Montelle and Plofker. Sanskrit Astronomical Tables
Clemency Montelle and Kim Plofker wrote the first book to treat Sanskrit table texts as a genre. Before it, tables were described one at a time in catalogues; here it is shown how the genre took shape, how a sarini differs from a karana and from a siddhanta, and why a fifteenth-century computer found tables more convenient than formulas.
Section 5.5 is given over wholly to the Makaranda: the structure of its tables and the botanical names of its sections — kanda (bulb), guccha (blossom), valli (creeper), vatika (garden), saurabha (fragrance) — apparently playing on the names of the author and his father Anandakanda. The same section works through an example of computing the Sun's mean longitude from Vishvanatha Daivajna's commentary (Saka 1540), step by step.
Appendix B.2 collects the parameters of all four pakshas — Arya, Ardharatrika, Brahma and Saura — with revolutions and daily motions. Under the Saurapaksha Mars has 2,296,832 revolutions in a mahayuga, exactly those our engine uses.
From the same place comes an admission that matters for our search: 'The general identification of the Makaranda with Saurapaksha parameters is all we currently know about its textual heritage.' Makaranda's own kshepakas have not been published, and our search runs through undescribed ground.
Details: 311 pages, 18.2 MB.