
Various
locations where the text was composed have been proposed but this has been
controversial. Some of the proposed locations include Kashmir, Southwestern or South India.[3] The text's original language was likely Sanskrit. Though
the text is now known as Panchatantra, the title found in old manuscript
versions varies regionally, and includes names such as Tantrakhyayika, Panchakhyanaka,
Panchakhyana and Tantropakhyana. The suffix akhyayika and akhyanaka
mean "little story" or "little story book" in Sanskrit.[23]
The
text was translated into Pahlavi in 550 CE, which forms the latest limit of the text's
existence. The earliest limit is uncertain. It quotes identical verses from Arthasastra,
which is broadly accepted to have been completed by the early centuries of the
common era. According to Olivelle, "the current scholarly consensus places
the Panchatantra around 300 BCE, although we should remind ourselves
that this is only an educated guess".[3] The text quotes from older genre of Indian literature, and
legends with anthropomorphic animals are found in more ancient texts dated to
the early centuries of the 1st millennium BCE such as the chapter 4.1 of the Chandogya Upanishad.[24] According to Gillian Adams, Panchatantra may be a product
of the Vedic period,
but its age cannot be ascertained with confidence because "the original
Sanskrit version has been lost".[25]
Content
What
is learning whose attaining,
Sees no passion wane, no reigning
Love and self-control?
Does not make the mind a menial,
Finds in virtue no congenial
Path and final goal?
Whose attaining is but straining
For a name, and never gaining
Fame or peace of soul?
Sees no passion wane, no reigning
Love and self-control?
Does not make the mind a menial,
Finds in virtue no congenial
Path and final goal?
Whose attaining is but straining
For a name, and never gaining
Fame or peace of soul?
The
Panchatantra is a series of inter-woven fables, many of which deploy
metaphors of anthropomorphized
animals with human virtues and vices.[27] According to its own narrative, it illustrates, for the
benefit of three ignorant princes, the central Hindu principles of nīti.[28] While nīti is hard to translate, it roughly means
prudent worldly conduct, or "the wise conduct of life".[29]
Apart
from a short introduction, it consists of five parts. Each part contains a main
story, called the frame story,
which in turn contains several stories "emboxed" in it, as one
character narrates a story to another. Often these stories contain further
emboxed stories.[30][31] The stories thus operate like a succession of Russian
dolls, one narrative opening within another, sometimes three or four deep. Besides the stories, the
characters also quote various epigrammatic verses to make their point.[32]
Book 1: Mitra-bheda
If
loving kindness be not shown,
to friends and souls in pain,
to teachers, servants, and one's self,
what use in life, what gain?
to friends and souls in pain,
to teachers, servants, and one's self,
what use in life, what gain?
The
first treatise features a jackal named Damanaka, as the unemployed minister in
a kingdom ruled by a lion. He, along with his moralizing sidekick named
Karataka, conspire to break up alliances and friendships of the lion king. A
series of fables describe the conspiracies and causes that lead to close and
inseparable friends breaking up.[36]
The
Book 1 contains over thirty fables, with the version Arthur Ryder translated
containing 34: The Loss of Friends, The Wedge-Pulling Monkey, The Jackal and
the War-Drum, Merchant Strong-Tooth, Godly and June, The Jackal at the
Ram-Fight, The Weaver's Wife, How the Crow-Hen Killed the Black Snake, The
Heron that Liked Crab-Meat, Numskull and the Rabbit, The Weaver Who Loved a
Princess, The Ungrateful Man, Leap and Creep, The Blue Jackal, Passion and the
Owl, Ugly's Trust Abused, The Lion and the Carpenter, The Plover Who Fought the
Ocean, Shell-Neck Slim and Grim, Forethought Readywit and Fatalist, The Duel
Between Elephant and Sparrow, The Shrewd Old Gander, The Lion and the Ram,
Smart the Jackal, The Monk Who Left His Body Behind, The Girl Who Married a
Snake, Poor Blossom, The Unteachable Monkey, Right-Mind and Wrong-Mind, A
Remedy Worse than the Disease, The Mice That Ate Iron, The Results of
Education, The Sensible Enemy, The Foolish Friend.[33]
Book 2: Mitra-samprāpti
The
second treatise is quite different in structure than the remaining books,
states Olivelle, as it does not truly embox fables. It is a collection of
adventures of four characters: a crow (scavenger, not a predator, airborne
habits), a mouse (tiny, underground habits), a turtle (slow, water habits) and
a deer (a grazing animal viewed by other animals as prey, land habits). The
overall focus of the book is the reverse of the first book. Its theme is to
emphasize the importance of friendships, team work, and alliances. It teaches,
"weak animals with very different skills, working together can accomplish
what they cannot when they work alone", according to Olivelle.[38] United through their cooperation and in their mutual
support, the fables describe how they are able to outwit all external threats
and prosper.[38]
The
second book contains ten fables: The Winning of Friends, The Bharunda Birds,
Gold's Gloom, Mother Shandilee's Bargain, Self-defeating Forethought, Mister
Duly, Soft, the Weaver, Hang-Ball and Greedy, The Mice That Set Elephant Free,
Spot's Captivity.[33]
Book 3: Kākolūkīyam
The
third treatise discusses war and peace, presenting through animal characters a
moral about the battle of wits being a strategic means to neutralize a vastly
superior opponent's army. The thesis in this treatise is that a battle of wits
is a more potent force than a battle of swords.[39] The choice of animals embeds a metaphor of a war between good
versus evil, and light versus darkness. Crows
are good, weaker and smaller in number and are creatures of the day (light),
while owls are presented as evil, numerous and stronger creatures of the night
(darkness).[39] The crow king listens to the witty and wise counsel of
Ciramjivin, while the owl king ignores the counsel of Raktaksa. The good crows
win.[39]
The
fables in the third book, as well as others, do not strictly limit to matters
of war and peace. Some present fables that demonstrate how different characters
have different needs and motives, which is subjectively rational from each
character's viewpoint, and that addressing these needs can empower peaceful
relationships even if they start off in a different way.[39] For example, in the fable The Old Man the Young Wife,
the text relates a story wherein an old man marries a young woman from a
penniless family.[40] The young woman detests his appearance so much that she
refuses to even look at him let alone consummate their marriage.[41] One night, while she sleeps in the same bed with her back
facing the old man, a thief enters their house. She is scared, turns over, and
for security embraces the man. This thrills every limb of the old man. He feels
grateful to the thief for making his young wife hold him at last. The aged man
rises and profusely thanks the thief, requesting the intruder to take whatever
he desires.[40][41][42]
The
third book contains eighteen fables in Ryder translation: Crows and Owls, How
the Birds Picked a King, How the Rabbit Fooled the Elephant, The Cat's
Judgment, The Brahmin's Goat, The Snake and the Ants, The Snake Who Paid Cash,
The Unsocial Swans, The Self-sacrificing Dove, The Old Man with the Young Wife,
The Brahmin the Thief and the Ghost, The Snake in the Prince's Belly, The
Gullible Carpenter, Mouse-Maid Made Mouse, The Bird with Golden Dung, The Cave
That Talked, The Frog That Rode Snakeback, The Butter-blinded Brahmin.[33]
Book 4: Labdhapraṇāśam
The
book four of the Panchatantra is a simpler compilation of ancient
moral-filled fables. These, states Olivelle, teach messages such as "a
bird in hand is worth two in the bush".[43] They caution the reader to avoid succumbing to peer
pressure and cunning intent wrapped in soothing words. The book is different
from the first three, in that the earlier books give positive examples of
ethical behavior offering examples and actions "to do". In contrast,
book four presents negative examples with consequences, offering examples and
actions "to avoid, to watch out for".[43]
The
fourth book contains thirteen fables in Ryder translation: Loss of Gains, The
Monkey and the Crocodile, Handsome and Theodore, Flop-Ear and Dusty, The Potter
Militant, The Jackal Who Killed No Elephants, The Ungrateful Wife, King Joy and
Secretary Splendor, The Ass in the Tiger-Skin, The Farmer's Wife, The Pert
Hen-Sparrow, How Supersmart Ate the Elephant, The Dog Who Went Abroad.[33]
Book
4, along with Book 5, is very short. Together the last two books constitute
about 7% of the total text.[31]
Book 5: Aparīkṣitakārakaṃ
The
book five of the text is, like book four, a simpler compilation of moral-filled
fables. These also present negative examples with consequences, offering
examples and actions for the reader to ponder over, avoid, to watch out for.
The messages in this last book include those such as "get facts, be
patient, don't act in haste then regret later", "don't build castles
in the air".[45] The book five is also unusual in that almost all its
characters are humans, unlike the first four where the characters are
predominantly anthropomorphized animals. According to Olivelle, this may be by
design where the text's ancient author sought to bring the reader out of the
fantasy world of talking and pondering animals into the realities of the human
world.[45]
The
fifth book contains twelve fables about hasty actions or jumping to conclusions
without establishing facts and proper due diligence. In Ryder translation, they
are: Ill-considered Action, The Loyal Mungoose, The Four Treasure-Seekers, The
Lion-Makers, Hundred-Wit Thousand-Wit and Single-Wit, The Musical Donkey, Slow
the Weaver, The Brahman's Dream, The Unforgiving Monkey, The Credulous Fiend,
The Three-Breasted Princess, The Fiend Who Washed His Feet.[33]
One
of the fables in this book is the story about a woman and a mongoose. She leaves her child with a mongoose friend. When she returns, she sees blood on the mongoose's
mouth, and kills the friend, believing the animal killed her child. The woman
discovers her child alive, and learns that the blood on the mongoose mouth came
from it biting the snake while defending her child from the snake's attack. She
regrets having killed the friend because of her hasty action.
Links with other fables
The
fables of Panchatantra are found in numerous world languages. It is also
considered partly the origin of European secondary works, such as folk tale
motifs found in Boccaccio,
La Fontaine
and the works of Grimm Brothers.[46][47] For a while, this had led to the hypothesis that popular
worldwide animal-based fables had origins in India and the Middle East.[46] According to Max Muller,
Sanskrit
literature is very rich in fables and stories; no other literature can vie with
it in that respect; nay, it is extremely likely that fables, in particular
animal fables, had their principal source in India.
This
monocausal hypothesis has now been generally discarded in favor of polygenetic
hypothesis which states that fable motifs had independent origins in many
ancient human cultures, some of which have common roots and some influenced by
co-sharing of fables. The shared fables implied morals that appealed to
communities separated by large distances and these fables were therefore
retained, transmitted over human generations with local variations.[46][49] However, many post-medieval era authors explicitly credit
their inspirations to texts such as "Bidpai" and "Pilpay, the
Indian sage" that are known to be based on the Panchatantra.[48]
According
to Niklas Bengtsson, even though India being the exclusive original source of
fables is no longer taken seriously, the ancient classic Panchatantra,
"which new folklore research continues to illuminate, was certainly the
first work ever written down for children, and this in itself means that the
Indian influence has been enormous [on world literature], not only on the
genres of fables and fairy tales, but on those genres as taken up in children's
literature".[50] According to Adams and Bottigheimer, the fables of Panchatantra
are known in at least 38 languages around the world in 112 versions by Jacob's
old estimate, and its relationship with Mesopotamian and Greek fables is hotly
debated in part because the original manuscripts of all three ancient texts
have not survived.[51] Olivelle states that there are 200 versions of the text in
more than 50 languages around the world, in addition to a version in nearly
every major language of India.[9]
Scholars
have noted the strong similarity between a few of the stories in The
Panchatantra and Aesop's
Fables. Examples are 'The Ass in the Panther's Skin' and 'The Ass without Heart and Ears'.[52] "The Broken Pot" is similar to Aesop's "The Milkmaid and Her Pail",[53] "The Gold-Giving Snake" is similar to Aesop's
"The Man and the Serpent" and "Le Paysan et Dame serpent"
by Marie de France
(Fables)[54] Other well-known stories include "The Tortoise and The Geese" and "The Tiger, the
Brahmin and the Jackal".
Similar animal fables are found in most cultures of the world, although some folklorists view India as the prime source.[55][56] The Panchatantra has been a source of the world's
fable literature.[57]
The
French fabulist Jean de La Fontaine
acknowledged his indebtedness to the work in the introduction to his Second
Fables:
"This is a second book of fables that I present to the
public... I have to acknowledge that the greatest part is inspired from Pilpay,
an Indian Sage".[58]
The
Panchatantra is the origin also of several
stories in Arabian Nights,
Sindbad, and of many Western nursery rhymes and ballads.[59]
Origins and function
In
the Indian tradition, The Panchatantra is a nītiśāstra. Nīti
can be roughly translated as "the wise conduct of life"[29] and a śāstra is a technical or scientific treatise;
thus it is considered a treatise on political science and human conduct. Its
literary sources are "the expert tradition of political science and the
folk and literary traditions of storytelling". It draws from the Dharma and Artha
śāstras, quoting them extensively.[60] It is also explained that nīti "represents an
admirable attempt to answer the insistent question how to win the utmost
possible joy from life in the world of men" and that nīti is
"the harmonious development of the powers of man, a life in which
security, prosperity, resolute action, friendship, and good learning are so
combined to produce joy".[29]
The
Panchatantra shares many stories in common with
the Buddhist Jataka tales,
purportedly told by the historical Buddha before his death around 400 BCE. As the scholar Patrick
Olivelle writes, "It is clear that the Buddhists did not invent the
stories. [...] It is quite uncertain whether the author of [the Panchatantra]
borrowed his stories from the Jātakas or the Mahābhārata, or
whether he was tapping into a common treasury of tales, both oral and literary,
of ancient India."[60] Many scholars believe the tales were based on earlier oral
folk traditions, which were finally written down, although there is no
conclusive evidence.[61] In the early 20th century, W.
Norman Brown found that many folk tales in India
appeared to be borrowed from literary sources and not vice versa.[62]
An
early Western scholar who studied The Panchatantra was Dr. Johannes
Hertel, who thought the book had a Machiavellian character. Similarly, Edgerton noted that "the
so-called 'morals' of the stories have no bearing on morality; they are
unmoral, and often immoral. They glorify shrewdness and practical wisdom, in
the affairs of life, and especially of politics, of government."[52] Other scholars dismiss this assessment as one-sided, and
view the stories as teaching dharma, or proper moral conduct.[63] Also:[64]
On
the surface, the Pañcatantra presents stories and sayings which favor the
outwitting of roguery, and practical intelligence rather than virtue. However,
[..] From this viewpoint the tales of the Pañcatantra are eminently ethical.
[...] the prevailing mood promotes an earthy, moral, rational, and
unsentimental ability to learn from repeated experience[.]
According
to Olivelle, "Indeed, the current scholarly debate regarding the intent
and purpose of the 'Pañcatantra' — whether it supports unscrupulous
Machiavellian politics or demands ethical conduct from those holding high
office — underscores the rich ambiguity of the text".[60] Konrad Meisig states that the Panchatantra has been
incorrectly represented by some as "an entertaining textbook for the
education of princes in the Machiavellian rules of Arthasastra", but instead it is a book for the "Little
Man" to develop "Niti" (social ethics, prudent behavior,
shrewdness) in their pursuit of Artha, and a work on social satire.[65] According to Joseph Jacobs, "... if one thinks of it,
the very raison d'être of the Fable is to imply its moral without
mentioning it."[66]
The
Panchatantra, states Patrick
Olivelle, tells wonderfully a collection of
delightful stories with pithy proverbs, ageless and practical wisdom; one of
its appeal and success is that it is a complex book that "does not reduce
the complexities of human life, government policy, political strategies, and
ethical dilemmas into simple solutions; it can and does speak to different
readers at different levels."[9] In the Indian tradition, the work is a Shastra genre of literature, more specifically a Nitishastra
text.[9]
The
text has been a source of studies on political thought in Hinduism, as well as
the management of Artha
with a debate on virtues and vices.[67][68]
Metaphors and layered meanings
The
Sanskrit version of the Panchatantra text gives names to the animal
characters, but these names are creative with double meanings.[69] The names connote the character observable in nature but
also map a human personality that a reader can readily identify. For example,
the deer characters are presented as a metaphor for the charming, innocent,
peaceful and tranquil personality who is a target for those who seek a prey to
exploit, while the crocodile is presented to symbolize dangerous intent hidden
beneath a welcoming ambiance (waters of a lotus flower-laden pond).[69] Dozens of different types of wildlife found in India are
thus named, and they constitute an array of symbolic characters in the Panchatantra.
Thus, the names of the animals evoke layered meaning that resonates with the
reader, and the same story can be read at different levels.[69]
Cross-cultural migrations
The
work has gone through many different versions and translations from the sixth
century to the present day. The original Indian version was first translated
into a foreign language (Pahlavi) by Borzūya in 570CE, then into Arabic in 750. This Arabic version was
translated into several languages, including Syriac, Greek, Persian, Hebrew and
Spanish,[70] and thus became the source of versions in European
languages, until the English translation by Charles
Wilkins of the Sanskrit Hitopadesha
in 1787.
Early cross-cultural migrations
The
Panchatantra approximated its current literary form within the 4th–6th
centuries CE, though originally written around 200 BCE. No Sanskrit texts
before 1000 CE have survived.[71] Buddhist monks on pilgrimage to India took the influential
Sanskrit text (probably both in oral and literary formats) north to Tibet and
China and east to South East Asia.[72] These led to versions in all Southeast Asian countries,
including Tibetan, Chinese, Mongolian, Javanese and Lao derivatives.[59]
How Borzuy brought the work from India
The
Panchatantra also migrated into the Middle East, through Iran, during the Sassanid reign of Anoushiravan.[73][74] Around 550 CE his notable physician Borzuy (Burzuwaih) translated the work from Sanskrit into the
Pahlavi (Middle Persian
language).[73] He transliterated the main characters as Karirak ud
Damanak.[75][76]
According
to the story told in the Shāh
Nāma (The Book of the Kings, Persia's late 10th-century national epic by Ferdowsi), Borzuy sought his king's permission to make a trip to
Hindustan in search of a mountain herb he had read about that is "mingled
into a compound and, when sprinkled over a corpse, it is immediately restored
to life."[77] He did not find the herb, but was told by a wise sage of
"a
different interpretation. The herb is the scientist; science is the mountain,
everlastingly out of reach of the multitude. The corpse is the man without
knowledge, for the uninstructed man is everywhere lifeless. Through knowledge
man becomes revivified."
The
sage pointed to the book, and the visiting physician Borzuy translated the work
with the help of some Pandits (Brahmins).[77] According to Hans Bakker, Borzuy visited the kingdom of Kannauj in north India during the 6th century in an era of intense
exchange between Persian and Indian royal courts, and he secretly translated a
copy of the text then sent it to the court of Anoushiravan in Persia, along
with other cultural and technical knowledge.[78]
Kalila wa Demna: Mid. Persian and Arabic versions
Borzuy's
translation of the Sanskrit version into Pahlavi arrived in Persia by the 6th
century, but this Middle Persian version is now lost. The book had become
popular in Sassanid, and was translated into Syriac and Arabic whose copies survive.[74] According to Riedel, "the three preserved New Persian
translations originated between the 10th and 12th century", and are based
on the 8th-century Arabic translation by Ibn al-Muqaffa of Borzuy's work on Panchatantra.
It is the 8th-century Kalila wa Demna text, states Riedel, that has been
the most influential of the known Arabic versions, not only in the Middle East,
but also through its translations into Greek, Hebrew and Old Spanish.[74]
The
Persian
Ibn al-Muqaffa'
translated the Panchatantra (in Middle Persian:
Kalilag-o Demnag) from Middle
Persian to Arabic as Kalīla wa Dimna. This is considered the first
masterpiece of "Arabic literary prose."[79]
The
introduction of the first book of Kalila wa Demna is different than Panchatantra,
in being more elaborate and instead of king and his three sons studying in the
Indian version, the Persian version speaks of a merchant and his three sons who
had squandered away their father's wealth. The Persian version also makes an
abrupt switch from the story of the three sons to an injured ox, and thereafter
parallels the Panchatantra.[80]
The
two jackals' names transmogrified into Kalila and Dimna in the Persian version.
Perhaps because the first section constituted most of the work, or because
translators could find no simple equivalent in Zoroastrian Pahlavi for the
concept expressed by the Sanskrit word 'Panchatantra', the jackals' names, Kalila
and Dimna, became the generic name for the entire work in classical times.
After
the first chapter, Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ inserted a new one, telling of Dimna's trial.
The jackal is suspected of instigating the death of the bull “Shanzabeh",
a key character in the first chapter. The trial lasts for two days without
conclusion, until a tiger and leopard appear to bear witness against Dimna. He
is found guilty and put to death.
Ibn
al-Muqaffa' inserted other additions and interpretations into his 750CE
"re-telling" (see Francois de Blois' Burzōy's voyage to India and the
origin of the book Kalīlah wa Dimnah). The political theorist Jennifer
London suggests that he was expressing risky political views in a metaphorical
way. (Al-Muqaffa' was murdered within a few years of completing his
manuscript). London has analysed how Ibn al-Muqaffa' could have used his
version to make "frank political expression" at the 'Abbasid court
(see J. London's “How To Do Things With Fables: Ibn al-Muqaffas Frank Speech
in Stories from Kalila wa Dimna," History of Political Thought
XXIX: 2 (2008)).
The Arabic classic by Ibn al-Muqaffa
Borzuy's
570 CE Pahlavi translation (Kalile va Demne, now lost) was translated
into Syriac.
Nearly two centuries later, it was translated into Arabic by Ibn al-Muqaffa
around 750 CE[81]
under the Arabic title, Kalīla wa Dimna.[82] After the Arab invasion of Persia (Iran), Ibn al-Muqaffa's
version (two languages removed from the pre-Islamic Sanskrit original) emerged
as the pivotal surviving text that enriched world literature.[83] Ibn al-Muqaffa's work is considered a model of the finest
Arabic prose style,[84]
and "is considered the first masterpiece of Arabic
literary prose."[79]
Some
scholars believe that Ibn al-Muqaffa's translation of the second section,
illustrating the Sanskrit principle of Mitra Laabha (Gaining Friends),
became the unifying basis for the Brethren of Purity
(Ikwhan al-Safa) — the anonymous 9th-century CE encyclopedists
whose prodigious literary effort, Encyclopedia of the
Brethren of Sincerity, codified
Indian, Persian and Greek knowledge. A suggestion made by Goldziher, and later
written on by Philip K. Hitti
in his History of the Arabs, proposes that "The appellation is presumably taken
from the story of the ringdove in Kalilah wa-Dimnah in which it is
related that a group of animals by acting as faithful friends (ikhwan
al-safa) to one another escaped the snares of the hunter." This story
is mentioned as an exemplum
when the Brethren speak of mutual aid in one risaala (treatise), a crucial part of their system of ethics.
Spread to the rest of Europe
Almost
all pre-modern European translations of the Panchatantra arise from this Arabic
version. From Arabic it was re-translated into Syriac in the 10th or 11th century,
into Greek
(as Stephanites and Ichnelates) in 1080 by the Jewish Byzantine doctor Simeon
Seth,[85] into 'modern' Persian by Abu'l Ma'ali Nasr Allah Munshi in
1121, and in 1252 into Spanish (old Castilian, Calila
e Dimna).
Perhaps
most importantly, it was translated into Hebrew by Rabbi Joel in the 12th century. This Hebrew version was
translated into Latin
by John of Capua
as Directorium Humanae Vitae, or "Directory of Human Life",
and printed in 1480, and became the source of most European versions.[86] A German translation, Das Buch der Beispiele, of the
Panchatantra was printed in 1483, making this one of the earliest books to be
printed by Gutenberg's
press after the Bible.[59]
The
Latin version was translated into Italian by Antonfrancesco Doni
in 1552. This translation became the basis for the first English translation,
in 1570: Sir Thomas North
translated it into Elizabethan English
as The Fables of Bidpai: The Morall Philosophie of Doni (reprinted by
Joseph Jacobs, 1888).[15] La Fontaine published The Fables of Bidpai in 1679,
based on "the Indian sage Pilpay".[59]
Modern era
It
was the Panchatantra that served as the basis for the studies of Theodor
Benfey, the pioneer in the field of
comparative literature.[87] His efforts began to clear up some confusion surrounding
the history of the Panchatantra, culminating in the work of Hertel (Hertel 1908,
Hertel
1912, Hertel
1915) and Edgerton
(1924).[59] Hertel discovered several recensions in India, in
particular the oldest available Sanskrit recension, the Tantrakhyayika
in Kashmir, and the so-called North Western Family Sanskrit text by the Jain
monk Purnabhadra in 1199 CE that blends and rearranges at least three earlier
versions. Edgerton undertook a minute study of all texts which seemed "to
provide useful evidence on the lost Sanskrit text to which, it must be assumed,
they all go back", and believed he had reconstructed the original Sanskrit
Panchatantra; this version is known as the Southern Family text.
Among
modern translations, Arthur
W. Ryder's translation (Ryder
1925), translating prose for prose and
verse for rhyming verse, remains popular.[88][89] In the 1990s two English versions of the Panchatantra
were published, Chandra Rajan's translation (like Ryder's, based on
Purnabhadra's recension) by Penguin (1993), and Patrick Olivelle's translation
(based on Edgerton's reconstruction of the ur-text) by Oxford University Press
(1997). Olivelle's translation was republished in 2006 by the Clay Sanskrit Library.[90]
Recently
Ibn al-Muqaffa's historical milieu itself, when composing his masterpiece in
Baghdad during the bloody Abbasid
overthrow of the Umayyad
dynasty, has become the subject (and rather confusingly, also the title) of a
gritty Shakespearean drama by the multicultural Kuwaiti playwright Sulayman Al-Bassam.[91] Ibn al-Muqqafa's biographical background serves as an
illustrative metaphor for today's escalating bloodthirstiness in Iraq —
once again a historical vortex for clashing civilisations on a multiplicity of
levels, including the obvious tribal, religious and political parallels.
The
novelist Doris Lessing
notes in her introduction to Ramsay
Wood's 1980 "retelling" of the
first two of the five Panchatantra books,[92] that
"...
it is safe to say that most people in the West these days will not have heard
of it, while they will certainly at the very least have heard of the Upanishads
and the Vedas. Until comparatively recently, it was the other way
around. Anyone with any claim to a literary education knew that the Fables of
Bidpai or the Tales of Kalila and Dimna — these being the most
commonly used titles with us — was a great Eastern classic. There were at
least twenty English translations in the hundred years before 1888. Pondering
on these facts leads to reflection on the fate of books, as chancy and
unpredictable as that of people or nations."
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