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A History of Sanskrit Literature c24.s6: 6. The Hexameter and Indian Metre

A History of Sanskrit Literature c24.s6

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6. The Hexameter and Indian Metre

c24.s6.1

An interesting suggestion has been made by Jacobi¹ that the Dohā metre of Apabhrañça, with which may be compared the Dodhaka metre of Classical Sanskrit poetry, in so far as both are essentially originally dactylic in structure, is to be traced back to the Greek hexameter, the Dohā being the result of combining two hexameters into a stanza and then dividing it in the usual Indian manner into four lines. The Ābhīras, he contends, were situated in Gandhāra and the neighbourhood during the period of the influence of the Greco-Bactrian kings, and they must have eventually felt the need for a rendering into an Indian speech of the Homeric poems which, as Dio² tells us, the Greeks loved so dearly, and clung to even when they had lost much else of Hellenic character. The version of Homer thus made for the educated classes would probably be in the metre of the original, and thus the Dohā would grow up as the peculiar metre of the Ābhīras and would cling to Apabhraṅça poetry. A parallel may be seen in the great influence exerted on Bengal prose literature by the missionaries of Serampore.

c24.s6.2

¹ *Festschrift Wackernagel*, pp. 127 ff.

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² *Or.* liii. 6. On the amount of Greek known in India cf. Kennedy, JRAS. 1912, pp. 1012 ff.; 1913, pp. 122 ff.; 1917, pp. 228 ff.; Thomas, 1913, pp. 1014 f.

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Jacobi's theory rests naturally on the validity of the assertion of Dio that the Indians had a translation of Homer, which is repeated by Aelian, who asserts the same of the Persian kings, and who may have used the same source as Dio, although it is possible that he merely copies the latter. The general view¹ that Dio's reference is really to the *Mahābhārata* as the Indian equivalent of Homer is possible, but there is no doubt that it is not proved. Jacobi strengthens his case by pointing out that from the later sculpture of India we should never be able to demonstrate Hellenistic influence, were it not for the Gandhāran art, which being permanent has survived to testify to the strength of Greek art, and it might be added that the proof of the influence of Greek painting has probably been lost through the disappearance of the frescoes which once existed in abundance in Gandhāra.² But, granting that the tale of Dio may have foundation, it must be admitted that it does not seem possible to accept as even probable the origin suggested for the Dohā; the dactylic form is easy to explain independently. It must, however, be said that the effort of Leumann³ to reconstruct an Indo-European metre with a quantitative basis, of which the Dohā would be a descendant, is clearly a mere *tour de force*, resting on utterly inconclusive evidence.

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¹ Weber, IS. ii. 161 ff.

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² Cf. Foucher, *L'Art Gréco-Bouddhique du Gandhāra*, ii. 402 f.

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³ *Festschrift Wackernagel*, pp. 78 ff. and elsewhere. His work is vitiated by a complete failure to weigh evidence and inability to meet criticism. By his methods anything could be proved. Meillet and Weller (ZII. i. 115 ff.), whom he attacks, are far sounder.

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