Bhatti’s Poem: The Death of Rávana

By Bhaṭṭi
Translated by Oliver Fallon

To the dry bones of grammar Bhatti gave juicy flesh in his poem, telling the greatest Indian story in clear elegant Sanskrit. Composed in the seventh century CE, in South India, “Bhatti’s Poem: The Death of Rávana” is both a poetic retelling of Rama’s adventures, and a compendium of grammatical and rhetorical examples for students. Its finest passages stands comparison with the best of Sanskrit poetry.

This is the perfect companion to Pánini’s groundbreaking grammatical treatise, the “Eight Books” (Aṣṭādhyāyī), studied intensely for the millennium before Bhatti, just as it is today by linguisticians worldwide. Bhatti’s study aid to Pánini’s abstruse text gives examples disguised as the gripping, morally improving “Ramáyana” story. His systematic illustration of the canon of figures of speech is an important text in the history of Sanskrit poetics. One canto even gives a pleasant, accessible taster of the Prakrit language. In Bhatti’s own words: “This composition is a lamp to those whose eyes have language as their goal.”

The story goes that Bhatti’s outdoors grammar class was one day interrupted by an elephant ambling between him and his pupils. By Hindu law this intrusion cancelled class for a year. Lest vital study time be lost, Bhatti composed his poem to teach grammar without textbooks. Ever since, “Bhatti’s Poem: The Death of Rávana” has been one of the most popular poems in Sanskrit literature.

566 pp. | ISBN-13: 978-0-8147-2778-2 | ISBN-10: 0-8147-2778-6 | Co-published by New York University Press and JJC Foundation

Excerpts

Canto 7: “The Search for Sita”
(pp. 133–45; 7.1–7.60)
(20 pp)

Download Excerpts (pdf)
Download CSL Front Matter (pdf)
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Download the title page and table of contents and one chapter of the book (in English and Sanskrit on facing pages), bundled together as a .pdf file. You can also download the CSL Front Matter (6pp, 1.3mb). It describes how we transliterate the Sanskrit text in the Roman alphabet and includes a guide to pronunciation. It also explains our system of representing phonetic fusion (sandhi).

You can set Adobe Acrobat Reader to display the Sanskrit text and translation in facing page view. Simply go to “View” in the toolbar, select “Page Layout” and click on “Facing.”

eCSL Word Frequency Counts

Top 50 Verbs

Rank	Unique Words	Number of Occurrences
1	Like	174
2	Made	94
3	Said	74
4	Went	72
5	See	55
6	Go	55
7	Come	50
8	Spoke	50
9	Saw	47
10	Struck	46

11	Came	46
12	Killed	41
13	Grove	41
14	Took	40
15	Kill	40
16	Cut	40
17	Make	39
18	Filled	39
19	Shone	33
20	Sought	33

21	Destroyed	32
22	Became	30
23	Brought	29
24	Delighted	27
25	Fell	27
26	Making	25
27	Fight	24
28	Take	24
29	Live	24
30	Bear	23

31	Seen	23
32	Tell	23
33	Set	22
34	Seeing	22
35	Shining	21
36	Lost	21
37	Crushed	21
38	Seeking	20
39	Reached	20
40	Eat	20

41	Know	20
42	Done	20
43	Bearing	19
44	Wish	19
45	Gone	19
46	Wishing	18
47	Protect	18
48	Become	18
49	Roared	18
50	Speak	18

Top 50 Nouns

Rank	Unique Words	Number of Occurrences
1	Rama	264
2	Monkey(s)	245
3	Demon(s)	189
4	Enemy(ies)	184
5	Sita	151
6	Ravana	117
7	King	116
8	Mountain(s)	116
9	Tree(s)	107
10	Battle	102

11	Water(s)	84
12	Hanuman	83
13	Arrows	82
14	Lanka	81
15	Weapon(s)	81
16	Son(s)	78
17	Lord	77
18	Men (man)	76
19	Earth	75
20	Lakshmana	67

21	Vibhishana	62
22	Forest	58
23	Fire	57
24	City	57
25	Sky	57
26	Gods	57
27	Ocean	56
28	Two	55
29	Indra	55
30	Sun	55

31	World	52
32	Body(ies)	51
33	Grief	43
34	Elephants	43
35	Moon	43
36	Wind	42
37	Birds	39
38	Blood	38
39	Horses	38
40	Cloud(s)	38

41	Women	37
42	Heart	37
43	People	37
44	Eyes	36
45	Army	36
46	Chariot	36
47	Fear	35
48	Sugriva	35
49	Rama’s	34
50	Canto	33