Kuspuran

Kuspuran is a term that appears in a small number of Sanskrit bibliographies as the name of a purported Puranic work. The precise identity of Kuspuran is not established in modern scholarship, and there is no widely accepted manuscript or edition bearing this title.

The references to Kuspuran are fragmentary and inconsistent across catalogs. Some scholarly lists classify it among minor or dubious Puranic titles, while others omit it altogether. Because no manuscript is currently known, information about its date, authorship, or contents remains speculative and unverified.

Etymology and classification of the term are also uncertain. The form resembles the naming patterns of Purana titles, but there is no consensus on whether Kuspuran denotes a distinct text, a fragment of a larger work, or a misreading of another title. As a consequence, discussions of Kuspuran are largely limited to bibliographic notes rather than discussions of mythological material or doctrinal content.

Due to the lack of reliable manuscript evidence, most modern sources do not treat Kuspuran as a recoverable or verifiable text. It is therefore generally regarded as a bibliographic curiosity or an example of how obscure or disputed title names appear in historical catalogs of Sanskrit literature. In scholarly practice, Kuspuran is typically mentioned only to illustrate the challenges of cataloging Puranic literature.

See also: Puranas; Sanskrit literature; Manuscripts and bibliographies; dubious texts.