Halāyudha (Sanskrit: हलायुध) wrote the , a commentary on Pingala's Chandaḥśāstra, was an Indian mathematician and poet who lived and worked in the 10th century. The Chandaḥśāstra by the Indian lyricist Piṅgala (3rd or 2nd century BC) somewhat cryptically describes a method of arranging two types of syllables to form metress of various lengths and counting them; as interpreted and elaborated by Halāyudha his "method of pyramidal expansion" (meru-prastāra) for counting metres is equivalent to Pascal's triangle.

Biography

Halayudha originally resided at the Rashtrakuta capital Manyakheta, now located in Karnataka, where he wrote under the patronage of emperor Krishna III. His Kavi-Rahasya eulogizes Krishna III. Later, he migrated to Ujjain in the Paramara kingdom. There, he composed Mṛta-Sañjīvanī in honour of the Paramara king Munja.

Works

Halayudha composed the following works:

• Kavi-Rahasya, a book on poetics

• Mṛta-Sañjīvanī, a commentary on Pingala's Chandaḥ-śāstra

• Abhidhana-ratna-mala, a lexicon

• Halāyudha Kośa, a dictionary

See also

• Indian mathematicians

References

Bibliography

• History of Rashtrakutas