4 HISTORY OF CASHM1R. 



p]\ oiJona Rlijd, whose work it professes to continue, so as to form with it, 

 and the history of Calhana, a complete record of the Kingdom of CasJimir. 

 It begins with Zein ul Ab-ed-din, whose name the unprepared reader would 

 scarcely recognise, in its Ndgari transfiguration, of Sri Jaina Ollabha Dina, 

 and closes with the accession of Fatteh Shah, in the year of the Hijra 882, or 

 A. D. 1477. The name which the author has chosen to give his work of Jaina 

 Taringini has led to a very mistaken notion of its character: it has been 

 included amongst the productions of Jaina literature, whilst in truth the 

 author is an orthodox worshipper of Siva, and evidently intends the epithet 

 he has adopted as complimentary to the memory of Zein ul Ab-ed din, a 

 prince who was a great friend to his Hindu subjects, and a liberal patron of 

 Hindu letters, and literary men. 



The fourth work, which completes the aggregate current under the name 

 of Rdj d Taringini, was written in the time of Acber, expressly to continue 

 to the latest date, the productions of the author's predecessors, and to bring 

 the history down to the time at which Cashmir became a province of Ac- 

 ber's empire. It begins accordingly where Sri Vara ended, or with Fatteh 

 Shah, and closes with Nazek-Shah ; the historian apparently, and judicious- 

 ly, avoiding to notice the fate of the kingdom during Hamayun's retreat in- 

 to Persia. The work is calied the Raja vali Patdcd, and is the production of 

 Punya or Prajnya Bhatta. 



Of the works thus described, the manuscript of Mr. Speke, containing the 

 compositions of Calhana and Sri Vara, came into my possession at the sale 

 of that gentleman's effects. Of Mr. Colebrooke's manuscript, containing also 

 the work of Punya Bhatta, I was permitted by that gentleman, with the 

 liberality I have had former occasion to acknowledge, to have a transcript 

 made; and the third manuscript, containing the same three works, I have al- 

 ready stated I procured by accidental purchase* Neither of the three com- 

 prises the work of JonaRaja, and but one of them, thetranscriptof Mr. Cole- 

 bkooke's manuscript, has the third Tarang or section ofCALHANA's history, 



