Background
The Ādityavāra-vrata-kathā is a popular story in Digambara circles. It shows the good and bad results of observing or not observing the so-called 'Sunday vow'. This is one of the numerous vows – vratas – which a Jain can keep to counteract the misfortunes of life, to acquire merit and diminish the quantity of karma. Observing such a vow means fasting, worshipping and also listening to specific stories. Some vows are connected with a given day of the week.
In this tale seven brothers gain success after numerous adventures, by worshipping Jinas and Jain deities.
Jains believe that there are 24 Jinas in each complete cycle of time in the human world. A 'victor' in Sanskrit, a Jina is an enlightened human being who has triumphed over karma and the neverending cycle of births in which the soul is trapped. Also known as a Tīrthaṃkara or 'ford-maker', a Jina teaches the way to achieve liberation.
Glossary
Description
A man and a woman stand inside a building. The man is gesturing while the woman sits preparing food. Outside two male figures search in the forest.
Back from the forest, Guṇadhara, one of the seven brothers who feature in this tale, asks his sister-in-law about his sickle. She is preparing the evening meal. He then returns to the forest looking for the sickle he has forgotten to bring back.
Other visual elements
This Ādityavāravratakathā manuscript is highly decorative. There are broad floral borders round both the picture and the text while the writing is set within a colourful garden.
Script
The elaborate script used for the main text is the Jaina Devanāgarī script. It is used for writing numerous Indian languages, although here it is used for Gujarati and Hindi.
There are a few notable features of this script:
- it is an old type in the way the sounds e and o are notated when used with a consonant, known as pṛṣṭhamātrā script
- the red vertical lines within the text divide the long sentences into smaller parts, but are not necessarily punctuation marks.
- Source:
The British Library Board
- Shelfmark:
Or. 14290
- Author:
Gangādāsa
- Date of creation:
1792
- Folio number:
7 verso
- Total number of folios:
19 (folio 8 missing)
- Place of creation:
central India
- Language:
Gujarati and Hindi in Devanāgarī script
- Medium:
opaque watercolour on paper
- Size:
27 x 11.5 cms
- Copyright:
CC0 1.0 (Creative Commons Public Domain)
- Image Copyright:
Guṇadhara looks for his sickle
- Source:
The British Library Board
- Shelfmark:
Or. 14290
- Author:
Gangādāsa
- Date of creation:
1792
- Folio number:
7 verso
- Total number of folios:
19 (folio 8 missing)
- Place of creation:
central India
- Language:
Gujarati and Hindi in Devanāgarī script
- Medium:
opaque watercolour on paper
- Size:
27 x 11.5 cms
- Copyright:
CC0 1.0 (Creative Commons Public Domain)
- Image Copyright:
Description
A man and a woman stand inside a building. The man is gesturing while the woman sits preparing food. Outside two male figures search in the forest.
Back from the forest, Guṇadhara, one of the seven brothers who feature in this tale, asks his sister-in-law about his sickle. She is preparing the evening meal. He then returns to the forest looking for the sickle he has forgotten to bring back.
Other visual elements
This Ādityavāravratakathā manuscript is highly decorative. There are broad floral borders round both the picture and the text while the writing is set within a colourful garden.
Script
The elaborate script used for the main text is the Jaina Devanāgarī script. It is used for writing numerous Indian languages, although here it is used for Gujarati and Hindi.
There are a few notable features of this script:
- it is an old type in the way the sounds e and o are notated when used with a consonant, known as pṛṣṭhamātrā script
- the red vertical lines within the text divide the long sentences into smaller parts, but are not necessarily punctuation marks.