Studies in the History of Sanskrit Poetics v2.c81.s1.35

v2.c81.s1.35

"For the purpose of classifying the *mārgas*, some *alaṃkāras* have been already spoken of (by me in the previous chapter) ; now are shewn those *alaṃkāras* which are common (to both the *mārgas*)". Taruṇavācaspati rightly comments on this verse ¹² : "The *śleṣa* and the like are already spoken of as the ten *guṇas*. If it is objected, therefore, that they cannot also be called *alaṃkāras*, the reply is that the characteristic of an *alaṃkāra* consists in its capacity of embellishing, and that on account of this characteristic they (*guṇas*) are also *alaṃkāras*. The learned teachers have already said that the *guṇas* are indeed *alaṃkāras*. Hence the *alaṃkāras*, like the *śleṣa*, which are essentially *guṇas*, were mentioned before to indicate the difference between the (two) *mārgas*; but now are enumerated those *alaṃkāras* which are common to the two *mārgas*." Daṇḍin, it may be pointed out, uses the word *alaṃkriyā* in same general sense in iii 137 (or iv 14 in Madras ed.). From what is said above it follows that Daṇḍin does not make a fundamental theoretic distinction between the *guṇa* and the *alaṃkāra* as such (as later writers from Vāmana downwards do), but apparently regards them both essentially as *alaṃkāra*, taking the word in its wider sense of that which embellishes; the *guṇas* being of primary importance as essentials of a good style, and the *alaṃkāras* (i. e. poetic figures) of subsidiary value as constituents of styles, both good and bad. It is noteworthy that Daṇḍin never makes a confusion in the use of the two terms, but invariably applies the former term to denote (except in one case in ii 364) the literary excellences of diction (i 42, 76, 81, 100), and the latter to designate the poetic figures to which the name is traditionally restricted (ii 7, 116, 214, 220, 268, 300, 340, 359; iii 141, *alaṃkāratā* in ii 237, 287, 367). In this way he practically foreshadows, if he does not theoretically develop, the rigid differentiation of the *guṇa* and the *alaṃkāra* of the Riti school.