Indian Epigraphy c8.s1.13

c8.s1.13

Essentially, the popularity of Sanskrit at the courts of the rulers either of foreign or indigenous extraction was due to the influence of grammarians. Classical Sanskrit was codified as a result of the efforts of a number of early grammarians, the most outstanding amongst them being Pāṇini (5th century B.C.) who was an inhabitant of Śālātūra in Gandhāra (i.e. the Rawalpindi-Peshawar region) in North-Western Bhāratavarṣa. Gradually Pāṇini's *Aṣṭādhyāyī* eclipsed all the other works of earlier authors. The well-known story⁴ of the association of the grammarian Śarvavarman, author of the *Kātantra* (*Kaumāra* or *Kālāpa*), with the court of king Śātavāhana (probably Simuka Śātavāhana who flourished in the second half of the 1st century B.C.) shows that indigenous Indian kings patronised Sanskrit grammarians. But the fact that the records of the kings of the Śātavāhana family are all in Prakrit indicates that the influence of the grammarians at the Indian courts was acting rather slowly. We have, however, some inscriptions in Sanskrit (slightly influenced by Prakrit) belonging to Indian rulers who flourished about the second half of the 1st century B.C., that is to say, some time before Śaka Soḍāsa, the Sanskrit records of whose age have been referred to above. One of the earliest such inscriptions from Western India is the Ghosundi-Hathibada (Chitorgadh District, Rajasthan) epigraph¹ (in duplicate) of king Gājāyana Sarvatāta while the earliest such record in East India is the Ayodhya (Fyzabad District, U. P.) inscription² of Dhanadeva, both of whom flourished in the said age. It is interesting to note that, whereas the grammarian Patañjali, author of the Mahābhāṣya on Pāṇini's grammar, is known to have taken part in one of the two Aśvamedhas celebrated by Puṣyamitra Śuṅga,³ the sixth ancestor of Dhanadeva, Sarvatāta was also the performer of an Aśvamedha sacrifice.