Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v1.c6.27

v1.c6.27

We are in a position, however, to infer that the substance of Bharata’s work is probably much older than that of Bhāmaha¹, who may be assigned to the last quarter of the 7th century. Bhāmaha, in his treatment of poetic figures (*kāvyālaṃkāras*), groups them in a curious but suggestive way, which probably indicates the different periods in the growth and multiplication of such figures². At the outset, he names and defines only five poetic figures (ii 4), recognised, as he says, by other writers, viz., *anuprāsa*, *yamaka*, *rūpaka*, *dīpaka* and *upamā*. This represents the first stage; but in course of time, six other figures appear to have been added, and Bhāmaha mentions and deals with them next in ii 66. Then he goes on to enumerate, two (or three, including *svabhāvókti*) more figures admitted by writers like Medhāvin (ii 88), who also appears to have dealt with *upamā* etc. (ii 40). Finally, Bhāmaha defines and illustrates a further long list of twenty-three more figures in a separate chapter (iii 1-4). The differentiation and multiplication of poetic figures with the progress of speculation is a familiar fact in Alaṃkāra literature, and the way in which Bhāmaha successively enumerates and groups these figures probably shows that to the original five mentioned by him at the outset, others were added in course of time as the study itself advanced. Now Bharata, in his treatment of *alaṃkāras*, names (xvi 41) only four such figures known to him, viz., *yamaka*, *rūpaka*, *dīpaka* and *upamā*. These four in reality correspond to the five mentioned by Bhāmaha; for *anuprāsa* may be taken as falling in the same class as *yamaka*, the one being *varṇábhyāsa* and the other *padábhyāsa*. At the same time the very fact *anuprāsa* is thus differentiated from *yamaka* may indicate further refinement in the analysis of these poetic figures. It is clear, therefore, that Bharata's work belonged to a period when the number of figures had not yet multiplied; and one, if not more, stages must have intervened between it and Bhāmaha's *Kāvyálaṃkāra* in which the number had already swelled into nearly forty in all.¹ To this intermediate stage belonged Madhāvin and others, whom Bhāmaha cites, and the loss of whose work makes it difficult for us to trace the development thus indicated by Bhāmaha.