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PREFACE
IN the literature of all countries there will be found a certain number of
works treating especially of love. Everywhere the subject is dealt with
differently, and from various points of view. In the present publication it is
proposed to give a complete translation of what is considered the standard work
on love in Sanscrit literature, and which is called the `Vatsyayana Kama Sutra',
or Aphorisms on Love, by Vatsyayana.
While the introduction will deal with the evidence concerning the date of the
writing, and the commentaries written upon it, the chapters following the
introduction will give a translation of the work itself. It is, however,
advisable to furnish here a brief analysis of works of the same nature, prepared
by authors who lived and wrote years after Vatsyayana had passed away, but who
still considered him as the great authority, and always quoted him as the chief
guide to Hindoo erotic literature.
Besides the treatise of Vatsyayana the following works on the same subject
are procurable in India:
The Ratirahasya, or secrets of love
The Panchasakya, or the five arrows
The Smara Pradipa, or the light of love
The Ratimanjari, or the garland of love
The Rasmanjari, or the sprout of love
The Anunga Runga, or the stage of love; also called Kamaledhiplava, or a boat
in the ocean of love.
The author of the `Secrets of Love' was a poet named Kukkoka. He composed his
work to please one Venudutta, who was perhaps a king. When writing his own name
at the end of each chapter he calls himself `Siddha patiya pandita', i.e. an
ingenious man among learned men. The work was translated into Hindi years ago,
and in this the author's name was written as Koka. And as the same name crept
into all the translations into other languages in India, the book became
generally known, and the subject was popularly called Koka Shastra, or doctrines
of Koka, which is identical with the Kama Shastra, or doctrines of love, and the
words Koka Shastra and Kama Shastra are used indiscriminately.
The work contains nearly eight hundred verses, and is divided into ten
chapters, which are called Pachivedas. Some of the things treated of in this
work are not to be found in the Vatsyayana, such as the four classes of women,
the Padmini, Chitrini, Shankini and Hastini, as also the enumeration of the days
and hours on which the women of the different classes become subject to love,
The author adds that he wrote these things from the opinions of Gonikaputra and
Nandikeshwara, both of whom are mentioned by Vatsyayana, but their works are not
now extant. It is difficult to give any approximate idea as to the year in which
the work was composed. It is only to be presumed that it was written after that
of Vatsyayana, and previous to the other works on this subject that are still
extant. Vatsyayana gives the names of ten authors on the subject, all of whose
works he had consulted, but none of which are extant, and does not mention this
one. This would tend to show that Kukkoka wrote after Vatsya, otherwise Vatsya
would assuredly have mentioned him as an author in this branch of literature
along with the others.
The author of the `Five Arrows' was one Jyotirisha. He is called the chief
ornament of poets, the treasure of the sixty-four arts, and the best teacher of
the rules of music. He says that he composed the work after reflecting on the
aphorisms of love as revealed by the gods, and studying the opinions of
Gonikaputra, Muladeva, Babhravya, Ramtideva, Nundikeshwara and Kshemandra. It is
impossible to say whether he had perused all the works of these authors, or had
only heard about them; anyhow, none of them appear to be in existence now. This
work contains nearly six hundred verses, and is divided into five chapters,
called Sayakas or Arrows.
The author of the `Light of Love' was the poet Gunakara, the son of Vechapati.
The work contains four hundred verses, and gives only a short account of the
doctrines of love, dealing more with other matters.
`The Garland of Love' is the work of the famous poet Jayadeva, who said about
himself that he is a writer on all subjects. This treatise is, however, very
short, containing only one hundred and twenty-five verses.
The author of the `Sprout of Love' was a poet called Bhanudatta. It appears
from the last verse of the manuscript that he was a resident of the province of
Tirhoot, and son of a Brahman named Ganeshwar, who was also a poet. The work,
written in Sanscrit, gives the descriptions of different classes of men and
women, their classes being made out from their age, description, conduct, etc.
It contains three chapters, and its date is not known, and cannot be
ascertained.
`The Stage of Love' was composed by the poet Kullianmull, for the amusement
of Ladkhan, the son of Ahmed Lodi, the same Ladkhan being in some places spoken
of as Ladana Mull, and in others as Ladanaballa. He is supposed to have been a
relation or connection of the house of Lodi, which reigned in Hindostan from
A.D. 1450-1526. The work would, therefore, have been written in the fifteenth or
sixteenth century. It contains ten chapters, and has been translated into
English but only six copies were printed for private circulation. This is
supposed to be the latest of the Sanscrit works on the subject, and the ideas in
it were evidently taken from previous writings of the same nature.
The contents of these works are in themselves a literary curiosity. There are
to be found both in Sanscrit poetry and in the Sanscrit drama a certain amount
of poetical sentiment and romance, which have, in every country and in every
language, thrown an immortal halo round the subject. But here it is treated in a
plain, simple, matter of fact sort of way. Men and women are divided into
classes and divisions in the same way that Buffon and other writers on natural
history have classified and divided the animal world. As Venus was represented
by the Greeks to stand forth as the type of the beauty of woman, so the Hindoos
describe the Padmini or Lotus woman as the type of most perfect feminine
excellence, as follows:
She in whom the following signs and symptoms appear is called a Padmini. Her
face is pleasing as the full moon; her body, well clothed with flesh, is soft as
the Shiras or mustard flower, her skin is fine, tender and fair as the yellow
lotus, never dark coloured. Her eyes are bright and beautiful as the orbs of the
fawn, well cut, and with reddish corners. Her bosom is hard, full and high; she
has a good neck; her nose is straight and lovely, and three folds or wrinkles
cross her middle - about the umbilical region. Her yoni resembles the opening
lotus bud, and her love seed (Kama salila) is perfumed like the lily that has
newly burst. She walks with swan-like gait, and her voice is low and musical as
the note of the Kokila bird, she delights in white raiments, in fine jewels, and
in rich dresses. She eats little, sleeps lightly, and being as respectful and
religious as she is clever and courteous, she is ever anxious to worship the
gods, and to enjoy the conversation of Brahmans. Such, then, is the Padmini or
Lotus woman.
Detailed descriptions then follow of the Chitrini or Art woman; the Shankhini
or Conch woman, and the Hastini or Elephant woman, their days of enjoyment,
their various seats of passion, the manner in which they should be manipulated
and treated in sexual intercourse, along with the characteristics of the men and
women of the various countries in Hindostan. The details are so numerous, and
the subjects so seriously dealt with, and at such length, that neither time nor
space will permit of their being given here.
One work in the English language is somewhat similar to these works of the
Hindoos. It is called `Kalogynomia: or the Laws of Female Beauty', being the
elementary principles of that science, by T. Bell, M.D., with twenty-four
plates, and printed in London in 1821. It treats of Beauty, of Love, of Sexual
Intercourse, of the Laws regulating that Intercourse, of Monogamy and Polygamy,
of Prostitution, of Infidelity, ending with a catalogue raisonnée of the
defects of female beauty.
Other works in English also enter into great details of private and domestic
life: The Elements of Social Science, or Physical, Sexual and Natural Religion,
by a Doctor of Medicine, London, 1880, and Every Woman's Book, by Dr Waters,
1826. To persons interested in the above subjects these works will be found to
contain such details as have been seldom before published, and which ought to be
thoroughly understood by all philanthropists and benefactors of society.
After a perusal of the Hindoo work, and of the English books above mentioned,
the reader will understand the subject, at all events from a materialistic,
realistic and practical point of view. If all science is founded more or less on
a stratum of facts, there can be no harm in making known to mankind generally
certain matters intimately connected with their private, domestic, and social
life.
Alas! complete ignorance of them has unfortunately wrecked many a man and
many a woman, while a little knowledge of a subject generally ignored by the
masses would have enabled numbers of people to have understood many things which
they believed to be quite incomprehensible, or which were not thought worthy of
their consideration.
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