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Kalhaṇa : Kalhaṇa was born in Kashmir in Parihaspura, now in Bārāmullah district. Commissioned by the king, between 1148 & 1150 he produced Rājataraṅginī, the Royal River, a history of Kashmir, starting from its legends to the lives of the kings & queens of the 12th century. It consists of 7,826 taraṅgas or waves, verses set in eight cantos of varying length in composition of which he used several historical sources including Kashmir’s sculpture, architecture, coinage, & manuscripts, thus making it a fairly authentic record. The preamble of the first canto states: “That noble-minded [poet] is alone worthy of praise whose word, like that of a judge, keeps free from love or hatred in relating the facts of the past…. What is the skill required in order that men of a later time should supplement the narrative of events in the works of those who died after composing the history of those kings whose contemporaries they were? Hence my endeavour is to give a connected account where the narrative of past events has become fragmentary in many respects.”