A History of Sanskrit Literature c3.58.3

c3.58.3

Nor does Meyer attempt systematically¹ to prove that *Manu* is later than the *Arthaçāstra*, though on his theory of dates that text is more than a hundred years at least posterior to the *Arthaçāstra*. He has been as unable as the Indian supporters of Cāṇakya’s² authorship to explain the silence which the *Arthaçāstra* observes regarding everything imperial and its absolute ignoring of the facts as to Pāṭaliputra. His further effort³ to prove the late date of the *Gautama Dharmaçāstra* is in itself less open to objection, but his contentions are largely inconclusive⁴ and do little more than prove, what has always been admitted, that our text of that Dharmaçāstra has been considerably worked over. The main principles of the development of the legal literature remain as they were formulated by Max Müller and Bühler, and further established by Oldenberg and Jolly. Indeed, Meyer’s own view at present⁵—his conclusions lack admittedly any great fixity—is that *Baudhāyana* and *Āpastamba* are pre-Buddhist, *Vāsiṣṭha* belongs to the fourth century B.C., and *Manu* may be ascribed rather nearer to 200 B.C. than to A.D. 200; there is, however, no tolerable proof of *Vāsiṣṭha’s* posteriority to *Āpastamba*, still less that *Āpastamba* is pre-Buddhist in date. Still less convincing again are Meyer’s efforts⁶ to assign *Nārada* to a period anterior to *Manu* and *Yājñavalkya*; if we take our present texts as the basis of argument, this is certainly out of the question;