Mahipati

Mahipati (1715 - 1790) was an 18th century Marathi language hagiographer who wrote biographies of prominent Hindu Vaishnava sants who had lived between the 13th and the 17th centuries in Maharashtra and other regions of India. Mahipati was born in a Marathi Deshastha Rigvedi Brahmin family of Shakala Shakha and Vasishta gotra to Dadopant Kamble who was the hereditary Kulkarni (record keeper) of Taharabad in present day Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra. Dadopant and his wife were devotees of Vithoba of Pandharpur. After his father's death, he inherited the job of Kulkarni for Taharabad. He also worked for a local Mughal landlord. After falling out with his landlord, Mahipati devoted the rest of his life to performing Kirtans on lives of saints, collecting information on these saints and writing their hagiographies.