ORIENTAL SERIES.

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208 MEDINIMIMANSA-DARSANA.
MEDINI, MEDINI-KOSHA A well-known Sanskrit
vocabulary. There are printed editions.
MEGHA-DUTA. '
Cloud messenger.' A celebrated poem
by Kali-dasa, in which a banished Yaksha implores a cloud to
convey tidings of him to his wife. It has been translated into
English verse by Wilson, and there are versions in Erench and
German.
Johnson.
The text has been printed with a vocabulary by
MEGHA-NADA A son of Ravawa. See Indra-jit.
MEKALA Name of a mountain from which the Narrnada
river is said to rise, and from which it is called Mekala and
Mekala-kanya, 'daughter
of Mekala. 5
There was a people of
this name, who probably lived in the vicinity of this mountain.
Then1 kings were also called Mekalas, and there appears to have
been a city Mekala.
MENA, MENAKA. i, ID the Sag-veda, a daughter of
Ynshan-aswa. A Brahnma tells a strange story of Indra
having assumed the form of Mena and then fallen in love with
her. In the Purawas, wife of Himavat and mother of Uma and
Ganga, and of a son named Mainaka. 2. An Apsaras sent to
seduce the sage Yiswamitra from his devotions, and succeeding
in this object, she became the mother of the nymph $akuntala.
MEEU. A fabulous mountain in the navel or centre of the
earth, on which is situated Swarga, the heaven of Indra, containing
the cities of the gods and the habitations of celestial
spirits. The Olympus of the Hindus. Regarded as a terrestrial
it
object, would seem to be some mountain north of the Hima-
c
layas. It is also Su-meru, Hemadri, golden mountain '
;
sanu, 'jewel peak;' Kamkachala, 'lotus
1
mountain;
'
Amaradri and Deva-parvata,
Ratna-
and
mountain of the gods,'
MERU-SAYARJVAS. The ninth, tenth, eleventh, and
twelfth* Manus, said to be the "mind-engendered sons of a
daughter of Daksha by himself and the three gods Brahma,
Dharma, and Rudra, to whom he presented her on Mount
Meru." The signification of the appellation Meru is obvious ;
that of Savarwa or Savarm signifies that they were all of one
caste
(varna).
MlMANSA. A school of philosophy.
See Darsana.
MIMANSA-DARASANA A work on the Mimansa philo-
sophy.
Printed in the BiUiotheca