ANDHRA UNIVERSITY PREFACE TO THE ANDHRA VIJNANAM OR THE TELUGU ENCYCLOPAEDIA BY Sri Ijjitasar Kandukuri Balasuryaprasada Rao Bahadur OF DEVIDI. Sri Ijjitasar Kandukuri Balasuryaprasada Rao Bahadur, the author of this Telugu Encyclopaedia, which I have the proud privilege to introduce to the public, is one of the most remarkable personalities in the Telugu country. He is a member of one of our old and aristocratic families. His fore-fathers in days gone by occupied no less a position than the Ministership of the then Nizams of Hyderabad. The documentary history of the family goes back to 1803 and beyond. But ancientry is not always the most convincing title for consideration. Personal worth is and ought to be the determining factor. And indeed one may remember in this connection the proud boast of Disraeli that he would rather be an ancestor than a descendant! Sri Balasuryaprasada Rao Bahadur is not merely a Zamindar, which quite a number are, but a scholar of encyclopaediac range and extraordinary thoroughness and a writer of high standing in Telugu. It would be noted that I have already described him as the author of this Encyclopaedia. Usually Encyclopaedias are compiled. In this particular instance, it is almost wholly written by our talented Zamindar an almost superhuman achievement. To the scholarship obtained by study of books, he has added the grander equipment of wide travel and varied intercourse with people. And even in his travels the scholar predominated over the tourist and he concentrated his atten- tion on the great countries of ancient civilisations, Egypt, Italy, Greece, Arábia and Palestine, the historic watersheds from which cultures have taken their origin and flowed quenching the spiritual and material thirst of humanity in such gracious measure. Before I say a word or two about this Encyclopaedia in Telugu or the Andhra Vijnanam, as he has styled it, I shall refer to his earlier Works, of which the following are noteworthy:- (1) Seemanthani Parinayamu, a Prabhanda in which the Somavara Vrata Mahatyam is expounded. (2) Veedhi Natakamu, a poetical work after the manner of the great poet, Sreenatha.
