Mudr, mudd Author(s): Ananda K. Coomaraswamy Source: Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 48 (1928), pp.

279-281 Published by: American Oriental Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/593148 . Accessed: 20/10/2011 20:55
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manuscript warrant. The second line can easily be justified by supplying tamo hanyate or tamo hatam: "One moon drives off the darkness, and not by swarms of stars even (is the darkness driven off)." In the first line, the supplying is more difficult, and there is a likelihood that corruption has crept in. Perhaps the nominative miirkhasatany api, for which there is some manuscript authority, was altered to agree formally with the second line. On the basis of the change of voice in the second line of this stanza, however, I wish to suggest that the Avestan passage also contains a change of voice, although in it the implied verb comes first, which the nominative with the expressed verb follows. The difficulties then disappear, and we have the following English phrasing, which, though awkward, is entirely intelligible: "(those not tending cattle,) of whom not by the good deeds (is it prevailed), but the evil deeds prevail." ROLANDG. KENT.
University of Pennsylvania.

MudrJ, mudda Dr. Otto Francke, in ZDMG, 46, 1892, has an elaborate article entitled Mudra Schrift (oder Lesekunst) ?, in which he tries to prove that muddd in the Milindapanfha (where it must be confessed the word has been unsuccessfully translated by Rhys Davids, SBI 35, pp. 6, 91, 247) means script, or when cited with lekhA, in lists of the sippts, as reading in distinction from writing; and he draws some far-reaching conclusions. This view seems to me very far-fetched and quite implausible; it would never have occurred to anyone familiar either with Indian dramatic technique or with Indian iconography. As a matter of fact, the interpretation of the Sinhalese commentator quoted in SBE 35, p. 91, note (hastamudra S'astraya) is at once correct and intelligible; a rendering mudr= "sign language " or " hand gesture " is appropriate to all the passages of the Milindapanho in question, and we know from other sources that in early India a sign language of the hands was considered an art or accomplishment with which an educated person should be familiar. To make assurance doubly sure we have a Jataka passage in.
=

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which the term is illustrated by examples. In Jdtaka 546 (Cowell's translation, VI, p. 364) we find the following (I quote the quite satisfactory rendering of Cowell and Rouse): The Bodhisattva, seeing a woman suitable to be his wife, reflected, " ' Whether she be unwed or not I do not know; I will ask her by hand gesture (hatthamudd)ya) and if she be wise she will understand.' So standing afar off he clenched his fist (mutthi&). She understood that he was asking whether she had a husband, and spread out her hand " to signify that she had not a husband. books (see, e. g., in It need only be remarked that in cabhitnaya of the sikhara meanings the of one 30) p. Mirror of my Gesture, the thumb with but musti the hand, hand, which is the same as hand hand (pataka The outspread " husband." raised, is precisely " empty"; mean to of the abhinaiyabooks) can well be understood the nearest meaning given in the Abhinaya Darpana is " having no refuge," which would not be inapplicable to the case of a woman without a husband. So it is evident that the Bodhisattva was already using an established and conventional sign language of the hands, and this is what muddc, as an art or accomplishment, always means. Nata-sUtras, which must have dealt with the expression of ideas, etc., by means of formal gesture, are mentioned as early as in Panini. Needless to say, this conventional sign language of the hands, whether in actual use by living persons, or in the more limited range of iconographic usage, must have been based on a natural and spontaneous language of gesture; even today the common mudras of the hieratic art, e. g., vydkhyana mud,? (often called vitarka) can be observed in the course of a conversation, whenever a point is made. I append a list of some other references to the language of gesture: Dracott, Simla Village Tales, pp. 47, 50; Folk-lore, 30. 312 (a note on the language of gesture); Hodson, T. C., Primitive Cultaureof India, p. 61; Indian Antiquary, 22. 21; Kath7a Sarit SAgara, Tawney's translation, I, p. 44; II, p. 235; Knowles, FolkTalts of Kashnmir,pp. 215, 220; Parker, Village Folk-Tales of. Ceylon, II, p. 24, III, p. 343; Penzer, N. M., The Ocean of Story (Katha-saritsagara), I, pp. 46, 80-82; Stokes, Indian Fairy Tales, pp. 207, 208; Swynnerton, Romantic Tales from the Panjab uith Indian Nigkts' Entertainment, pp. 329, 392; Vetdlapdficavihiiatt, story 1; Vimdnavatthut-atthakathi, p. 209, cited by K. Mitra in

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JBORS, 12, 1926, p. 161; Venkatasubbiah, A., The Kalts, Madras, 1911, p. 18; Woodward, F. L., Kindred Sayings, IV, p. 267, note 1, muddika, explained tentatively as " reader of symbolic gestures " though it must be admitted the sense here seems to require some kind of enumerator.
ANANDA K. COOMABASWAMY. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Dani0ara,

vat'hanartin, and caturasratva

The Karpfiramafijarl, IV, 11, speaks of a "staff dance" (dandardsa); this is not explained by Konow and Lanman, in the edition and translation, Harvard Oriental Series, Vol. 4, p. 280, but a possible connection with the varhsanartin of the gatapatha Brdhmana is suggested. First as regards the staff dance. This is a well-known popular (deR) dance, found all over India, and in Tamil designated kolattam. I have seen it also in Ceylon. Pandit Hira Lal, quoted in Ridgeway, Dramas and Dramatic Dances of non-European Peoples, p. 205, says that in the Nagpur District the Danddhar (sic) dance is sometimes performed as part of the Krsna LIla "taking its name from Danda, or sticks, which are used to keep time when dancing." Actually, each dancer has two such short sticks, or rods, and turns alternately to right and left, to strike them against those of her neighbour. Another instance is afforded by the Sola dance of the Gonds and Baigas, cited by llodson, Primitive Culture of India, p. 67. That this dance also found favor as a spectacle in more sophisticated circles is shown by the Karp-dramanjarl reference, and by the fact that it is frequently represented in decorative temple sculpture. There are good examples, both of fifteenth century date, on the walls of the Mallikarjuna temple at Srisailam (reproduced in A. S. I., A. R., Southern Circle, 1917-18), and on the walls of the Mallesvara temple near Bezwadd. In the latter example, one of the musicians of the chorus is playing a sdrangi; I do not know of any older representation of this instrument, though it is almost invariably used in playing dance music at the present day. The vachs'anartinr of gatapatha Brahmana, XIII, 6, 2, 20 (xii),