PREFACE. ix work. Although incorrect in many places, it proved to be of great value on account of its being complete and containing the Kanarese coramentary; and my thanks are specially due to Mr. A. Mahadeva Sastri for his leaving it sufficiently long at my disposal. A fifth manuscript, denoted by B, is a transcription on paper in Kanarese characters. of a palm-leaf manuscript found in a Jaina monastery at Mudbidri in South Canara, and was obtained through the kind effort of Mr. R. Krishnamacharyar, M.A., the Sub-assistant Inspector of Sanskrit Schools in Madras, and Mr. U. B. Venkataramanaiya of Mudbidri. This manuscript also contains the whole work, and gives, like K, in Kanarese a brief statement of the pro- blems and their answers. The endeavour-to secure more manuscripts having proved fruitless, the work has had to be brought out with the aid of these five manuscripts; and owing to the technical character of the work and its elliptical and often riddle-like language and the inaccu- racy of the manuscripts, the labour involved in bringing it out with the translation and the requisite notes has been heavy and trying. There is, however, the satisfac- - tion that all this labour has been bestowed on a worthy work of considerable historical value. It is a fortunate circumstance about the Ganita-sara- sangraha that the time when its author Mahavirācārya lived may be made out with fair accuracy. In the very first chapter of the work, we have, immediately after the two introductory stanzas of salutation to Jina Maha- vira, six stanzas describing the greatness of a king, whose name is said to have been Cakrika-bhañjana, and who appears to have been commonly known by the title of Araoghavarsa Nrpatunga; and in the last of these
