KATHA SARIT SAGARA

Samodeva Bhatta was a Kashmir Sanskrit poet approximately lived in 11 century. Certain facts of his life no longer exist and biography of his life is reconstructed today only by indirect sources. 

The Kathāsaritsāgara (another name “Ocean of the Streams of Stories”) is a famous 11th-century collection of Indian legends, fairy tales and folk tales as retold in Sanskrit by a Shaiva Brahmin named Somadeva. One intersting fact remaines that work was compiled for the entertainment of the queen Suryamati, wife of king Anantadeva of Kashmir. The work consists of 18 books where the principal tale is the narrative of the adventure of Naravahanadatta, son of the legendary king Udayana. A huge number of tales are built around this central story, making it the great existing collection of Indian tales.