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Process and Models of Translation: Cases fromMedieval Kannada Literature 117meditations (tapa), having done the sanyasana (leavingthe mortal body) by prāyōpagamana, and havingdestroyed all the encrusted karma.The recitation and listening of the stories not only constitutea sacred ritualistic narration but also act as a kavacha, a (sacred)shield that protects the listeners against all types of evil and sin thatattempt to threaten the maintenance of the Jaina path. Themultilingual nature of the text and the renderings that take placefrom one language to another within the text itself provides themodel of translation and cultural transaction. I have called the modelvrata-kathā or nōmpi-kathā model, as not only Vaddārādhane andseveral Jaina texts use such a model but also its variants could befound in many Indian languages, both at popular and folk levels.Thus mantra, ritual and narration of the ritualistic story in thelanguage become the characteristic structure of such culturaltransactions. The interconnections among different linguistic codesand their functions can be diagrammatically visualized as shown inFigure 2.mantraPrakrit gāhesRitualSanskrit ślokas / Prakrit gāhes /commentariesNarrationKannada story / poems / kāvyasFigure 2: Schematic model of the translation process for the life-stories invrata-kathā or nōmpi-kathā.