Colophon of a rare and unpublished commentary on the Aiśvarya-kādambinī
Unexpectedly, yet another substantial discovery has been made during the lockdown in India. I had ordered a scanned copy of a single text from a major manuscript library, and they kindly delivered it in a CD. Upon going through the images, I noticed that instead of one, there were various texts in the same folder under the same entry. One of the additional texts was Sri Baladeva Vidyabhusana’s Aisvarya-kadambini, but besides the original verses there was an extensive Sanskrit commentary that remains unpublished and whose existence has not been mentioned in any of the lists of works that I have come across thus far.
As I had mentioned earlier, an increasing number of libraries have started to make books and manuscripts available online, which facilitates research work in multiple ways. Among the materials collected in the last few months are lists and catalogues of nearly 200,000 manuscripts from various places. A few important libraries are about to release new parts of their catalogues, thus giving hope that more lost texts may come to light.
Although travel in India is still difficult at the moment and some states have imposed restrictions, I am planning to resume research expeditions soon, mostly to consult a few more manuscript copies to consolidate the readings of the critical editions that will be published next.
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