Sometimes the pages or folios of a manuscript are placed inside a manuscript holder, like here. The folios are kept between the outside and inner parts. These holders are generally made of cardboard and painted with colourful scenes on their front and back sides.

Jain paper manuscripts are made up of loose pages or folios that are not bound like a Western book. For this reason, they do not have title pages or introductory matter at the front. Very often the text starts directly at the top of the first page and the beginning is marked simply by an auspicious sign in red ink. There are also cases where the recto side is blank and the text starts on the verso side of the first folio.

Sometimes there are decorated paper pages at the beginning and end of a manuscript. The blank recto side is decorated with ornamental motifs so as to make what is called a citra-pṛṣṭhikā page – a ‘page with painting’. Similarly, if the text ends on a recto side, the verso side remains blank or is decorated with ornamental motifs.

In some cases there are protective covers around a manuscript. These may be a rectangular cover at each end of the manuscript. Or, as here, they may be a cardboard holder.

Assorted folios

The pages or folios under this shelfmark belong to different manuscripts. The folios show a variety of handwriting, language and artistic style and are on noticeably different paper.

The folios are from four separate manuscripts, as follows:

• several folios are from a single manuscript of the Kālakācārya-kathā – Story of the Ācārya Kālaka
• three folios are from different manuscripts of the Kalpa-sūtra, an extremely popular text in the Śvetāmbara canon.

There is also a manuscript holder made for an unknown manuscript.

It is not known what has happened to the rest of each manuscript.

Copies of the Kalpa-sūtra and Kālakācārya-kathā are often made in a single manuscript, which may be why these folios were bundled together. At some point in the past these folios and the manuscript holder were put into a box at the British Library and labelled ‘Frags. of Jain Mss. Skt. / Pkt.’ meaning 'Fragments of Jain manuscripts in Sanskrit and Prakrit'. However, it is important to remember that they do not belong together.