The Sanskrit Drama in its Origin, Development, Theory & Practice c7.s3.39

c7.s3.39

The evidence is conclusive on the close connexion of religion and the drama, and it strongly suggests that it was from religion that the decisive impulse to dramatic creation was given. The importance of the epic is doubtless enormous, but the mere recitation of the epics, however closely it might approach to the drama, does not overstep the bounds. The element which fails to be added is that of the dramatic contest, the Agon of the Greek drama. That this was supplied by the development of such primitive vegetation rituals as that of the Mahāvrata, until they assumed the concrete and human form of the Kṛṣṇa and Kaṃsa legend would be a conjecture worth consideration, but without possibility of proof if we had not the notice of the *Mahābhāṣya* which expressly shows that the story of Kṛṣṇa and Kaṃsa could both be represented by Granthikas, who coloured their faces and expressed vividly the emotions of those whom they represented, but also, in dumb show seemingly, by Ṣaubhikas. If there did not exist an Indian drama proper, in which these sides were combined when Patañjali wrote, it is fair to say that it would be surprising if it did not develop shortly afterwards, and we have perfectly certain proof that the Naṭas of Patañjali were much more than dancers or acrobats; they sang and recited. The balance of probability, therefore, is that the Sanskrit drama came into being shortly after, if not before, the middle of the second century B.C., and that it was evoked by the combination of epic recitations with the dramatic moment of the Kṛṣṇa legend, in which a young god strives against and overcomes enemies.