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Social Life in Ancient India: Studies in Vatsyayana's Kamasutra c5.s1: Vātsyāyana's Reference to Earlier Works on the Science of Love

Social Life in Ancient India: Studies in Vātsyāyana's Kāmasūtra c5.s1

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Vātsyāyana's Reference to Earlier Works on the Science of Love

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In speaking of the origin of the *Kāmaśāstra*, Vātsyāyana says at the beginning of his work¹ that at first, Prajāpati, the ‘Lord of Beings,’ for the welfare and preservation of his progeny composed a huge encyclopædia in a hundred thousand chapters dealing with the three objects of human life, *viz.*, *Dharma*, *Artha* and *Kāma*²; the first two of these subjects were next taken up by Manu and Bṛhaspati respectively and Nandī the attendant of Mahādeva, took up the third which he dealt with in a thousand chapters. This last work was condensed into five hundred chapters by Śvetaketu, the son of Uddālaka. The work of Śvetaketu was further abridged into a hundred and fifty chapters and divided into seven sections by Bābhravya, a native of the Pañcāla country. Next, Dattaka, at the request of the

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¹ *Vide* Chapter I of the *Kāmasūtra*, pp. 4-7 of the Benares edition. The quotations from the *Kāmasūtra* have been made throughout from the Benares edition, edited by Pandit Dāmodarlāl Gosvāmī and published in the *Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series* and the references are to the pages of this edition. The Sanskrit text edited by Mahāmahopādhyāya Pandit Durgāprasāda of Jaipur had been published earlier, but the Benares edition is more easily accessible to the public, the Jaipur edition being meant for private circulation alone. There is also a Bengali edition of the text and the commentary with a Bengali translation, published by Babu Maheś Chandra Pal of Calcutta. There is some difference in the arrangement of the chapters; otherwise the readings are much the same with only occasional variations.

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² This agrees with what is said in the *Mahābhārata*, *Śantiparva*, Ch 59, with regard to the origin of the sciences. Here we are told that at the request of the gods who were filled with anxiety at the entire absence of discipline among mankind, Prajāpati Brahmā produced from his own intelligence a hundred thousand chapters in which were delineated *Dharma*—the science of religion and duty, *Artha*—the science of politics and economics and *Kāma*—the science of love.—

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ततोऽध्यायसहस्राणां शतचक्रे स्वबुद्धिजाम् ।
यत्र धर्मस्तथैवार्थः कामश्चैवमिवर्णितः ॥२६॥

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But there is no agreement as regards the subsequent development except that in the *Mahābhārata* also Bṛhaspati is one of the authors of Daṇḍanīti or Arthaśāstra.

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courtesans of Pāṭaliputra, wrote a separate treatise dealing with the *Vaiśika* section of Bābhravya. His example was followed by six other writers—Cārāyaṇa, Suvarṇanābha, Ghoṭakamukha, Gonardīya, Goṇikāputra and Kucumāra, each of whom took up a section of Bābhravya and wrote a monograph on it. As the science treated in this fragmentary fashion by numerous writers was about to be mangled and spoiled and as the work of Bābhravya, being huge in bulk, was difficult to be mastered, Vātsyāyana proposes to give an epitome of the whole subject in a single work of moderate dimensions. Towards the end of the Kāmasūtra, again, Vātsyāyana says that having mastered the significance of the *sūtras* of Bābhravya (from his teachers, as one would do in the case of a sacred text or *āgama*) and having pondered over them in his mind, he composed the Kāmasūtra in the approved method.¹ He thus admits that the great work of Bābhravya formed the groundwork of his own book as is also quite evident from the frequent references that he makes to it in every part of his Kāmasūtra : one out of his seven sections, the *Sāmprayogika*, covering about a fourth part of the whole work, is entirely taken from Bābhravya, as he says at the end of that section.² There can, therefore, be no doubt that Vātsyāyana had before him the great work of Bābhravya Pāñcāla. The commentator also quotes several verses stating the opinions of the followers of Bābhravya, and about a *sūtra* of Vātsyāyana he observes that it is a verse of

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¹ बाभ्रव्यांश्च सूत्रार्थान् आगमस्य विमृश्य च । वात्स्यायनश्चकारेदं कामसूत्रं यथाविधि ॥ *Kāmasūtra*, Benares edition, p. 381.

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² एवमेतां चतुःषष्टिं बाभ्रव्याः प्रकीर्तिताम् । Benares edition, page 182. Besides, at pp. 68 79, 94, 238, 273, 274, 296, 353, etc., the school of Bābhravya has been referred to.

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In speaking of the origin of the *Kāmaśāstra*, Vātsyāyana says at the beginning of his work¹ that at first, *Prajāpati*, the ‘Lord of Beings,’ for the welfare and preservation of his progeny composed a huge encyclopædia in a hundred thousand chapters dealing with the three objects of human life, viz., *Dharma*, *Artha* and *Kāma*²; the first two of these subjects were next taken up by *Manu* and *Bṛhaspati* respectively and *Nandī* the attendant of *Mahādeva*, took up the third which he dealt with in a thousand chapters. This last work was condensed into five hundred chapters by *Śvetaketu*, the son of *Uddālaka*. The work of *Śvetaketu* was further abridged into a hundred and fifty chapters and divided into seven sections by *Bābhravya*, a native of the *Pañcāla* country. Next, *Dattaka*, at the request of the

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¹ *Vide* Chapter I of the *Kāmasūtra*, pp. 4-7 of the Benares edition. The quotations from the *Kāmasūtra* have been made throughout from the Benares edition, edited by Pandit Dāmodarlāl Gosvāmī and published in the *Chowkhamba Sanskrit Series* and the references are to the pages of this edition. The Sanskrit text edited by Mahāmahopādhyāya Pandit Durgāprasāda of Jaipur had been published earlier, but the Benares edition is more easily accessible to the public, the Jaipur edition being meant for private circulation alone. There is also a Bengali edition of the text and the commentary with a Bengali translation, published by Babu Maheś Chandra Pal of Calcutta. There is some difference in the arrangement of the chapters ; otherwise the readings are much the same with only occasional variations.

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² This agrees with what is said in the *Mahābhārata*, *Śantiparva*, Ch 59, with regard to the origin of the sciences. Here we are told that at the request of the gods who were filled with anxiety at the entire absence of discipline among mankind, *Prajāpati* Brahma produced from his own intelligence a hundred thousand chapters in which were delineated *Dharma*—the science of religion and duty, *Artha*—the science of politics and economics and *Kāma*—the science of love.—

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ततोऽध्यायसहस्राणां शतञ्चक्रे स्वबुद्धिम् ।
यत्र धर्मस्तथैवार्थः कामश्चैवाभिवर्णितः ॥१२६॥

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But there is no agreement as regards the subsequent development except that in the *Mahābhārata* also Bṛhaspati is one of the authors of Daṇḍanīti or Arthaśāstra.

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courtesans of Pāṭaliputra, wrote a separate treatise dealing with the *Vaiśika* section of Bābhravya. His example was followed by six other writers—*Cārāyaṇa*, *Suvarṇanābha*, *Ghoṭakamukha*, *Gonardīya*, *Goṇikāputra* and *Kucumāra*, each of whom took up a section of Bābhravya and wrote a monograph on it. As the science treated in this fragmentary fashion by numerous writers was about to be mangled and spoiled and as the work of Bābhravya, being huge in bulk, was difficult to be mastered, Vātsyāyana proposes to give an epitome of the whole subject in a single work of moderate dimensions. Towards the end of the Kāmasūtra, again, Vātsyāyana says that having mastered the significance of the *sūtras* of Bābhravya (from his teachers, as one would do in the case of a sacred text or *āgama*) and having pondered over them in his mind, he composed the Kāmasūtra in the approved method.¹ He thus admits that the great work of Bābhravya formed the groundwork of his own book as is also quite evident from the frequent references that he makes to it in every part of his Kāmasūtra : one out of his seven sections, the *Sāmprayogika*, covering about a fourth part of the whole work, is entirely taken from Bābhravya, as he says at the end of that section. ² There can, therefore, be no doubt that Vātsyāyana had before him the great work of Bābhravya Pāñcāla. The commentator also quotes several verses stating the opinions of the followers of Bābhravya, and about a *sūtra* of Vātsyāyana he observes that it is a verse of

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² एवमेतां चतुःषष्टिं बाभ्रव्येण प्रकीर्तिताम् । Benares edition, page 182. Besides, at pp. 68, 79, 94, 238, 273, 274, 296, 353, etc. the school of Bābhravya has been referred to.

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बाभ्रवीयांश्च सूत्रार्थान् आगमथ्य विमृश्य च ।
वात्स्यायनश्चकारेदं कामसूत्रं यथाविधि ॥
*Kāmasūtra*, Benares edition, p. 381.

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Bābhravya;¹ he seems, therefore, to have access to some treatise specially belonging to Bābhravya’s school.

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¹ The Commentary (Ben. edn., p. 279) says, यथाहुर्बाभ्रव्याः— पुत्रिकां चित्ररूपाश्च पथवः शुकसारिकाः । सर्वेषां गूढभावानां दूतकर्माणि कुर्वत ॥ इति । Besides, the commentator quotes eight verses—Bābhravīyāḥ Ślokāḥ—at pp. 37-38. Moreover, he introduces the sūtra सुरतान्ते सुखं पुंसां, etc. (p. 81) with the remark आसुमेचार्यं बाभ्रव्यीतेन श्लोकेनाह ।

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It may be noted that Vātsyāyana speaks of having treated Bābhravya’s book like an āgama, a work of holy scripture, indicating that it was considerably ancient. A Bābhravya who is called Pāñcāla by Uvaṭa, the commentator, is mentioned in the Ṛk-prātiśākhya as the author of the Krama-pāṭha of the Ṛgveda and Professor Weber² holds that this Bābhravya Pāñcāla, and the Pāñcāla people through him, took a leading part in fixing and arranging the text of the Ṛgveda. The Mahābhārata also says that the author of the Kramapāṭha was a Pāñcāla of the Bābhravya gotra and that his proper name was Gālava.³ This connection of the Pāñcāla people with the Ṛgveda receives a confirmation from what Vātsyāyana tells us in connection with the sixty-four varieties of Samprayoga or connubial intercourse. He says that they belonged to the Pāñcāla country and were collectively called *Catuḥshaṣṭi*¹—"the sixty-four"—from analogy with the *Ṛgveda*. He avers that the *Ṛks* collected in ten *maṇḍalas* are called the *Catuḥshaṣṭi* (being divided into eight *Aṣṭakas* of eight chapters each) and the same principle holds in the case of the *Samprayogas* too (as they are divided into eight times eight varieties); and besides, because they are both connected with the Pañcāla country, therefore, the Bahvṛcas, the followers of the Ṛgveda, have out of respect given this appellation of *Catuḥshaṣṭi* to them.² It may be noted here that the followers of Bābhravya (Bābhravīyāḥ) are mentioned in the Mahābhāshya (on Pānini I. 1) but we cannot be certain whether a Vedic school or a Kāmaśāstra school is there meant. If Bābhravya, the author of the work on the *Kāmaśāstra*, is the same as the great author of the *Kramapāṭha*, then he has to be placed in a very early age indeed. But Bābhravya is merely a *gotra* or family name and it may be doubted whether the science of erotics could have been systematized so early; though it must be admitted that erotics and eugenics, the sciences that the Kāmasūtra embraces in its scope, had received particular attention from the *Ṛṣhis* at the time of composition of the hymns of the Atharvaveda, many of which deal with philtres and charms to secure love and drive away jealousy, with the means for obtaining good, healthy children and other allied matters.

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² History of Indian Literature, translated by J. Mann and T. Zachariæ. Popular Edition, pp. 10 and 34.

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³ Mahābhārata, Calcutta edition, Śāntiparva, ch. 342, vv. 102-104 and the Kumbakonam, South Indian Recension, ch. 352, verses 37-38. वामदेवहितार्थाय स मत्प्रसादान्महात्मना । पाञ्चालेन क्रमः प्राप्तस्तस्माद्भूतात् सनातनात् । बाभ्रव्यगोत्रः स बभौ प्रथमं क्रमपारगः ॥ नारायणाद्धरं लब्ध्वा प्राप योगमनुत्तमम् । क्रमं प्रणीय शिष्यान्वै प्रख्यायित्वा स गालवः ॥

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¹ पाञ्चालिकी चतुःषष्टिरप; Ben. ed., p. 40; संप्रयोगाश्च चतुःषष्टिरित्याचक्षते चतुःषष्टिरत्वात्; *ibid.* p. 92.

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² ऋचां दशतीनां च संज्ञितत्वाद्विहापि तदर्थसंबन्धात् पञ्चालसंबन्धाच्च बह्वृचाः पञ्चार्थ संज्ञां प्रवर्तित्त्येके ॥ अष्टानाष्टधा विकल्पभेदादष्टवष्टाचतुःषष्टिरिति बाभ्रवीयाः; *ibid.* pp. 93-94.

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The Pañcāla country where Bābhravya flourished appears to have been the part of India where the science of erotics was specially cultivated. We have seen how great was the debt of Vātsyāyana to Bābhravya Pañcāla, specially with regard to the section dealing with Samprayoga, the subject-matter proper of the Kāmasūtra. Some of the most revolting ceremonies in the Aśvamedha sacrifice seem to have originated in the Pañcāla country.¹ The Pañcāla people were evidently credited in ancient times with special knowledge in matters relating to the sexes, and one of them is said to have changed even the natural sex, as we see in the case of Śikhaṇḍin, the son of the Pañcāla king, Drupada.² Polyandry as we see it in the case of Draupadī Pañcālī, may be regarded as an ancient institution of the Pañcāla country and the Pāṇḍava brothers, belonging as they did, to the allied tribe of the Kurus, as we see from the common Vedic phrase Kuru-Pañcāla,³ were certainly familiar with it and could have no difficulty in acceding to it; in fact, the Kurus of Hastināpura and the reigning dynasties in North and South Pañcāla are said, in the Purāṇas, to belong to the same stock and to be descended from the same great ancestor Bharata.⁴ In this connection, a statement of Vātsyāyana is very significant. He says that according to the followers of Bābhravya, who belonged to Pañcāla, as we have seen, a woman’s chastity may not be respected when she is found to have intimacy with five lovers⁵ (in addition to her husband, explains the Commentary) showing that five was considered as the limit beyond which it was not proper for a woman to go; if she did so, she could be approached with impunity by any one. The Commentary explains that in the case of Draupadī this limit was not passed, as Yudhishṭhira and others were all her husbands.¹ The indulgence shown by the Pañcāla people to *five lovers*, appears to be significant. It is difficult to see in it a symbolic meaning as is done by Dahlmann.² It is worthy of remark in this connection that Āpastamba from whom, as we shall presently see, Vātsyāyana quotes several aphorisms, refers to the bestowal of a single woman in marriage to a whole family.³

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¹ See Weber, op. cit., pp. 114-115.

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² Mahābhārata, Udyoga Parva chh. 189-194.

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³ See Macdonell and Keith, Vedic Index, i, pp. 165-169

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⁴ F. E. Pargiter, North Pañcāla Dynasty, J. R. A. S. 1918, p. 238.

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⁵ दृष्टपञ्चपुरुषा नागम्या काचिदस्तीति बाभ्रवीयाः, Kāmasūtra, Ben. ed., p. 68.

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¹ स्वपतिव्यतिरेकेण दृष्टाः पञ्च पुरुषा पतित्वेन यथा सा स्वरिस्त्री कारणावशात् सर्व्व रेव गम्या । तथा च पञ्चातीता बन्धकीति पराशरः । द्रौपदी युधिष्ठिरादीनां स्वपतित्वाद-न्येषागम्या. कथमेका सत्यनेकपतिरिति चैतिहासिकाः प्रष्टव्याः ; *ibid*, p. 68.

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² *Das Mahābhārata als Epcs Und Rechtsbuch*, von J. Dahlmann, S. J., pp. 97-98.

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³ कुलाय हि स्त्री प्रदोयत इत्यपदिशन्ति, *Āp. Dharma Sūtra*, II. 27. 3. See also Winternitz, *Notes on the Mahābhārata*. J. R. A. S., 1897, p. 758.

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Of the predecessors of Bābhravya mentioned by Vātsyāyana, the earlier ones appear to be mythical, but Śvetaketu, the son of Uddālaka, is better known He is mentioned in the Mahābhārata as having established a fixity in sexual relations which before him were entirely free and promiscuous like those of the lower animals, the institution of marriage having not yet come into existence.⁴ This refers to a primitive stage of society, and it is hardly possible, I am afraid, that this Śvetaketu Auddālaki could have been the author of the work in five hundred chapters referred to by Vātsyāyana. However, in the Chāndogyopanishad, and in the Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa⁵ in the portion called the Bṛhadāraṇyakopanishad, we meet with a Śvetaketu who may be connected with the tradition of the authorship of a work relating to the Kāmaśāstra. Here we find three generations of Vedic teachers, Brāhmaṇas of Kurupañcāla—Aruṇa, his son Uddālaka Āruṇi, and his grandson, Śvetaketu Auddālaki Āruṇeya.¹ A story is told in almost the same words in both the Chāndogya as well as the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upanishads² how the young Śvetaketu, after finishing his education, went to the assembly (samiti or parishad) of the Pañcāla people and was there discomfited by some questions put to him by Pravāhaṇa Jaivali, a Kshattriya;

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he was mortified at thus being nonplussed by a mere Rājanya and complained to his father who also being unable to answer the questions, sought Pravāhaṇa Jaivali himself for being taught in the matters broached by him. Among the matters taught by this Kshattriya of Pañcāla we find a symbolic interpretation of the relations between the sexes.³ A few chapters later in the Bṛhadāraṇyakopanishad,⁴ we find the same thing related with further additions including rules for approaching a woman, for dealing with a lover of one's own wife and specially rules for obtaining good progeny, and Uddālaka Āruṇi is there referred to as one of the foremost teachers of this science⁵ which represents some of the earliest attempts made in India for the discovery of eugenic laws. These matters were afterwards more fully developed in the Gṛhyasūtras but the beginnings were made in the Upanishads, and, in fact, Āśvalāyana in his Gṛhyasūtra refers to the upanishad or the secret lore as the proper source in these things.⁶ It is significant that both Pravāhaṇa Jaivali and Uddālaka, of the Upanishad story, belonged to the Pañcāla country where, as we have seen before, the Kāmaśāstra was specially cultivated.

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From what we have said above, it is evident that Uddālaka considerably advanced the science the rudiments of which he had received from Pravāhaṇa Jaivali, and his son, Śvetaketu, must have carried it still farther as is evident from the body of tradition that has accumulated round his name as the first human founder of the Kāmaśāstra which appears to have been specially studied in his family. There can be no doubt that Śvetaketu and his father were historical personages and lived in a highly cultured age, an age of intense philosophical speculation, as we see from the many stories connected with them in the Brāhmaṇas and the Upanishads and it is not improbable that he had composed an Upanishad or secret work in which matters relating to marriage, love and the begetting of children were specially dealt with; at any rate, a body of eugenic rules of which a few fragments have been preserved in the Bṛhadāraṇyako-paniṣad, must have come down from him and his family.

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That Śvetaketu left behind him some such work may be gathered from the fact that a personal statement by him has been quoted by Āpastamba in his Dharmasūtra where Śvetaketu is represented as having said that even after his marriage he carried on Vedic studies at his teacher's house for two months every year and thus acquired a greater knowledge of the Śruti than before,¹ and we may note that this passage which seems to be a direct quotation from Śvetaketu, has not been traced as yet in any of the Vedic works where he is referred to. Āpastamba further states, in another chapter, that though Śvetaketu was a person belonging to a comparatively recent age, yet he had become a Ṛshi.¹ Coming back to Vātsyāyana we find that the opinions of Auddālaki are referred to by Vātsyāyana in three places² in his Kāmasūtra and in one of them he contrasts the opinions of Auddālaki and Bābhravya, thus proving the connection of Auddālaki with the Kāmaśāstra beyond any doubt. It does not, however, necessarily impiy that Vātsyāyana had access to Auddālaki's work in five hundred chapters, as in that case he would have made ampler use of it; certain opinions must have been current in Vātsyāyana's time among the teachers of the Kāmaśāstra (whom he frequently refers to as the Ācāryas), as having come down from the reputed human founder of the science; or, the legend of Auddālaki and his opinions might have been taken from the work of Bābhravya on whom Vātsyāyana mainly depends.

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⁴ *Mahābhārata*. Ādiparra, ch. 123. Calcutta Edn.; अनादृता हि सर्वेषां वर्णानां मङ्गना भुवि ॥ यथा गावः स्थितास्तात स्वे स्वे वर्णै तथा प्रजाः । ऋषिपुत्रोऽथ तं धर्मं श्वेतकेतुं चन्नमे ॥ चकार चैव मर्य्यादामिमां स्त्रीपुंसयोभुवि ।- मानुषेषु महाभागे न त्वन्येषु जन्तुषु ॥ See also Kumbakonam edn., ch. 128.

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⁵ *Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa*, x. 5. 1. 1. He is also referred to in two places in the *Taittiriya Saṃhitā*. vi. 1. 9. 2 and 4, 5. 1.

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¹ Chānd. Up.. V. 3. 1. ; VI. 8. 1. Śatap. Br. Mādhyandina Text, x. 3. 4. 1. xi. 4. 1. 1. ; xi. 6. 2. 1 ; xii. 2. 1. 9. etc.

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² Chānd. Up.. Adhyāya V. Khaṇḍas iii-x. specially Khaṇḍas viii and ix ; Bṛhad Up. VI. 2 1 ff.

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³ योवा वा अग्निर्गौतम तस्या उपस्थ एव समिद्धोमानि धूमो योनिरर्चिय्यदन्तः करोति तेऽङ्गारा अभिनन्दा विस्फुलिंगास्तस्मिन्ने तस्मिन्नग्नौ देवा रेतो जुहवति तस्या आहुत्यै पुरुषः संभवति स जीवति यावज्जीवत्यथ यदा म्रियते । Bṛh. Up. VI. 2 13.

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⁴ Bṛh. Up., VI. 4. 3. ff.

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⁵ एतद्वै तद्विद्वान् उद्दालक आरुणिराह ; Bṛh. Up.. VI. 4. 4.

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⁶ उपनिषदि गर्भसम्मनं पुंसवनमवलोभनं च ; Āśvalāyana, Gṛhyasūtra. I. 13 1.

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¹ निवेशे वृत्ते संवत्सरे संवत्सरे द्वौ द्वौ मासौ समाहित आचार्यकुले वसेद् भूयः श्रुतिमिच्छन्निति श्वेतकेतुः । एतेन ह्यहं योगेन भूयः पूर्वस्मात् कालाच्छ्रुतवानस्मि, Āpastamba Dh. Sūtras I. 1. 13, 19 and 20.

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¹ श्रुतर्षयस्तु भवन्ति केचित् कर्मफलशेषेण पुनः सम्भवे श्वेतकेतुः ; ibid I, 2, 5 and 6. See Buhler, S. B. E. II. pp. xxxviii and xlii.

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² क्यमेतदुपलभ्यते इति चेत् पुरुषो हि रतिमधिगम्य स्वेच्छया विरमति, नास्त्यव- मपेक्षते । नत्वेवं स्त्रीत्यौहालकिः ; Kāmasūtra. Ben. ed., p. 76 : नासंस्तुता दृष्टाकार्य्यो- र्दूत्यमस्तीत्यौहालकिः ; ibid. p. 273; इत्यौहालकेऽभ्यतोयोगाः ; ibid, p. 358. The commentator refers (ibid, pp. 74, 78) two of Vātsyāyana's sūtras to Auddālaki, evidently from the context.

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The monographs written by the successors of Bābhravya,—Dattaka and others—are quoted by Vātsyāyana in the respective chapters of his book. Dattaka's book on the courtesans appears to have been in use in the eighth century A.C. when Dāmodaragupta wrote his Kuṭṭanīmatam³ and it may have been availed of by the commentator who quotes a sūtra of Dattaka where Vātsyāyana has translated the substance of it.¹ Of the other writers, Gonardīya has been quoted by Mallinātha in his gloss on Kumārasambhava, VII, 95, and on Raghuvamśa, XIX, 29, 30.

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³ वात्सायनमयमबुधं वाहान् दूरेण दत्तकाचार्यान् । गणयति मन्मथतन्त्रे पशुतुल्यं राजपुत्रं च ।। वात्सायन-मदनोदय-दत्तक-विटपुत्र-राजपुत्रादौः । उल्लपितं यत्किञ्चित्तस्य हृदयदेशमध्यास्ते ।। —verses 77 and 122 in Kuṭṭanīmatam in Kāvyamālā. Gucchaka III.

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¹ “आगदसंपलवे विशिष्टगृह्यमिति” दत्तकसूत्रम्, अस्य स्पष्टार्थं सूत्रान्तरमाह - प्रतिशाखिकानामिति : *ibid*, p. 321.

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Rājaśekhara in his *Kāvyamīmāmsā*² refers to Suvarṇanābha as the author of a treatise on a branch of poetics, viz., *Rītinirṇaya* and speaks of Kucamāra as having dealt with the *Aupanishadika* section. The latter is evidently the same as Vātsyāyana’s Kucamāra, the author of a monograph on the *Aupanishadika* portion of the Kāmaśāstra, and most probably one and the same work has been referred to by the two authors, there being nothing extraordinary in the fact that the sections dealing with the secrets and mysteries (*upanishad*) of both poetics and erotics should coalesce.³ Kauṭilya in the *Arthaśāstra* has quoted⁴ *Dīrgha Cārāyaṇa* and *Ghoṭamukha* who, as Professor Jacobi holds,⁵ are probably the same persons as the Cārāyaṇa and Ghoṭamukha of Vātsyāyana; they would therefore have lived prior to the fourth century B. C. and Dattaka and Bābhravya who preceded them must be thrown back to a much earlier date. Dattaka, of course, could not have lived earlier than the fifth century B.C. when Pāṭaliputra became the capital of Magadha. Goṇikāputra is mentioned by Patañjali in the *Mahābhāshya* as a former grammarian⁶ and Professor Jacobi is inclined to believe that he is the same person as the Goṇikāputra of Vātsyāyana. But in his case, as also in that of Gonardīya, the identification is rather doubtful as grammar and erotics are not very allied subjects. The works of Bābhravya and Goṇiputraka, who must be the same as our Goṇikāputra, as well as that of Vātsyāyana, appear to have been used by Jyotirīśvara Ṭhakkura while composing his *Pañcasāyaka*,¹ a work on erotics which was written in Mithilā by the end of the thirteenth century, the author being considered to be the great-grand-father of the celebrated poet, Vidyāpati who flourished in the middle of the fourteenth century A.C.

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² *Kāvyamīmāmsā*, edited by C. D. Dalal and R. A. Shastry. Gaekwad’s Oriental Series, p. 1.—रीतिनिर्णयः सुवर्णनाभः, *** औपनिषदिकं कुचमार (समाम्नासीत् ) इति ।

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³ The *Kuchimāra-tantram* edited by Mathurāprasāda Dīkshita. Lahore, 1922, claims to give the substance of *Kucimāra’s Upanishad*. संयोगादिसंवादादुपपन्नञ्च तत्त्वतः । कुचिमारेण तपसा यत्कृतं क्रीडनं पुरा ।। तत् प्रवक्ष्यामि चित्तार्थं नानार्थपद-निश्चितम् । श्रयतां नामतश्चैव कुचोपनिषदं पुनः ।। Verses 2 and 3. p 1.

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⁴ ‘वृषमिति’ दीर्घश्चारायणः । ‘शीता शातीति’ घोटमुखः । *Arthaśāstra*, ed. R. Shama Sastri, 2nd edition. p. 253.

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⁵ *Sitzung. Königl. Preus. Akad. d. Wissenschaften*, 1911, pp. 959-963.

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⁶ अथैह कथं भवितव्यं नेताश्वस्य सुध्मित्याहोस्वित्नेताश्वस्य सुध्मस्येति । उभयथा गोणिकापुत्रः—*Mahābhāshya* on Pāṇini, I. 4. 51.

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¹ *Pañcasāyaka* edited by Sadānanda Śāstrī. Lahore, p. 2; see also R. Schmidt, *Beitrage zur Indischen Erotik*, p. 50.

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² Dr. Hoernle, *Comparative Grammar of the Gaudian Languages*, p. xxxv.

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