Page:Biographical Sketches of Dekkan Poets.djvu/73

46 ever, by employing the most learned natives, has been able to get the greater part of these manuscripts translated.

 VIDAYANAT.

This poet was a bramin, and a native of Ekaselanagur, or Orongole; he flourished in the 13th century of Salivahana, during the reign of Pratapa Rudra. Vidyanat, from his infancy, studied the Vedes, but a short time after he was invested with the sacerdotal thread, he unfortunately had a lawsuit with his cousin, by which he lost his small patrimony, and fell into very great distress. At the age of sixteen he began to read the Ramayana and other Sanscrit poems, in which are comprised the actions of ancient kings and heroes, and afterwards diligently applied to the study of the Sciences. When he was forty years of age, he composed some verses on cosmogony, which were very sublime and harmonious, and much admired by his contemporaries: by this publication he raised a small sum of money for his maintenance. Vidaynat had a daughter, and as he could not realize sufficient 