The History of Indian Literature c9.74.2

c9.74.2

Nay, one even of the three dramas that are ascribed to Kálidása would seem, from its style, to belong to a different author from the other two.²¹¹ And this view is further favoured by the circumstance, that in the introduction to this play Dhávaka, Saumilla, and Kaviputra are named as the poet's predecessors; Dhávaka being the name of a poet who flourished contemporaneously with king Śrí-Harsha of Kashmír, that is, according to Wilson, towards the beginning of the twelfth century A.D.²¹² There may, it is true, have been more Dhávakas than one; another MS., moreover, reads Bhásaka;²¹³ and besides, these introductions are possibly, in part, later additions. In the case of the Mṛichhakaṭí at least, this would appear to be certain, as the poet's own death is there intimated.∗ This last-mentioned drama, the Mṛichhakaṭí—whose author, Śúdraka, is, according to Wilson, placed by tradition prior to Vikramáditya²¹⁴ (*i.e.*, the same Vikrama at whose court the 'nine gems' flourished?)—cannot in any case have been written before the second century A.D. For it makes use of the word *náṇaka* as the name of a coin;† and this term, according to Wilson (*Ariana Antiqua*, p. 364), is borrowed from the coins of Kanerki, a king who, by the evidence of these coins, is proved to have reigned until about the year 40 A.D. (Lassen, *I. AK.*, ii. 413).