Swapnavāsavadattam in the context of "Magadha (Mahajanapada)"

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⭐ Core Definition: Swapnavāsavadattam

Svapnavasavadattam (Sanskrit: स्वप्नवासवदत्तम्, Svapnavāsavadattam) (English: The dream of Vasavadatta) is a Sanskrit play in six acts written by the ancient Indian poet Bhāsa.

The plot of the drama is drawn from the romantic narratives about the kaushambi king Udayana and Vasavadatta, the daughter of Pradyota, the ruler of Avanti, which were current in the poet's time and which seem to have captivated popular imagination. The main theme of the drama is the sorrow of Udayana for his queen Vasavadatta, believed by him to have perished in a fire, which was actually a rumour spread by Yaugandharayana, a minister of Udayana to compel his king to marry Padmavati, the daughter of the king of Magadha. It forms, in context, a continuation of his another drama, Pratijnayaugandharayana.

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Swapnavāsavadattam in the context of Bhāsa

Bhāsa is one of the earliest Indian playwrights in Sanskrit, predating Kālidasa. Estimates of his floruit range from the 4th century BCE to the 4th century CE; the thirteen plays attributed to him are commonly dated closer to the first or second century CE.

Bhasa's plays had been lost for centuries until the manuscripts were rediscovered in 1910 by the Indian scholar Ganapati Shastri. Bhāsa had previously only been known from mentions in other works, such as the Rajashekhara's Kāvya-mimāmsā, which attributes the play Swapnavāsavadattam to him.

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