PREFACE. 
The following fragments of Aryadeva ’s Catuhsatika with their commentary by 
Candra Kirti are published from 23 old palm leaves written on in Newari character 
of the nth century. I had great difficulty in arranging the leaves, as the old leaf- 
marks have been obliterated in all the leaves except one. That one leaf is marked 
15. The last owner of the manuscript marked the other leaves from 16 to 38, leaf 
29th belonging to a work on grammar. He has done his work so badly that his 
36th leaf contains the colophon of the first chapter, while the 15th leaf, which has 
the original leaf-mark, contains that of the third chapter. It was after a careful com- 
parison with the Tibetan translation in collaboration with my esteemed friend Dr. 
Satisa Candra Vidyabhusana that I could put the leaves in their proper order. 
A comparison with the Tibetan translation revealed the fact that the original 
Catuhsatika contained three hundred and seventy-five verses in the Anustup metre, 
which with sixteen long colophons, would count to a copyist, 400 Slokas. Hence the 
name Catuhsatika. These three hundred and seventy- five verses are divided into 
sixteen chapters, the majority of which contain 25 verses each. In a few only the 
number of the verses is less than 25. 
From a comparison with the Tibetan translation the commentary appears to have 
been written by Candra Kirti. The commentary is written in beautiful prose, en- 
livened in the first 8 chapters with pretty stories and anecdotes taken both from life 
and literature ; and in the last 8 chapters, with philosophical speculations both 
Buddhistic and Brahmanical. The only author quoted by name in these fragments 
of the commentary is Buddha palita, whom the commenator calls Acarya. Candra 
Kirti is well known by his commentary on the Madhyamaka Karikas of Nagarjuna, 
and also by his work entitled Madyamakavatara which is known in Tibetan version 
only. 
The author Aryadeva is said to have been a pupil of Nlgarjuna, and as such, 
must have flourished about the end of 2nd century a.d. One of his treatises in San- 
skrit entitled Caritra-visuddhi-prakarana was discovered by me in 1897 at Katmandu, 
and published in the Asiatic Society’s Journal for that year; and Catuhsatika is a 
discovery of another work in Sanskrit by Aryadeva. The work is often quoted 
under the name of Sataka in Candrakirti’s commentary on the Madhyamaka Karikas 
of Nagarjuna. For instance, in Bibl. Budh. Edition of the same work, p. 71, we 
read : — 
^ ^ I 
C\ ^ 
|| Ch. XIII. 1 . 2 . 
