A History of Sanskrit Literature c7.s4.16

c7.s4.16

It is probable enough that literature of a secular character was composed in these Old Prākrits until the second century A. D., but about that date we have clear evidence of the fundamental changes which mark what may be called the Middle Prākrit of the grammarians and of most of the extant literature. This consists in the softening or disappearance of intervocalic consonants, carried to the furthest in Māhārāṣṭrī in the dominions of the Çātavāhanas of the south-west, but noteworthy also in the other Prākrits recognized by the grammarians, Māgadhī, and Çaurasenī. We see in the dramas of Bhāsa, as compared with those of Açvaghoṣa on the one hand and of Kālidāsa on the other, clear evidence of transition, the omission of intervocalic consonants, the softening of surds to sonants, the reduction of aspirates to *h*, the change of *y* into *j*, the substitution of *ṇ* for *n*, the simplification of double consonants with compensatory lengthening. The evidence of inscriptions supports the view which assigns the loss of intervocalic consonants to the second century A. D.,¹ in which century Māhārāṣṭrī lyric began its successful career, made known to us in the anthology of Hāla. Once stereotyped by the grammarians at an uncertain date, the Prākrits rapidly lost in importance as they became more and more divorced from current speech, while they did not possess the traditional sanctity of Sanskrit or its clarity of structure and beauty of form.