ABSTRACT
The folk literature contains abundant evidence about Basava's efforts to create a new society and a new religious ideology through the Jangama order. For instance, one source refers to his enlisting the support of ninety-six thousand Jangamas in his cause. Basava's life was inextricably intertwined with the lives of fellow saranas of his time. The folk poets state repeatedly that Basava and his colleagues produced the vacana lore in order to propagate their socio-religious ideas and ideals. From the perspective of a student of Basava's life, thought and times, it is unfortunate that it is impossible to get even a single inscription referring to him between the years 1105 and 1167. The vacanas are short prose lyrics that dominated medieval Kannada literature which Basava and his co-workers either wrote down or recited. Though the vacanas yield a limited quantity of information about Basava's life, whose historical authenticity cannot be doubted, their relevance is specifically significant.
