Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v1.c11.29

v1.c11.29

At one time it was believed², on the indication given by the *Jayamangalā* on Bhaṭṭi, that the alaṃkāra-chapters in that *kāvya*, especially canto x, was meant to illustrate the rhetorical teachings of Bhāmaha in particular; but the date now assigned to Bhāmaha will readjust his relation to Bhaṭṭi in a new light. Bhaṭṭi tells us in xxii 35 that he composed his poem in Valabhī ruled over by Śrīdharasena.³ It appears that no less than four Śrīdharasenas ruled at Valabhī roughly between 550 and 650 A.D., of whom the last flourished, as his latest grant shows, in 651 A. D. Bhaṭṭi, therefore, at the latest, lived in the first half of the 7th century; and if, as his editor concludes,¹ he may be assigned to the end of the 6th and the beginning of the 7th century, he was certainly older than Bhāmaha by almost a century. Bhāmaha probably knew his work and therefore remarked, while dismissing verbal juggleries like *prahelikā* (ii 20):