Panchasiddhantika
Panchasiddhantika — what it is, what it added, and what we retired from it.
Panchasiddhantika — Varahamihira, translated by T. S. Kuppanna Sastry (crit. ed. K. V. Sarma).
Edition consulted: Adyar 1993, critical edition with introduction and appendices.
What kind of text this is
Best-edited text in the corpus alongside Pingree’s Yavanajataka. Editors document two unwarranted emendations by earlier editors that created a century-old false claim.
What it contributed
claim-from-editorial-emendation — novel. Editors show the ‘Varahamihira ranked Surya Siddhanta most accurate’ claim rests on two unwarranted emendations.
A fourth mechanism by which false claims establish themselves - textual corruption propagated by citation.
compare-on-the-checkable-quantity — novel. Schools compared on tithi because it matters, is frame-independent, and is checkable by eclipses and heliacal rising.
Genuine 6th-century empirical method, and the standard the modern product should be held to.
western-named-siddhantas — restatement. Varahamihira names Paulisa and Romaka among the five in his own verse (PS 1.2).
Confirms from the 6th-century author himself, not a later list.
Reading the text yourself
We quote and cite; we do not republish. Most translations in this corpus are in copyright, and the public-domain ones are better served by the Internet Archive than by a copy here. Citations give chapter and verse so any claim can be checked against your own edition.