A History of Sanskrit Literature c13.s2.5

c13.s2.5

As to the place of its origin, there is good reason for believing that the *Rāmāyaṇa* arose in Kosala, the country ruled by the race of Ikshvāku in Ayodhyā (Oudh). For we are told in the seventh book (canto 45) that the hermitage of Vālmīki lay on the south bank of the Ganges; the poet must further have been connected with the royal house of Ayodhyā, as the banished Sītā took refuge in his hermitage, where her twin sons were born, brought up, and later learnt the epic from his lips; and lastly, the statement is made in the first book (canto 5) that the *Rāmāyaṇa* arose in the family of the Ikshvākus. In Ayodhyā, then, there must have been current among the court bards (*sūta*) a number of epic tales narrating the fortunes of the Ikshvāku hero Rāma. Such legends, we may assume, Vālmīki worked up into a single homogeneous production, which, as the earliest epic of importance conforming to the rules of poetics, justly received the name of *ādi-kāvya*, or "first artificial poem," from its author's successors. This work was then learnt by professional rhapsodists (*kuçīlava*) and recited by them in public as they wandered about the country.