The Sivabharata, composed during the lifetime of the Maratha King Shivaji Bhosle (1627-80) by his court-poet Kavindra Paramananda, and here presented as The Epic of Shivaji, is a classical Sanskrit epic poem which recounts the early feats of Shivaji and those of his immediate forbears Maloji and Shahji. It is both a historical chronicle and a laudatory mahakavya (epic poem). This book contains the first complete English translation of the poem, together with a detailed introductory study by James W. Laine (who also translated the poem) and an essay by S.S. Bahulkar on the poem’s place in classical mahakavya literature. It is meant as a contribution to the study of seventeenth century Indian history and late Sanskrit literature, and to the study of Shivaji as one of India’s most prominent heroic figures. It provides the reader not only with a contemporary interpretation of Shivaji’s life, but also with access to an English version of the Sanskrit epic peom which is Shivaji’s earliest, if not complete, biography.
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