five hundred, broke with convention. They were written in vernacular Maithili as songs, not as formal poems in literary Sanskrit as was done before. Until Vidyapati, Maithili wasn't employed as a literary medium. He applied the tradition of Sanskrit love poetry to the "simple, musical, and direct" Maithili language. His inheritance from the Sanskrit tradition include its repertory of standard images to describe beauty ("eyes large and tender like a doe's") and standard settings to invoke certain moods and feelings (spring with its increasing heat as an analogy for rising passion). Vidyapati also drew from the beauty of his home in Madhubani ("forest of honey"), with its mango groves, rice fields, sugar cane, and lotus ponds. In the tradition of Jayadeva's Gita Govinda, Vidyapati's songs were simultaneously praises of love-making and praises of Krishna; praise of Krishna involved praise of love-making. The intensity and poetic virtuosity of the songs were integral to these songs' function as a way to directly worship god and earn spiritual merit. Vidyapati's continuation of Jayadeva's program in a different language earned him the title "the new Jayadeva". His work did differ from his predecessor's in two ways. His songs were independent from one another unlike the Gita Govinda, which comprises twelve cantos telling an overarching story of the couple's separation and reunion. While Jayadeva wrote from Krishna's perspective, Vidyapati preferred Radha's; "her career as a young girl, her slowly awakening youth, her physical charm, her shyness, doubts and hesitations, her naive innocence, her need for love, her surrender to rapture, her utter anguish when neglected – all of these are described from a woman's point of view and with matchless tenderness." These songs frequently mention the queens of king Sivasimha, an indicator that they were meant to be enjoyed by the court. At times, his poems identify Krishna with king Sivasimha and Radha with the king's chief queen, Lakhima Devi. They were sung by a court singer, Jayati, who sent the songs to music. They were learned by dancing girls and eventually spread out of the court. His love songs have been collected into the Padāvalī, probably not by Vidyapati himself. Devotional songs Though he wrote hundreds of love songs about the romance of Radha and Krishna, he was not a special devotee of Krishna or Vishnu. Instead, he lavished attention on Shiva and Durga but also wrote songs about Vishnu and Ganga. He is