A History of Sanskrit Literature c30.s2.1

c30.s2.1

This is the point of view from which we can best understand the origin of the *Mānava Dharmaçāstra* or *Manu Smṛti*, and the later Smṛtis. These works have the common characteristic that they claim to be generally applicable to all orthodox Hindus and cover the duties of all the castes; though they differ from the Dharmasūtras proper by the much greater development which they accord to the duties of the king and the distinctly more advanced treatment of what we style civil and criminal law. Their compilers, it is clear, drew largely on the floating mass of popular principles, and they adopted the verse form in which this was couched, while they were under the influence of the epic with its practical illustration of principles of polity and its easy versification which presented comparative simplicity of imitation. Even later law-books acknowledge beside the Çruti, holy writ, and the Smṛtis themselves the usage of experts (*çiṣṭācāra*) and the customs of places, castes, and families as sources of law, and these naturally were exploited by the makers of the Smṛtis. Further, in order to secure acceptance for their works, they were only too anxious to ascribe them divine provenance and to pass them off as the utterances of old sages.