Praise-Poems in Kṛṣṇa Temples and Royal Courts

A distinction is commonly made between two types of praise-poetry in Sanskrit: stotra s, which praise gods and other objects of religious veneration, and praasti s, which praise kings and other royal patrons. While noting features that distinguish these two types of poetry, this chapter emphasizes the commonality between them by examining the virudval genre employed in both devotional and royal contexts, making a case for the value of studying stotra and praasti alongside each other. The essay offers a brief overview of the structural features of the virudval genre, particularly focusing on its distinctive phoneto-metrical structures, and briefly sketches the history of virudval composition in two contexts: the religious poetry of the Gauya Vaiava tradition and a series of royal poems, some in praise of Mughal emperors, composed in Mithil. To demonstrate the close parallel between virudval as stotra and virudval as praasti , the chapter offers a transcription, translation, and analysis of excerpts from two works: the Govindavirudval in praise of the god Ka composed by Rpa Gosvmin (sixteenth century) and the Virudval of Raghudeva Mira (probably early seventeenth century) in praise of an unnamed royal patron.