The Early History of India, from 600 B.C. to the Muhammadan Conquest, including the Invasion of Alexander the Great c29.21

c29.21

Samudragupta's anxiety to provide for the remembrance of his deeds was not in vain. The record composed by his poet-laureate survives to this day practically complete, and furnishes a detailed contemporary account of the events of the reign, probably superior to anything else of the kind in the multitude of Indian inscriptions. Although, unfortunately, the document is not dated, it may be assigned with approximate accuracy to the year A.D. 360, or a little later, and is thus, apart from its value as history, of great interest as an important Sanskrit composition, partly in verse and partly in prose, of ascertained age and origin.³ The value as dated literature of the great historical inscriptions, although emphasized by Bühler many years ago, is still, perhaps, not fully recognized by scholars who occupy themselves primarily with the books preserved in libraries.¹ But our concern at present in the elaborate composition of Harishena is with its contents as an historical document, rather than with its place in the evolution of Sanskrit, and the exposition of its importance as a linguistic and literary landmark must be left to specialists.