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1 Introduction A jackal who had fallen into a vat of indigo dye decided to exploit his marvelous new appearance and declared himself king of the forest. He appointed the lions and other animals as his vassals, but took the precaution of having all his fellow jackals driven into exile. One day, hearing the howls of the other jackals in the distance, the indigo jackal’s eyes filled with tears and he too began to howl. The lions and the others, realizing the jackal’s true nature, sprang on him and killed him. This is one of India’s most widely known fables, and it is hard to imagine that anyone growing up in an Indian cultural milieu would not have heard it. The indigo jackal is as familiar to Indian childhood as are Little Red Riding Hood or Snow White in the English-speaking world. The story has been told and retold by parents, grandparents, and teachers for centuries in all the major Indian languages, both classical and vernacular. Versions of the collection in which it first appeared, the Pañcatantra, are still for sale at street stalls and on railway platforms all over India. The indigo jackal and other narratives from the collection have successfully colonized the contemporary media of television, CD, DVD, and the Internet. I will begin by sketching the history and development of the various families of Pañcatantra texts where the story of the indigo jackal first appeared , starting with Pu – r. nabhadra’s recension, the version on which this inquiry is based. This is followed by a review of previous scholarship on the Pañcatantra, including attempts to ascribe “meaning” to the text. I 1 conclude this opening chapter with an outline of the questions that I intend to address in this study: Why did the indigo jackal fall from power, and why was his demise inevitable? What social forces are at work here? What discourses give shape and structure to this narrative? What enables these discursive statements to function effectively? The traditional account of the Pañcatantra’s origins given in Pu – r. nabhadra ’s recension begins in a city called Mahila – ropya. There lived a king by the name of Amaraśakti, whose three foolish sons were averse to education. When the king asked his advisers what could be done to awaken the princes’ intellectual faculties, they replied that the mastery of grammar alone took twelve years; only then could one begin to study the treatises on spiritual and worldly affairs. They added that as life was short and the obstacles to learning were many, some more expedient path should be found. Accordingly, they recommended an elderly bra – hma. na by the name of Vi. s. nuśarman who was famed for his learning. Vi. s. nuśarman was duly summoned , and the king asked him to educate the boys in return for a grant of 100 parcels of land. The bra – hma. na replied that, as an octogenarian for whom sensual pleasures no longer held any attraction, he had no desire for wealth. But he accepted the king’s proposal and undertook to educate the princes in the science of worldly conduct by amusing them with stories . Asking that the date be noted down, Vi. s . nuśarman declared that if he had not fulfilled his promise within six months, “then it would befit your majesty to show me your buttocks” (PT 2.9–10). Amazed at the bra – hma. na’s unconventional pledge, the king nevertheless placed the princes in his care. Vi. s . nuśarman took the boys to his own home, where he composed five books, or tantras: 1. “Separation of friends,” in which a jackal manipulated the friendship between a lion and a bull to enhance his own position 2. “Winning of friends,” illustrating the collaboration of a crow, a mouse, a turtle, and a deer 3. “The crows and the owls,” in which a colony of owls was led to destruction by a crow who pretended to be their ally 4. “Loss of one’s gains,” in which a monkey, lured from a tree by a crocodile, saved himself by trickery 5. “Ill-considered actions,” in which a misguided barber, expecting a miraculous reward, struck and killed some mendicant monks. Each tantra serves as a frame in which numerous substories and proverbial verses are embedded. Having studied these stories, we are told, the princes 2 THE FALL OF THE INDIGO JACKAL [3.139.72.78...

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