VEMANA. Bl" 



ted, but great additions are made to the 

 Religions 416 religious and moral sections. Since then 



Moral . 468 & . 



Satirical 279 several small editions of Vemana have issu- 



ed from the London Mission Press at Viza- 

 gapatam and the Public Instruction Press- 

 With the exception of a few verbal discrepancies they 



Keliffious 68 are a ^ identical an ^ contain 201 stanzas 



Moral 51 taken in the proportions noted in the 



oatmeal 82 mar g^ n f rom ]\j r Brown's second edi- 



201 tion. 



Little or nothing seems known regarding Vemana. 

 Mr Brown at first supposed that he was by birth 

 a Kapu or farmer, that he lived about the beginning 

 of the 17th century, and that he was a native of 

 the South Western parts of Telingana. * Some assert" he 

 observes, "that he belonged to the family of Ana Vema 

 Reddi, a chief in the Candanul (or Kurnool) country ; and 

 the brother of the poet is said to have commanded the fort 

 of Gandicota. Some believe him to have been a native of 

 Crishtipad in Cadanul, others of Innaconda in Guntoor, 

 and I have also heard it said that he was born at Chitwel 

 in the Cuddapah District. Yet I have had opportuni- 

 ties of enquiring at all these places and have after 

 all gained no information whatever. Yet his dialect 

 in a few passages renders it probable that Vemana was a 

 native of the South Western part of Telingana, where these 

 towns are situated" In his second edition Mr. Brown 

 states that it is the general belief that Vemana's writings 

 are fully four centuries old, and adds that if the Jun- 

 gums are correct in making him coeval with the 

 writer of the Telugu Basava Puranam, this would give 

 an era still more remote. According, therefore, to Mr. 

 Brown's first hypothesis, Vemana must have been nearly con- 

 temporary with Bacon and Shakespear. according to 



