The period of the Maratha Rennaisance during which great poets and saints of Maharashtra flourished extends from the thirteenth to the seventeenth centuries. This literary revival found its impulse in a religious awakening. It is indeed appropriate to call them psalmists because certainly their most popular work consisted of short lyrical utterances called abhangas which usually express religious longing or describe religious experiences. This collection contains translations of one hundred and eight poems by some of the chief Vaisnavite poets of this period. Some of the poems have a place in the regular worship of the devotees as repeated daily by the Varkaris or sung in their bhajans. The saint poets whose hymns have been included are Jnaneswar Mukta Bai Namdev Tukaram and Ekanath. The message of these poets was opposed to a gross idolatory. Though they were worshippers of Vithoba they distinguished between their attitude to this god and that of the superstitious multitude. About the Author Nicol Macnicol (1870-1952) was educated at the University of Glasgow. He then studied at the United Free Church Theological College before being ordained as a missionary to India in 1895.
