CHUND, or CHAND, or CHANDRA-BARDAT, the Homer of the Rajpoots, flourished in the 12th century of the Christian era, as the chief professional bard at the court of Prithwirtija, or the last Hindu sovereign of Delhi ; but his poems, which are in the spoken dialect of Canouj, are still thoroughly and universally popular among his nation after the lapse of more than six centuries. " The most familiar of his images and sentiments," says Colonel Tod, who bold the post of English resident in Rejast'han, " I heard daily from the mouths of those around me, the descendant. of the men whose deeds he rehearses!' His poem, which Is called Prat'hiraj-Chdhlin Ram,' is a kind of universal history of the period at which he wrote, including something on almost every subject from geography to grammar, Interspersed with poetical fiction. It extend, to 69 books, comprising about 100,000 stanzas, of which Colonel Tod tells us that be translated into English as many as 30,000. Every noble family in )tajastban is commemorated in it in some shape, and the bard does not forget to interweave hie men exploits into the narrative. The leading action of the poem is the daring exploit of Prithwireja, who on receiving some stanza& from the Princess of Canouj, inviting him, if he Is braes enough, to come and bear her away from her father's court from the midst of the princes trembled as suitors for her hand, sc ept. the challenge, and succeeds in carrying off the princess for his bride; but, as Chund remarks, to his own destruction, "though it gained Mtn immortality in the song of the bard." A war enema, and tho A ffghan Shehabuddin, the Mohammedan invader of Prithwirtija's dominion., is six times defeated and twice taken prisoner; but twice released by the blind and chivalrous generosity of the Hindu sove reign. At last, in a final battle on the banks of the Caggar, Prithwl rija's army after three day.' fighting is cut to pieces, and he himself is taken prisoner and carried to Chinni Chund describes himself as following the train of the conqueror to the A ffghan capital, deter mined to trace his royal master, and he tells us that though the Affghans tried to baffle him in his object, " the music of his tongue overcame the resolves of the guardian of the prixon." The battle on
the Caggar—a memorable date in the history of Hindustan, since it established Mohammedan rule in Delhi for more than 500 years—is stated by chronologists to have taken place in the year of the Christian era 1193. This, by a remarkable coincidence was the identical year in which our Coeur de Lion was imprisoned by the Duke of Austria, and in which Blondel, according to the legend, discovered him in his dungeon. Chund was not destined like Blondel to effect his master's release. The Affghsn conqueror had deprived his captive of sight, and one of the finest passages in the poem, to which it is said not even the eteroest Rajpoot can listen without emotion, is a soliloquy of the blinded monarch, deploring the fickleness of fortune and his own unfortunate generosity to the enemy of whom he was now the victim. How the poem concludes Colonel Tod does not mention, but he informs us that "PrithwIrdja and the bard perished by their own hands, after causing the death of Shahabuddin." It is poesible that the narrative may have been brought to a close by the sou or grand son of Chund, both of whom were eminent poets, though they could not rival the glory of the Rajpootian Homer.
The fullest account of Chund that, has appeared in English is in Colonel Tod's ' Translation of a Sanecrit Inscription relative to the last Hindu King of Delhi,' in the first volume of the ' Transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society,' London, 1827. A few additional par ticulars may be gleaned in the colonel's 'Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan' (London, 1829-32). Several translated extracts from the poem are given iu the article in the ' Transactions,' which are all of an animated and chivalrous cast, and the spirit of which is compared by the colonel to that, of the ancient Scandinavian poetry.