Amarakosha

The Amarakosha (Sanskrit: अमरकोश, IAST: Amarakośa) from amara "immortal" and kosha "treasure, casket, pail, collection, dictionary", also Namalinganushasana (Sanskrit: नामलिङ्गानुशासनम्, IAST: Nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam) from nama-linga-anu-shasana "instruction concerning nouns and gender") is a thesaurus of Sanskrit written by the Jain or Buddhist scholar Amarasimha. Amarasimha was one of the Navaratnas ("nine gems") at the court of Chandragupta II, a Gupta king who reigned around AD 400. Some sources indicate that he belonged to the period of Vikramaditya of 7th century.

• The following Subhashitha ^[1] says about this:
  

ಧನ್ವಂತರಿ ಕ್ಷಪಣಕಾಮರಸಿಂಹ ಶಂಕು ವೇತಾಲಭಟ್ಟ ಘಟಕರ್ಪರ ಕಾಲಿದಾಸಾಃ

ಖ್ಯಾತೋ ವರಾಹಮಿಹಿರೋ ನೃಪತೇಸ್ಸಭಾಯಾಂ ರತ್ನಾನಿ ವೈವರರುಚಿರ್ನವ ವಿಕ್ರಮಸ್ಯ

• Its transliteration in English is:
  

dhanvaMtari kShapaNakAmarasiMha SaMku vEtAlaBaTTa GaTakarpara kAlidAsAH

KyAtO varAhamihirO nRupatEssaBAyAM ratnAni vaivararucirnava vikramasya

• In Devanagari
  

धन्वन्तरिक्षपणकामरसिंह शङ्कु वेताल भट्ट घटकर्पर कालिदासाः ।

ख्यातो वराहमिहिरो नृपतेः सभायां रत्नानि वै वररुचि र्नव विक्रमस्य ॥

When Jagadguru Shri Shankaracharya was traveling throughout India for propagating his Advaitic philosophy, he wanted to meet Amarasimha for a debate. When Amarasimha found out about this, he was scared by the possibility of a debate with Shri Shankaracharya and burned all of his collections. Upon learning about this Shri Shankara rushed to Amarasimhan's house. By that time all of his collections had turned into ashes except 'Amarakosha'. And Shri Shankaracharya saved Amarakosha from fire. This story can be seen in "Shankara dig Vijayam".

Contents 1 Textual organisation 2 Commentaries 3 Translations 4 Bibliography 5 Reference

Textual organisation

The Amarakosha consists of verses that can be easily memorized. It is divided into three khāṇḍas or chapters. The first, svargādi-khāṇḍa ("heaven and others") has words pertaining to gods and heavens. The second, bhūvargādi-khāṇḍa ("earth and others") deals with words about earth, towns, animals and humans. The third, sāmānyādi-khāṇḍa ("common") has words related to grammar and other miscellaneous words.

Svargadhikanda, the first Kandam of Amarakosham begins with the verse 'Svaravyam swarganakathridivatrishalaya..' describing various names of Heaven viz. Sva, Avya, swarga, Naka, Tridiva, Tridasalaya etc. The second verse 'Amara, nirjara, deva,’ describes various words that are equivalent to word God. The fifth and sixth verses give various names of Gautama Buddha reinforcing the claim that the author is a Buddhist.

The second Kandam, Bhuvargadhikanda, of Amarakosham is divided into ten Vargas or parts. The ten Vargas are Bhuvarga (Earth), Puravarga (Towns or Cities), Shailavarga (Mountains), Vanoshadivarga (Forests and medicines), Simhadivarga (Lions and other animals), Manushyavarga (Mankind), Bramhavarga (Brahmin), Kshatriyavarga (Kshatriyas), Vysyavarga (Vysyas) and Sudravarga (Sudras).

The Third Kandam, Samanyadhikanda contains Adjectives, Verbs, words related to prayer and business etc.. The first verse Kshemankaroristatathi Shivathathi Shivamkara gives the Nanarthas of the word Shubakara or propitious as Kshemankara, Aristathathi, Shivathathi and Shivamkara.

Commentaries

"Amarakoshodghaatana" by "Kshiirasvaamin" ,
"Tiikaasarvasvam" by "Vandhyaghatiiya Sarvaananda" ,
"Raamaasramii"(Vyaakhyaasudha) by "Bhaanuji Diikshita" ,
"Padachandrikaa" by "Raayamukuta"
"Kaashikavivaranapanjikha" by Jinendra Bhudhi
"paarameshwari by parameswaran moosad in malaylam

Translations

"Gunaratha" of Ujjain translated it to Chinese in 7th century .

Bibliography