Harshacharita
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A court poet writes the reigning king's life in ornate Sanskrit prose, producing the first sustained biography of a living Indian ruler and, incidentally, a picture of court life no chronicle supplies.
- biography of a living king in ornate Sanskrit prose
- incidental description more historically useful than the narrative itself
- an insider account that can be checked against a foreign visitor's
- a major work left deliberately or accidentally unfinished
Bana's account of Harsha covers the poet's own family and journey to court before turning to the king's accession after his brother's murder, and it breaks off unfinished. The prose is deliberately elaborate, built on long compounds and sustained description, and the historical value lies less in its narrative of events than in its incidental detail: the composition of the camp, the appearance of officials, the routines of a royal progress. Read against Xuanzang, who was in India during the same reign, it gives an unusual double view of one court from inside and outside.
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