Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v1.c30.29

v1.c30.29

A tradition, chiefly obtaining in Bengal, as we find it in Baladeva Vidyābhūṣaṇa and Maheśvara Nyāyālaṃkāra, two very late Bengal commentators on the *Kāvya-prakāśa*¹, imputes the authorship of the *kārikās* (here called *sūtras*²) to Bharata and the prose-*vṛtti* to Mammaṭa, while Bharata himself is said to have drawn upon the *Agni-purāṇa*. While the last assertion about the *Agni-purāṇa* has no foundation in fact and is apparently prompted by the amiable but unhistorical imagination of late writers, which delights in exalting the antiquity of the *Purāṇas*, the suggestion of Bharata's authorship of the *kārikās* is too unauthentic and fanciful to be accepted. Mammaṭa's authorship of the *kārikās* has been declared by Hemacandra (Comm. p. 109 = *Kāv. prak.* v 1-2b) in the first quarter of the 12th century, as well as accepted by a succession of authors and (or Ruyyaka), but it only indicates the names of the authors of the original work (viz, Mammaṭa and Allaṭa) as well as the name of the author of the *Saṃketa* commentary comprised in the codex.