Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages c8.s2.t2.18

c8.s2.t2.18

The second theory of hybridization places more emphasis on the status value of Sanskrit as the traditional language of the learned elite. According to this view, the early adoption of Sanskritic spellings and the ever-increasing Sanskritization of the epigraphic language, and eventually the adoption of classical Sanskrit itself, all reflect the irresistible influence of Sanskrit as the language of learning par excellence. In this connection it has been pointed out by several authors, from Sylvain Lévi⁴² to Damsteegt (EHS 207–9), that the Sanskritizing trend was accelerated by the influence of the Scythian and Kuṣāṇa rulers of northern and western India in the period concerned. As foreigners, they were evidently inclined to patronize the elite language in an effort to legitimize their rule and emphasize their own Indianization. Thus it is no accident that the Sanskritized hybrid came into extensive use at precisely the time and place that the Kuṣāṇas and Śaka Kṣatrapas were ruling; just as it is no coincidence that the first major literary Sanskrit inscription, Rudradāman’s Junāgaḍh rock inscription (see 3.3.3), was written on behalf of a Śaka king who, like his predecessors in Mathurā, was trying to appear “more Indian than the Indians.”