India as Known to Panini: A Study of the Cultural Material in the Ashtadhyayi c6.83

c6.83

A critical reconstruction of the *Gaṇa-pāṭha* is an essential part of the Pāṇinian textual problem. The *Kāśikā* has preserved lists of words belonging to each *gaṇa*. The evidence of the *Chāndra-vṛitti* also, shows that the *Kāśikā* was following a previous tradition. Kātyāyana and Patañjali were also at pains to conserve the purity of the *Gaṇa-pāṭha*. In many cases they have critically examined the inclusion of certain words in a particular *gaṇa*, e.g. *ulūka* and *Kshudraka-Mālava* in *Khaṇḍikādi* (IV.2.45); *nṛiṇamana* in *Kshubhnādi* (VIII.4.39); *Śākalya* in *Lohitādi* (IV.1.18, on which there is a long discussion); *takshan* in *Śivādi* (II.262; Kātyāyana has three *vārttikas* to discuss the reading in the group); *Garga-Bhārgavikā* in *Gopavanādi* (II.4.67; I.492); and *Atharvan* and *Ātharvaṇa* in the *Vasantādi* group (*Bhāshya* II.320, *cf.* Patañjali's remark that the words are read four times in the *Ashṭādhyāyī*).