Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v2.c80.33

v2.c80.33

¹⁴ Vol. I pp. 60 and 67. We have tried to show elsewhere (*The Kathā and the Ākhyāyikā in Classical Sanskrit* in *BSOS*, vol. iii) that two or three well-defined stages are distinguishable in the development of these two species of the *kāvya* in Classical Sanskrit, the earliest being represented by the characteristics given by Bhāmaha and the latest by those given by Rudraṭa; and that while Bhāmaha cannot be taken as having accepted Bāṇa's two masterpieces as his prototype, Rudraṭa has only generalised their important features into universal definitions of the *kathā* and the *ākhyāyikā*. Lacôte in his *Essai sur Guṇāḍhya et la Bṛhatkathā* suggests (p.282) that Daṇḍin must have found that Guṇāḍhya did not observe the traditional distinction between the *kathā* and the *ākhyāyikā* (e. g. in the original *Bṛhatkathā*, on Lacôte's showing p. 220, there was a narration by Naravāhanadatta of his own victories, which is contrary to the rule laid down by Bhāmaha), and was therefore led to reject it altogether. Bhāmaha, no doubt, refers to a *kathā* in Apabhraṃśa in i 28 but it is not known whether he was aware of the existence of the *Bṛhatkathā*.