Comment by ssriram | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ssriram | Hacker News Reader

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Vedanta Desikan (aka KaviTarkika Simhan - Lion of the Poet Logicians) born 1268 C.E. wrote over 100 books.

One of them is called Padhuka Sahasram, was written in less than a day in response to a challenge and contains 1008 verses in 32 chapters.

The 30th chapter called Chitra Paddathi or Picturesque Chapter (aka Matrix of Artistry) contains verses that whilst paying homage to the feet (Padhuka) of the Lord also paint elaborate patterns, such as The Knight's Tour (1).

One hint as to why "Indians did this ages ago" is of intellectual interest to "some" indians is because the middle name of the early-stage investor and long time board member of google is KaviTark.

[1] http://www.ibiblio.org/sripedia/ebooks/vdesikan/rps/chitra.h...

> One of them is called Padhuka Sahasram, was written in less than a day in response to a challenge and contains 1008 verses in 32 chapters.

If he spent 24 hours non-stop writing those verses, he's have to write 7 verses every 10 minutes on the average. If it is really a "less than a day" 8 hours, he'd have to write nearly 3 verses every minute. In summary, this sounds like something that will need some serious substantiation to believe.

The Vedic tradition is typically an oral one. It takes about 3hrs to recite the Padhuka Sahasram.

Those of us who come from India and have grown up with this have older uncles and others who can compose extremely mellifluous and deep meaning verses extemporaneously.

The Chitra Paddathi which comprises of 40 verses (of the 1,008) takes 7mins 37secs.

If you are so inclined you can hear it at (1) - You can follow along with the romanized english phrases with meanings at (2) and you can see it's corresponding visual artistry at (3)

(1) http://andavan.org/audio/7.CHITRA%20%20%20PADDHATHI.mp3 (2) 92, 93, 94 & 95 (10's) at http://www.ibiblio.org/sripedia/ebooks/vdesikan/rps/92.html (s/92/93 etc.) (3) http://www.ibiblio.org/sripedia/ebooks/vdesikan/rps/chitra.h...

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