India as Known to Panini: A Study of the Cultural Material in the Ashtadhyayi c6.28

c6.28

*ŚALĀTURA, THE BIRTH-PLACE OF PĀṆINI*—The term Śālātīrīya applied to Pāṇini preserves the tradition of his original home being at Śalātura. The antiquity of the place is carried back to the time of Pāṇini himself, who mentions Śalātura in a *sūtra* (IV.3.94) for the sake of the formation *Śālātīrīya* to denote a person whose ancestors were natives of that place (*abhijana*). Thus the town existed even before Pāṇini, and the place of his ancestors may be taken as the place of his own birth. Vardhamāna refers to Pāṇini as Śālātūrīya (*Gaṇaratnamahodadhi*, commentary on verse 2), and Bhāmaha and a Valabhī inscription also use this synonym for the grammarian (*Śālātūrīya-matam*, Bhāmaha; *Śālātūrīya-tantra*, Ins. of Śīlāditya VII of Valabhī, Fleet, *Corpus Inscript. Indi.* III, p. 175).