Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v2.c79.98

v2.c79.98

Even if they were the earliest formulators, neither Bhāmaha, nor Daṇḍin, nor the Dhvanikāra however, claims entire originality of having created the system which he individually represents. None of them can be taken as the absolute founders of the particular doctrines of *alaṃkāra*, *rīti* or *dhvani* with which they are respectively associated; and with them we do not start at the absolute beginnings of the discipline. Indebtedness of these writers to their predecessors in the line, acknowledged by themselves, has already been noted in the first volume of this work (pp. 49-50, 70-71, 115-116); but apart from such explicit admissions, one can easily argue that certain fundamental concepts and formulas (such as vakrokti, rīti, guṇa or alaṃkāra) appear in writers like Bhāmaha without a preliminary explanation, as things traditionally handed down or already too well known to require any detailed discussion. It is also unthinkable that these early writers could have, as they certainly do not claim to have, evolved by themselves the relatively developed form and treatment of the main topics of Poetics in the absence of earlier tentative works.