Laghu-mānasa (c. 932 CE) is a Sanskrit-language text on astronomy by the Indian astronomer Mañjula. It is a karana text containing simple rules for astronomical calculations, aimed at panchanga-makers. It remained highly popular across a vast region of present-day India for several years: the first pre-modern commentary on it was written in Kashmir in 958, and the last one was written in 1732 in Kerala. Date and authorship Laghu-mānasa is the only surviving work of Mañjula, whose geographic location is not known. Mañjula adopted 10 March 932 CE (Saturday noon of Chaitra 1, Shaka 854) as the epoch of calculation in text, which suggests that he started composing the text sometime in 932 CE. According to Surya-deva Yajva's commentary on the text, Mañjula studied several works on astronomy, and summarized them in an earlier work called Laghu-mānasa. He asked one of his pupils to take a copy of the work to the local king. The pupil did so, but took credit for writing the work. When Mañjula later visited the king, he asked the king to test him and the pupil by making them write another text on the same day, in the king's custody. Mañjula then wrote the present-day Laghu-mānasa, while the pupil was unable to write anything. The king banished the pupil, rewarded Mañjula, and popularized the latest Laghu-mānasa. Content Laghu-mānasa, also called Laghumanāsam, is a karana text, that is, a work containing short and simple rules for astronomical calculations aimed to help the panchanga-makers. It is the smallest karana text of classical Indian astronomy: the main text contains 60 anushtubh-metre verses that provide the rules, plus an additional 5 arya-metre verses that provide the epochal constants required for the calculations. According to commentator Surya-deva Yajva, Mañjula wrote the additional verses in the arya metre so as not to mix up the constants with the main text, and to remind the reader to revise the consonants every 100 years. The text provides much of the planetary model information known to the contemporary Indian astronomers, and appears to derive information from earlier sources including Aryabhata's various works (c. 500), Brahmagupta's Brahma-sphuta-siddhanta (c. 628 CE), and Lata-deva's Surya-siddhanta (6th century). Chapters Different commentators divide the text into chapters in different ways. The critical edition by K.S. Shukla divides the text into 9 chapters (Sanskrit names in IAST): Dhruvaka-nirūpaṇādhikāraḥ (Dhruvakas or constant parameters): Verses 1–2, 1'-5' Madhyagatyadhikāraḥ (Mean motion): Verses 3-10